Next pit stop for virtual reality?
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VIRTUAL REALITY has always been a subject of immense fascination for young and adults alike which has been further accentuated by Hollywood blockbusters ranging from the Tron, Brainstrom, Total Recall, The Matrix in the 80’s and 90’s to the recent ones such as Avatar, Inception and Tron Legacy. Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus Rift, a virtual reality headset maker, for a staggering $2 billion recently further emphasises the potential of virtual reality and its impact on our near future.
Oculus VR, the virtual reality headset maker which had made waves on account of being able to raise about $2 million funding via a Kickstarter campaign further went on to amass about $90 million for the development of the famed virtual reality headset which is expected to commercially launch the same in late 2014 or early 2015.
Virtual reality which is also termed as immersive multimedia, is a computer controlled and simulated environment that can mimic the physical presence in places in the real or imaginary worlds. While a majority of the virtual reality environments are based on visual effects displayed on screens or through custom- ized head mounted displays the others include effects such as sound and other sensory effects. Newer developments also include tactile information or force feedback and is typically useful in the medical domain and gaming applications.
The real-life applications and uses of virtual reality technology are immense. Virtual reality simulated environments are mimicked on the lines of real-life scenarios – typical examples being the famous Flight Simulator which is used to train fighter and commercial airline pilots as well as for guerilla warfare combat training. Other areas include museum and visitor center applications wherein pre-historic and historic reconstructions of the past are rendered, and also in architecture wherein virtual walkthroughs aid in understanding the site layouts and its environs easily. While the biggest consumer of VR is undoubtedly the gaming industry other non-gaming applications include telepresence, therapy to handle phobias and emergency trainings. Palmer Luckey, the founder of Oculus VR, who became famous for having the largest personal collection of head-mounted displays in the world had conceptualised the idea of creating a new headmounted display which would be operationally and technically sound yet easy on the pocket. Luckey believes that virtual reality headsets are set to re-baseline the limits of technological excellence. Oculus Rift, the upcoming virtual reality headset is expected to move the gamer to the realms of visualisations with myriad colours and near real life experiences!
Oculus VR, has launched DK2 for Pre-order, as the latest development kit for the Oculus Rift which allows developers to build games and experiences for the consumer. Some of the features of the DK2 comprises of accurate low latency positional tracking, low persistence display which helps reduce motion blur and sickness and the Oculus Software Development Kit (SDK) which provides out-of-the-box engine integrations and includes source code, documentation, and demo samples. The Oculus Rift and the Oculus SDK currently support Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.
Even though the issues with the use of headsets could be perceived nausea, dizziness and even moments of disorientation typically after prolonged use of the same, the gamers love to get their hands on the headsets.
Mark Zuckerberg apparently wishes to build the next-gen computing platform post the mobile era and be actively involved in the company’s mission to build a “knowledge economy”. Conceptually, Virtual reality can be integrated with a social network such as Facebook by leveraging communications posts from the site thereby tracking human behavioral patterns. With more and more time spent on virtual reality and more algorithms and techniques being developed around the same, the end impact on the humanity and economy are farreaching. Though the above sounds more visionary, strategic and far-fetched for now, one could argue that virtual reality can open up completely new dimensions to social networking.