TrueScale was announced back on the 12th of December. Warsaw based studio Immersion partnered up with Vive Studio to create the interior design tool that can simultaneously create 2D floor plans, 3D mockups and full room-scale environments in VR. HTC Vive’s roomscale technology enables users the freedom to walk around and explore a design space whilst making changes in real time. VRFocus spoke to Piotr Baczyński, the CEO of Immersion about how they got involved in virtual reality (VR) and how they will be integrating augmented reality (AR) in the future to help build our future homes and buildings.
Warsaw based Immersion started working in VR back in late 2013. With a client base that were in real estate, they decided to create applications for real estate investment. By creating mock-up office buildings and with the aid of VR, their clients around the world were able to not only see future buildings but also walk around in the space as well. As VR started to become more popular Immersion started to create other applications for museums, training and pharmaceutical companies.
He believes that Polish people are extremely fascinated with anything new, always feeling the need they have to catch up with both the West and East. Baczyński says, “I would say that Poland has one of the best most talented communities of developers… If you look at Polish real estate market, almost every single big real estate project has virtual reality application right now presenting it.”
He explains that TrueScale is especially useful for people who have no or limited spatial imagination. That is to say that TrueScale allows users to understand whether a room is too small, too big or whether they want smaller or larger offices. Baczyński says it’s not all about scale either. If you have a sample of flooring, tiles or wood that you have a sample of you are able to take them into TrueScale and visually see the material in your room and immediately see if it works or doesn’t. He says this process speeds up the whole procedure of designing and building.
If there is a company that wants to implement their objects, materials or items into TrueScale they can contact Immersion and get a custom-built application for use on the showroom or with their sales team in order to have this speedy process of design. Users will be able to select the items, flooring or wallpaper for example and put it inside a room to see whether they l like it. A shopping basket with a full pricing list will be available as well to allow users to choose how much square space of the material they need or can afford to put in the room. Baczyński says that TrueScale isn’t exactly a design tool more a communication tool between two people.
Immersion are now looking to take TrueScale on the next level. They want to also make it in AR. Immersion are currently creating five to six AR applications at the moment. With the potential of accessing so many smart phones that are AR capable all over the world, he believes there is a great opportunity for TrueScale having AR features: You would be able to project your mock-up 3D design onto the actual ground or floor or even see it appear on the actual location you want it built on. This would help people visualise the building through AR. Baczyński says that they believe the future will see the AR and VR mixing together into one technology, mostly due to both platforms using the gaming engines Unity and Unreal Engine.
VRFocus will keep you up to date on their latest VR and AR applications, in the meantime watch the video to have a visual understanding of what TrueScale is and what other applications they’ve made.
