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A 3D virtual reality experience you can afford
Addtime: 2016.02.15        View:

By: Scott Simmie World Affairs, Published on Sun Feb 14

2016You’ve likely heard of the Oculus Rift by now – or at least seen a picture of the device.It’s the somewhat futuristic-looking headset that can provide you with a truly immersive 3D virtual reality experience.When you turn your head, look up or down, you see what’s in that virtual space. Lean or take a step forward – and you’ll start moving through that space, as the system tracks the location of the headset and readjusts the signal accordingly.With the right content, the 3D motion-tracking headset display makes it feel like you’re inside another world.Oculus is far from being the only VR headset out there, but it’s the one that seems set to make the biggest splash when it comes to market next month. It’s backed by the might of Facebook, which bought the company for $2 billion (U.S.) two years ago.I spent some time with the Oculus developer’s kit recently and was pretty much blown away. I experienced a CGI version of a Tuscan villa, moving outside and exploring the courtyard. I rode a virtual roller coaster — an experience so visceral that when I looked over the “edge” as the coaster began to crest the peak, my stomach felt like it was preparing for a backflip.I knew it was all an elaborate illusion — and seeing the pixels kept reminding me I was watching a screen — but it was real enough that my body instinctively braced for the drop.And that is a very different experience from watching even the best 3D television or movie.The potential — for everything from gaming to psychotherapy to virtual training — is huge. Even some major news organizations are starting to create content so that viewers can “experience” other locations and stories without leaving their armchair.But that full-blown Oculus experience comes at a price. You can pre-order the headset now for $599 (U.S.) with shipping at the end of March. To experience it at its best, you’ll require either a high-end PC or an “Oculus Ready” computer. That will set you back about $900 (U.S.), or roughly $6 million (Cdn.). The headset will come bundled with an Xbox One controller – and many software developers have Oculus-ready games well down the pipeline.But while Oculus has the greatest brand recognition – it’s not the only headset in town. Motion-sensing VR units on the way include the Sony Playstation VR, the HTC Vive Pre (both with TBA prices), the $349 US FOVE VR (which can track where your eyes are looking to simulate depth-of-field depending on what you’re focussing on).And now there's word Google is going to move beyond plain old Cardboard — its foldable VR viewer that sells for about $25.A recent report in the Financial Times says Google is developing its own VR headset, and also beefing up its Android OS to more fully exploit VR capabilities. The device, according to FT, will be along the lines of the Samsung Gear VR – meaning users will slide their smartphones into the unit. (That also means it will be more affordable than the Oculus Rift.)For developers, one of the big pre-market hurdles that had to be overcome was latency. The problem was getting the visual displays to refresh quickly enough to respond to your head movements as instantaneously as possible. If the image lagged a few too many microseconds, many users felt nauseous.It makes sense. In real life we are used to essentially zero lag. Our sighted perception moves at the speed of light and thought. Think how disconcerting it would be if, when you turned your head, it took everything just a shade longer to catch up.Well, that problem now appears to be solved. (And the next generation headsets will undoubtedly have even faster refresh rates, with higher resolution screens.)One headset, the $649 (U.S.) Avegant Glyph, doesn’t use traditional screens. Instead, according to its website, the unit employs “an array of two million mirrors to project images directly to your eyes. . . It’s more like seeing than watching. . .“Prepare,” it continues, “to be amazed.”There’s a growing consensus — regardless of device (and there some very inexpensive options available) — that VR will be the Next Big Thing.It’s not hype.If you’ve tried a set, you’ll likely agree.And if you haven’t, odds are it won’t be long before you too are immersed.

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