Virtual Reality

[fuse]

If the price comes in higher than expected for PSVR2 I'm personally blaming QC for having posted that table and giving them ideas.

[QualityChimp]

They're always on here, getting ideas, the basts!

[Asura]

So as an addendum to all this discussion, I downloaded Immerse VR tonight on my Quest 2; it's a productivity app which functions a bit like Virtual Desktop, but it's intended specifically for work purposes. I'm posting from within that now.

It was a bit of faff at first but I'm now on my PC with three massive virtual monitors. I was also able to set up "portals" where it cuts through to the camera feed, so while I'm in a virtual environment, I can see the top of my desk, with my mouse, keyboard etc. It even allows you to place a "webcam" and on the camera feed, you appear as your avatar in a virtual space.

The concept is interesting and I'm going to give it a try this week. Clearly the Quest 2 is suboptimal for this, because the passthrough camera is monochrome and quite blurry, and the headset is heavier than the Quest Pro. The biggest issue I can see is that to have a usable monitor, I have to make it quite large (or text is too small), but that means the monitors to my left/right require a big turn of the head - but a higher-res display would fix this.

Anyway, I'm gonna give it a go and see how it progresses.

[Brad]

So as an addendum to all this discussion, I downloaded Immerse VR tonight on my Quest 2; it's a productivity app which functions a bit like Virtual Desktop, but it's intended specifically for work purposes. I'm posting from within that now.

It was a bit of faff at first but I'm now on my PC with three massive virtual monitors. I was also able to set up "portals" where it cuts through to the camera feed, so while I'm in a virtual environment, I can see the top of my desk, with my mouse, keyboard etc. It even allows you to place a "webcam" and on the camera feed, you appear as your avatar in a virtual space.

The concept is interesting and I'm going to give it a try this week. Clearly the Quest 2 is suboptimal for this, because the passthrough camera is monochrome and quite blurry, and the headset is heavier than the Quest Pro. The biggest issue I can see is that to have a usable monitor, I have to make it quite large (or text is too small), but that means the monitors to my left/right require a big turn of the head - but a higher-res display would fix this.

Anyway, I'm gonna give it a go and see how it progresses.

Following with interest.

[Dogg Thang]

Over the last year or so, I have been part of three virtual art galleries. One of those I organised myself, collecting art from some of the best pixel artists in the world (or at least my personal favourite pixel artists). I made the gallery in Spatial, based on a gallery space created by a New York artists, who was kind enough to let me use what he built. It could be viewed on browser but VR was what it was designed for and, honestly, it was amazing.

It was like being in the space with the art. The art was displayed huge - digital pixel art is so very rarely seen this way. Much of it was animated and it really looked stunning. And you could move around the space and the audio works just like 8t does in real life - you can hear people close to you. So we had the artists visit and talk to people who came to see the art.

We didn’t have a huge number of visitors but we ran it for a week and, at least for the events, we had quite a few people turn up to see, most using VR headsets. I loved it and it was a fantastic use case for VR. Also some of those artists sold their work as a result of that exhibition so it also made money.

Edit: the other part of this that I feel is relevant is when the artist who made the space first talked me through what this even was, because he was building it for his own exhibition when we first talked. We started on a zoom call and then he just asked if I had a headset so we could continue the meeting in the space itself. I had the Quest and just put it on and followed the link he sent me and we were in and he was showing me around in the virtual space. It wasn’t a faff. It wasn’t uncomfortable. It was very easy and a natural extension of the meeting we started and, in my view, you would have to actively be rejecting it to feel like it was any kind of big deal or barrier to do that.

[Asura]

That sounds cool @Dogg Thang.

The only thing putting me off a lot of this stuff is the association with Enn Eff Tees, which I'm opposed to - I tend not to support any business which goes with them. Recently I've softened up a bit because I've been told by friends in tech that a lot of these businesses are only featuring them in some capacity because investors demand it to get through the greenlight process (and they don't really use them), so I'm giving stuff a chance first. Immersed VR uses them, which I'm not happy about, but I thought I'd see how much of the business revolves around them before I dismiss the software.

EDIT: Removed a term in case it causes a flood of bots.

[MartyG]

Yeah, that sounds interesting.

When the pandemic started at my last company, I proposed getting headsets for meetings so we could do meetings in the virtual space. The Managing Director was up for it and would buy headsets for it. The only people that wanted to try it were myself and the director - he bought a headset and afterwards he decided it wasn't worthwhile as it was too much effort, that headset is now being used by his kids for gaming.

I do think there are environments where it can work well, like the one described above (I've even visited such things myself) - getting corporations to adopt VR headsets as a general way of working is something else entirely - especially at £1500 and especially with Meta driving it.

[Asura]

Two things worth knowing about the Quest Pro reveal.

Apparently Zuckerberg's 3D avatar with legs was using a mocap rig, not Meta's new AI-based leg prediction algorithm, because the algorithm isn't ready yet. So it was a bit of a porky pie.

Also, the headset was supposed to have a Kinect-style depth sensor, but this has been removed from the final version.

That last one is a real killer as it affects its ability as an AR device.

[wakka]

Over the last year or so, I have been part of three virtual art galleries. One of those I organised myself, collecting art from some of the best pixel artists in the world (or at least my personal favourite pixel artists). I made the gallery in Spatial, based on a gallery space created by a New York artists, who was kind enough to let me use what he built. It could be viewed on browser but VR was what it was designed for and, honestly, it was amazing.

It was like being in the space with the art. The art was displayed huge - digital pixel art is so very rarely seen this way. Much of it was animated and it really looked stunning. And you could move around the space and the audio works just like 8t does in real life - you can hear people close to you. So we had the artists visit and talk to people who came to see the art.

We didn’t have a huge number of visitors but we ran it for a week and, at least for the events, we had quite a few people turn up to see, most using VR headsets. I loved it and it was a fantastic use case for VR. Also some of those artists sold their work as a result of that exhibition so it also made money.

Edit: the other part of this that I feel is relevant is when the artist who made the space first talked me through what this even was, because he was building it for his own exhibition when we first talked. We started on a zoom call and then he just asked if I had a headset so we could continue the meeting in the space itself. I had the Quest and just put it on and followed the link he sent me and we were in and he was showing me around in the virtual space. It wasn’t a faff. It wasn’t uncomfortable. It was very easy and a natural extension of the meeting we started and, in my view, you would have to actively be rejecting it to feel like it was any kind of big deal or barrier to do that.

Fascinating, and, yeah, this is a good example of how I think VR could be integrated into our lives in the future. Traditional Zoom/FaceTime style videoconferencing will have its place, just as we still use the phone now in largely the same way Alexander Graham Bell designed it. But as convenience level and quality increases, and cost falls, it will begin to seem obviously better for some purposes to bring VR into the mix.

[QualityChimp]

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[MartyG]

Yup, that's why you got the drift - how could the PS Camera possibly have a wide enough lens?

[Asura]

Decided to pre-order the Oculus Touch Pro controllers; the ones for the Oculus Pro - they can be used with the Quest 2, too.

They have their own cameras, so don't have a tracking ring. That offers two advantages.

First, you can hold them close together without them clashing. That also helps with certain games like Bonelab which require you to prime weapons; there's a tendency for the controllers to collide when doing so.

Second, though, most importantly - the controllers track themselves and report their position to the headset, so they will track when over your shoulder or behind your head. This immediately improves many games, particularly ones involving golf swing motions, or archery games where there's a tendency for the Q2 controllers to lose tracking when you pull back the bowstring. Countless others too.

They're expensive, but it looks like they'll work with the Quest 3 (the expectation is Meta will split away the headset and controllers and support both the cheaper and more expensive options).

[MartyG]

I think at £300 I'll wait for the reviews - I won't be surprised if they're not the default controllers with Quest 3 as that's nearly doubling the price.

[Asura]

I think at £300 I'll wait for the reviews - I won't be surprised if they're not the default controllers with Quest 3 as that's nearly doubling the price.

True, but the suggestion is that the Quest 3 is likely to ship without any controllers, with the requirement that the user buys either the tracking ring set (cheaper) or the pro set (more expensive).

This would be a good idea too, because while I've managed to never break one, the controllers are reasonably fragile (based on the number I've seen cracked etc. online) and while you can buy individual replacements direct from Meta, the availability is a bit touch-and-go. Splitting them into their own product line would fix that.

[Brad]

The possibly only good thing about WMR headsets is that all WMR controllers work with any headset. They work badly across the board admittedly but they do work.