Atlanta Business Chronicle | Atlanta looks to become Virtual Reality hub Atlanta Business Chronicle ... of Trick 3D, whose tool Floorplan Revolution helps developers take more. Joann Vitelli. A group of companies, academic institutions and government agencies have united in an effort to make Atlanta the hub of the burgeoning virtual reality industry. |
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Atlanta looks to become Virtual Reality hub - Atlanta Business Chronicle
We're live at the Game Developers Conference all week, with news, interviews and livestreams direct from San Francisco.
The key to virtual reality succeeding commercially on a global scale may lie in the hands of a team of volunteers working to create a royalty-free standard.
But the clock is ticking.
Were trying to do this as fast as we can, said Nick Whiting, who is the chair on the working group trying to come up with a solution. VR headsets are already out there and have been out there for a year. We want to do something as soon as possible, this isnt a long-term project.
The Khronos VR initiative is the latest effort by the Khronos Group, an American nonprofit that focuses on creating open standards for technology. The group, which was founded in 2000 by a collection of powerful tech companies, previously helped to create or oversee a variety of royalty-free, open-standard application programming interfaces (APIs) such as OpenGL, Vulkan and WebGL.
The group held a gathering at the 2017 Game Developers Conference this week to discuss virtual reality and its OpenXR initiative, which aims to create open standards for VR, augmented reality and mixed reality.
A key issue, though, is that there are already multiple standards being used that are tied to developing for headsets from Sony, Microsoft, HTC and Valve, and Oculus.
Whiting said that the key is that all of the systems already require a relatively similar deep tech stack to work, and that the OpenXR working group hopes to create a royalty-free, open API that will be common to all the headsets.
A bunch of us on the software and hardware side realized there is a lot of common group and that people are reinventing the wheel, Whiting said. There is this gigantic web of dependencies. So we decided it would be a good idea to create a single API.
Those involved, like Oculus, Valve, Google, Nvidia, AMD, Unity, Epic and Samsung, agree that the API shouldnt be owned by a single company. Two notable companies not listed as members are Microsoft, which recently floated its own API, and Sony. Weve reached out to both for comment.
The group of those involved seem to realize that the market is so relatively small right now that they need to come together to ensure that it is as easy as possible for a developer to create VR experiences across all existing platforms.
The big concern we see at Epic is that the VR market is a little nascent, said Whiting, who is also the technical director of AR and VR at Epic Games. Its not necessarily large enough numbers to support a big game team.
Were hoping through standardization that might change.
The group announced the Khronos VR initiatives name last week, along with a call for standardization.
VR and AR have experienced a boom of interest recently, and with that, a flood of hardware and software companies have begun spinning up efforts in the field, Khronos said in a news release. While variety is great, the growing number of devices, each with their own incompatible APIs is increasing fragmentation.
The key issue now, Whiting said, is timing.
The group has to move fast, but before it can create the API, it needs to make sure everyone can agree on what common bits of the software should be included.
Once it rolls out, Whiting believes it will be a large component of virtual realitys commercial success.
Coming from Epic, the biggest thing I see is developers trying to decide which device or market they should target, he said. They have a game or an experience to make but dont know where to bring it.
Were trying to make the market more viable by combining all of these smaller markets.
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Virtual reality's success could ride on a new initiative discussed at GDC - Polygon
Andrew Sorensen , KUSA 7:31 AM. MST March 03, 2017
(Photo: Andrew Sorensen, KUSA)
The Boulder International Film Festival is back this weekend with a twist: they're going virtual.
The 13-year-old festival is hosting a virtual reality pavilion at Galvanize Boulder on Walnut Street. Organizers say they'll have five projects to show off on virtual reality headsets.
Three are actual narrative films.
BIFF founder Kathy Beeck says you're likely to see more VR at film festivals in the near future.
"I think it will play a bigger role as technology advances more and more and as people experience it more and more, she said. I think it's a great way to highlight some really cutting edge films and stories.
The free VR pavilion kicks off at 1 p.m. Friday.
They also have a workshop for people interested in learning how to make their own VR films on Saturday.
For more on the rest of the festival check out their website:https://biff1.com/
( 2017 KUSA)
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Could you watch a film in virtual reality? | 9news.com - 9NEWS.com
Forbes | A Hippie Explains Virtual Reality Video Games Forbes Much in the same way that the Nintendo Wii remotes brought people who don't normally game to the home console market, the latest installment of virtual reality is supposed to bring new users into their technological fold. When it does, a lot of less ... |
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Insightsis a new weekly series featuring entertainment industry veteran David Bloom. It represents an experiment of sorts in digital-age journalism and audience engagement with a focus on the intersection of entertainment and technology, an area that David has written about and thought about and been part of in various career incarnations for much of the past 25 years. David welcomes your thoughts, perspectives, calumnies, and kudos at [emailprotected], or on Twitter @DavidBloom.
In the year that Netflix, ESPN, and Amazon won their first Oscarsand a little-seen film about a gay African-American teenager (eventually) won Best Picture, the industry that runs movie theaters is busily trying to figure out how to remain relevant.
What the industry comes up with matters quite a lot. The National Association of Theater Owners (NATO) says there were nearly 41,000 movie screens in the U.S. and Canada in 2016, about double the total of 30 years earlier and the most ever. Thats a lot of real estate, and jobs, tied to a business that last year generated $11.3 billion in domestic box-office receipts.
In part, that still-hefty number is thanks to a 49% jump in average ticket prices since 2002, making up for a 16% decline in ticket sales. And most of the recent growth worldwide has been overseas, which now generates about three-fourths of film-industry revenue. Growth is particularly stout in China, where theaters are still being built at a brisk clip. And Chinese money, especially from Dalian Wanda, has been a major source of investment capital as several U.S. theater chains have been bought, consolidated and upgraded.
At the same time, however, the theater business is getting ever more complicated. More people, especially young ones, now entertain themselves with mobile phones, home theater systems, video game consoles, the Internet and more. They have more reasons than ever to skip a trip to the theater for entertainment.
The business has been further challenged by studio proposals to shrink the time between theatrical release and home-entertainment distribution on platforms such as DVD or iTunes. NATO and its members generally have fiercely opposed such proposals.
That was somewhat less the case last March, when former Napster founder and Facebook midwife Sean Parker announced a plan to launch his latest industry disrupter, called Screening Room. It would charge users $150 for a specialized box, which would allow users to pay another $50 to stream a movie at home on the same day it released in theaters. The price also included two tickets to watch the same movie in a theater. That latter move was a sop that reduced some exhibitor concerns about cannibalization of its only market.
A year later, however, Screening Room remains a cryptic one-page website listing three offices and an email address for inquiries. Meanwhile, lots of other options and alternatives have popped up, trying to change and improve the moviegoing experience.
One option is to improve the theater experience itself. Ive long been spoiled in Los Angeles by high-end speciality theaters operated by the Arclight, Laemmle, and Landmark chains. But now the big chains are getting wise too.
Over the past couple of years, Ive visited showcase theaters that feature cutting-edge projection and audio technologies from Dolby Atmos and Barco. These showcase facilities such as in Regals 800-seat palace in L.A. Live, the AMC theaters at Universal Studios and Burbank, and the redone but still classic TCL Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard also feature far more comfortable seats, cleaner aisles, better concessions and even alcohol and reserved seating. For lovers of the big popcorn movies that can fill these huge spaces, its a wonderful improvement.
Investing in a better product is usually a Very Good Idea, so Im glad to see the industry stepping up. And yet, those investments wont be enough to encourage droves of people to return. First of all, it will take lots of money and many years to bring these improvements to thousands of screens nationwide. Mostly, Im guessing a better experience will reduce the reasons people have to give up the movie-going experience entirely.
So, Ill be watching closely some of the initiatives in experiential entertainment that are coming to theaters from the virtual-reality world. Done right, these experiences could generate more money while powering new creative opportunities to pull audiences even further into fictional worlds they love.
IMAX is perhaps uniquely positioned to take advantage of this, because it already produces content to run on the special projectors and giant screens that it owns and operates with partners. Last month, in a big shift, it officially opened its first IMAX VR complex here in Los Angeles, with promises of many more to come.
Each of 14 IMAX VR pods offers a different experience, like one set on the Star Wars planet of Tattooine, or another in the shoot-em-up John Wickmovies. The IMAX pods use one of two makers headsets, sensory vests, controllers and headphones to almost completely immerse users in a different world.
I talked with Will Maurer, who heads the VR and visual-effects divisions at Legend 3D/VFX/VR, about what these kinds of VR experiences could become. He sketched a vision of VR pods replacing the videogame arcades found in many theaters. And unlike those arcade games, these VR experiences could be updated regularly to tie in with films also screening in that theater complex. Such tie-in experiences could be a lucrative source of additional revenue for theaters and studios.
Its the way to upsell people who are already there, Maurer said. If youre going to the theater to see a movie, you can pay the extra $5 for the VR experience. The aftermarket (in home entertainment) for that is pretty strong as well.
But Maurer also pointed out several obstacles that will slow mainstream adoption, especially for theaters wanting such experiences in their existing screening rooms instead of a lobby arcade.
One is the tether. Current high-end headsets have an H.R. Giger-esque swoop of cables attached at the back to a honkin powerful computer that drives a lot of polygons on your screen. That tether is vital, and vulnerable. Its just not going to work at scale in facilities with dozens of daily users stomping around.
Instead, technologies will need to evolve into something like what happens now with 3D, where lightweight, cheap glasses are handed out before the film and tossed in a collecting box afterward for cleaning and reuse.
Losing the tether also would enable more of what can only be described as laser tag on steroids, experiential entertainment centers where people can freely move within large physical spaces, navigating through a realistic virtual overlay. Imagine laser tag or paintball-like experiences within a virtual spaceship interior or some long-ago land. A version of this is starting to crop up in centers in the Midwest and in China. When this is more fully realized, well be one step closer to the Holodeck of Star Trek.
Another potential obstacle lies with creators, and the way stories have to be structured for mass entertainment.
Because dozens or hundreds might be watching at once, story structure needs to be less interactive than usual in VR, while allowing some of the exploration and narrative branching that make VR so compelling.
Such approaches are often used in video games, where complex narratives allow a choice of different story lines while still ultimately converging in one ending. Done right, Maurer said, that approach can increase the social and replayability aspects, as you and friends work through different storylines, then talk about and try each others path.
Beyond that, well need new kinds of content. Maurer envisions writers creating not just a script for a feature film but simultaneously structuring a related VR experience with interwoven story lines. To get the entire experience, you need to watch both. But you also need writers capable of writing for both platforms and connecting the story lines, on projects that already take years to realize.
Im still a skeptic about the future of the theater business amid all the technological shifts already coming. Yes, I know many who still rhapsodize about the joys of a communal entertainment experience.
But surviving and thriving may require a continued embrace of new technologies and new ways to tell stories, an approach that could give a century-old mass medium longer legs than any of us might guess.
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Insights: Can Movie Theaters Find a Place In the Virtual Reality Future? - Tubefilter
Nvidia at the Game Developers Conference this week announced a new frame capture analysis tool for virtual reality. Dubbed FCAT VR, the utility is designed to help VR developers, reviewers and enthusiasts analyze the quality and performance of a virtual reality experience.
Traditional benchmark utilities arent all that practical when it comes to virtual reality. Zvi Greenstein, general manager of Nvidias GeForce team who also leads business development for VR at the company, notes in a recent blog post that traditional measurement tools like FRAPS only measure whats happening on the desktop monitor instead of whats happening on the VR headset.
In other words, they focus squarely on frame rate and dont take other important metrics into account like latency, stutter and hitching all of which can have a big impact on the virtual reality experience. If stutter and latency fall below a certain threshold, for example, they can cause motion sickness not fun.
FCAT VR, which supports the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, is said to provide a comprehensive performance measurement for frame time and stutter on the headset without requiring special external capture equipment.
The tool captures four key performance metrics:
Nvidias new utility should be available to download by mid-March.
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Nvidia's new FCAT VR tool will help quantify virtual reality performance - TechSpot
Orlando Business Journal | Why SeaWorld, other theme parks are going all-in on virtual reality Orlando Business Journal Virtual reality is gaining in popularity as the technology becomes more accessible and accepted by consumers and theme parks are taking note. In Orlando, SeaWorld Entertainment Inc. (NYSE: SEAS) has hopped on board the virtual reality trend for ... |
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Why SeaWorld, other theme parks are going all-in on virtual reality - Orlando Business Journal
Chinese twins wear VR headsets as they ride in a roller coaster simulator at the Wantong VR Park on Nov. 27 in Beijing.
Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
This question originally appeared on Quora, the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus.
Answer by Kynan Eng, research group leader, neuroscience of VR and applications to rehabilitation:
I think that most of the first uses of augmented realityand virtual realityeye-tracking will be to improve general AR/VR headset comfort and usability. Why? As a direct input device, eye-tracking is actually fairly frustrating and useless. However, as a general contextual signal indicating possible user intent or attentional focus, it is quite useful. Many use cases for eye-tracking will work in the background, and will probably include the following:
Graphics rendering resource allocation: If a person is looking somewhere, more graphics rendering resources can be allocated in that general direction. This can provide better quality output for a given amount of rendering power.
Data prefetch: Some VR data operations require time to complete, e.g. looking up something in an online database. If a person glances in a particular direction, data fetching can begin in the background even before the person selects an item to interact with. This improves the perceived responsiveness of the VR environment, which can be especially useful e.g. over mobile data networks.
Multimodal smart 3-D object selection: In VR, pointing at a small object in a cluttered environment can be quite difficult. Eye-tracking can be used to help disambiguate the object that the user intends to select by combining the information with the controller input.
Automatic headset calibration: A headset that knows where the users eyes are can better adjust its own image output parameters for optimal user comfort.
Balance manipulation: The vestibulo-ocular reflex is a well-known automatic effect linking eye movements to changes in the vestibular system. Knowing eye movements as well as those of the headset (via accelerometers) allow deductions about the likely state of the users vestibular system, and thus enables systematic manipulations to heighten changes in balance or possibly to reduce the effects of motion sickness during VR use.
What all of these use cases have in common is that, when working well, you dont notice that they are doing anything. In fact, I would go as far as to guess that some of these eye tracking use cases are essential for enabling truly useable VR/AR for mass-market applications.
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Which New Areas of Virtual Reality Will Use Eye-Tracking? - Slate Magazine (blog)
By David Ingram | SAN FRANCISCO
SAN FRANCISCO Facebook Inc's virtual reality unit Oculus has cut $200 from the total price of its flagship hardware set, in a bid to expand the system's base of video game players, the company said on Wednesday.
The virtual reality headset Rift and the motion controllers Touch will together retail for $598, Jason Rubin, Oculus' vice president of content, said in a statement.
Facebook paid $2 billion for Oculus in 2014, believing it to be the next major computing platform. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg has said that Oculus would spend $500 million to fund virtual reality content development.
Oculus and other virtual reality makers are struggling to make their products competitive with other gaming systems that sell for much less.
Oculus believes the lower entry price will attract consumers to virtual reality for personal computers at a faster pace, Rubin said. "This price drop was as inevitable as it is beneficial. This is how the technology business works," he said.
A larger user base would lead to easier player matching, better communities and the ability to invest more in gaming titles, he said, calling those results "a virtuous cycle."
Rift used to retail for $599 on its own, while Touch sold for $199.
Rival virtual reality company Vive, a unit of HTC Corp, said it would not match Oculus on price and would not change its "strategy of delivering the best and most comprehensive VR product." Its system is listed at $799 on its website.
"We don't feel the need to cut the price of Vive, as we've had incredible success, and continue to see great momentum in market," Vive spokesman Patrick Seybold said in a statement.
Sony Corp joined the race for virtual reality dominance in October with a $399 headset, the PlayStation VR, which was the company's first major product launch since it emerged from years of restructuring.
(Reporting by David Ingram; Additional reporting by Laharee Chatterjee; Editing by Phil Berlowitz)
WASHINGTON A coalition of 53 companies on Thursday backed transgender rights at the U.S. Supreme Court, signing on to a brief supporting a Virginia student who is fighting to use the school bathroom that corresponds with his gender identity.
RIYADH Drivers from ride-hailing services Uber and Careem are barred from picking up passengers from Saudi Arabia's airports, Al Madina newspaper reported, quoting a spokesman from the kingdom's General Directorate of Traffic.
Elon Musk, an active Twitter user, has been Tesla's mouthpiece to the public, informing them about the electric car maker's upcoming products and plans.
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Facebook's Oculus cuts price of virtual reality set by $200 - Reuters
Graham Sack has never been the sort of guy content to do one thing. He was for many years an actor, on stage and in films. Hes a PhD candidate in comparative literature at Columbia. He recently sold a screenplay about a math genius who gamed the Texas lottery. Combining his interests in literature and movies, he had long dreamed of adapting something by the writer George Saunders, whose writing Sack fell in love with a decade ago when reading a dystopian Saunders story in The New Yorker.
With so many interests, Sack is the sort of person who wouldnt think twice about reinventing himself as a director of virtual reality films, which is what he decided to do a little over a year ago. In late 2015, he and his girlfriend saw someone in a New York caf fiddling around with a VR headset, which theyd never seen before. They approached the stranger, who it turned out was visiting New York from Austin, befriended him, and tried out the headset. Within a few months, Sack decided to fly down to Austin to visit his new friend and attempt to shoot something himself.
While in Austin, Sack was sitting in a caf paging through a local newsletter when he saw that George Saunders was scheduled to speak at Book People, a local bookstore. Sack checked the time: Saunderss talk was actually happening that very minute.
Lincoln in the Bardo VR experience
It all felt like kismet. Some of Sacks favorite Saunders stories had seemed to anticipate emerging virtual reality and augmented reality technologies. Sack wondered: had the author himself actually sampled these technologies? Sack rushed back to his Airbnb, grabbed the VR headset hed been playing with, and called an Uber to Book People.
By the time he arrived, Sack had missed the talk entirely, but fans were in line to meet Saunders and have their books signed. Sack filed into the rear of the line, his VR headset in tow.
Finally, it was Sacks turn to speak to Saunders. Sack introduced himself quickly, and asked: Might Saunders like to sample virtual reality?
In case you havent read George Saunders, know that his short stories are infused with techno-skepticism. Many of them present dystopian science fiction worlds where people are manipulated by, or manipulate each other with, various forms of digital machinery. So approaching the author to ask him to put on a scary VR headset was a big ask.
"I think he was curious, but very off-put at the same time," recalls Sack. Whats more, Sack was proposing that Saunders try VR for the first time in a public place (the managers of Book People were still milling about). When Saunders hesitated, Sack explained: "You are already doing virtual reality." The technology that Saunders portrayed in his stories was here. Wasnt it time he sampled it?
Saunders acquiesced. Soon, Sack was fumbling nervously to get the Samsung headset on his favorite living author. After a few false starts with the menu"super awkward," recalls Sackhe managed to boot up his favorite VR film, Chris Milks "Evolution of Verse," a poetic short whose highlight may be the moment a train charges at the camera before transforming into a flock of birds.
At last, the film was running. One of Americas foremost literary figures now stood with a headset strapped to his face in the back of an Austin bookstore beside the table where he had been signing books a few moments before. "Ah jeez . . ." Saunders said as the VR film progressed. "Oh boy, its coming right at me," he said, bumping into the table.
The film ended, and Sack helped Saunders take off the headset. Sack waited anxiously for Saunderss verdict.
"What else should I see?" asked the author.
Sack told Saunders he would be eager to collaborate sometime. They traded emails. Weeks went by. "It was basically radio silence for a month," recalls Sack.
Then, suddenly, Sack got an email from Penguin Random House. They said that Saunders had been thinking a lot about the VR, and invited Sack in for a talk.
Sack assumed hed have the chance to pitch a VR adaptation of a Saunders short story, so he spent weeks combing through every short story Saunders had written, jotting ideas of which ones might work in the medium. But when Sack got to his meeting at Penguin Random House, they sprung a surprising idea on him: Would Sack be interested in making a companion VR short for Saunderss forthcoming debut novel, Lincoln in the Bardo?
Lincoln in the Bardo
Now it was Sack who was slightly hesitant. Saunderss dystopian short fiction was a natural fit for VR, but Lincoln in the Bardo was a period piece (about, among other things, Abraham Lincolns mourning the death of his son, Willie). Was it even suited to a medium of the future like virtual reality?
Sack took the novel home and started reading it. And soon, he came to an early, major scene in the novel, where Lincoln cradles the dead body of his son, a sort of paternal Piet. "I read it, and the tears came, and I was like, I want to do this scene," says Sack. The scene was highly visual, rooted in one place, and had a theatrical qualityall elements VR excelled in handling, Sack had come to feel.
Sack agreed to do the film, entering into a production partnership with the New York Times. (Though the Times has been doing VR journalism for over a year, this is its first foray into scripted, fictional VR. Other production partners for the film are the New York VR firm Sensorium, and the San Francisco literary studio Plympton.) After navigating a complex, precedent-setting contract negotiationnever before has a novel launched with a VR tie-inSack worked on the film through the summer and fall. Finally, by November, Sack had a rough cut of the film to show Saunders.
They met in a New York hotel: only their second in-person encounter.
Again, Sack fumbled to put the headset on Saunders. And as Saunders watched the film, he scrutinized the authors every reaction. He was particularly nervous about what Saunders would think about the moment in the short film where Lincoln cradles Willies body. Would he find it moving, or maudlin?
Sack had by now tested the film on enough people that he knew exactly where they were in the film based on the most subtle movements of their faces. As Saunders approached the big moment with Willie, Sack braced himself.
Finally, the author spoke. "I'm fucking crying in here man," he said.
And indeed, when the film's last moments were over and Saunders removed the headset, his eyes were red. He said that watching Sacks film helped him relive the pathos he'd felt when originally composing the Lincoln-and-Willie Piet.
You can experience the scene now, too, in various forms. Lincoln in the Bardo itself went on sale last week, along with a companion audiobook (featuring performances from Nick Offerman and others). The VR companion piece can be found via the NYT VR app, or experienced less immersively on YouTube.
"Honestly, its the most fulfilling project Ive ever been involved in," says Sack now.
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The Strange Story Of When George Saunders First Met Virtual Reality - Co.Create
The startup virtual reality production and training company EON Sports VR announced Wednesday it has expanded its baseball category overseas to the Yokohama DeNA Baystars, a member of the Japanese Central League.
The organization will begin incorporating EON Sports interactive software and baseball virtual reality simulator into its training for this season. It is the first Japanese professional baseball team to leverage EON Sportstraining technology and also the companys first international sports client.
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EON Sports is excited to announce our partnership with the Baystars, Dan ODowd, theex-Colorado Rockies general manager and current EON Sports managing partner,said in a statement. They are joining the growing number of professional baseball teams that are using our technology to enhance and change the way players are prepared and developed within the game of baseball. They are one of the most respected franchises in all of baseball, and we are thrilled to work with them on this next generation of player development.
Added Baystars outfielder Takayuki Kajitani after utilizing the technology: I actually was able to experience the atmosphere in the iCube, standing in the batters box. I felt it was very realistic of what I would see in the game. Im going to take advantage of the iCube to experience the pitching of pitchers who Ive never played against, and will be able to experience it before an actual match.
Last summer, EON Sports VR started working with the Tampa Bay Rays, and other MLB teams use it as well.
EON Sports W.I.N. Series gives players the ability to experience the training system technology with headsets like the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift or smartphone-based displays.
Additionally, users can take advantage of the EON iCube, a multi-projector system that provides players an experience similar to that of facing an actual pitcher. Through data compiled via a ball tracking system, EON is able to reproduce not only the ball flight but the throwing motion as well. With now a dedicated training room that includes a full iCube, Baystars batters can select various kinds of pitches to generate a life-like experience.
Beyond baseball, where MLB clubs and their minor league affiliates have integrated the iCube, EON Sports VR has also partnered with college athletics programs like Penn State and the University of Miami (Fla.) to launch exclusive virtual reality channels, which provides fans with behind-the-scenes content, interviews and practice highlights.
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Some phobias, for instance, can be effectively treated by gradually exposing a patient to his or her worst fear, be it spiders, plane travel or small, enclosed spaces.
TeleSoftas, a Lithuanian firm that develops mobile apps, believes this exposure therapy can easily be achieved from the safety of a health professional's consulting room using the headsets.
"With virtual reality you can create audiovisual therapies in a safe environment for phobics," its CEO Algirdas Stonys told AFP at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the phone industry's largest annual trade fair.
So for instance, someone who is scared of speaking in public would find himself in front of a room full of people, virtually.
TeleSoftas has just received EU funding to finance the development of mental health apps for virtual reality headsets, in collaboration with academics.
Psious, a Spanish start-up, is also in a similar field.
Exposure therapies are designed to encourage the individual to enter feared situations, either in the real world or through imagined exercises.
"But we thought that in this digital age, there had to be something more," said CEO Xavier Palomer Ripoll.
Created three years ago because one of its founders was scared of flying, the firm develops apps for psychotherapists who can download them and use them on virtual reality headsets.
The doctor then choses an adequate environment.
For instance, once kitted out with the headset, a person with vertigo will find him- or herself in a lift going up or down a skyscraper.
Using a computer, the psychotherapist can propel the lift higher and higher, or make the floor transparent to increase the difficulty of the exercise.
They can also gauge how well the patient is doing by seeing for example if they are able to look down.
Psious raised close to a million euros ($1.1 million) in 2015, and provides the technology to some 600 doctors, mostly in Spain.
In parallel, it is currently going through nine clinical trials with universities to get long-term efficacy data.
TeleSoftas, meanwhile, hopes to eventually be able to offer virtual environments to treat obsessive-compulsive disorders, post-traumatic syndromes, alcoholism or smoking.
Several American start-ups are working on these kinds of applications as well.
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Virtual reality hopes to treat mental health problems - Times LIVE
UTSA students are traveling abroad without leaving the classroom. Charlie Cooper shows us how.
Charlie Cooper, KENS 6:54 AM. CST March 02, 2017
UTSA student uses virtual reality to travel the world.
SAN ANTONIO - Students at the University of Texas at San Antonio are getting an opportunity to travel abroad without ever leaving the classroom.
Professor Michael Rushforth teaches Spanish using virtual reality. This gives students an opportunity to travel to foreign lands right from their seats.
This technology gives me a pretty good idea about what the culture is like as well as the beauty of the language, John Pick, a sophomore at UTSA, said.
Its a class where having phones out is encouraged. Students download the Google Cardboard app, put on the virtual reality headgear and are instantly taken to another country.
For instance, we may be talking about the weather and how to express terms about the weather in Spanish and so we'll say what's the weather in Machu Picchu and we'll visit there, Rushforth said.
The 360-degree experience fully engages students for only a fraction of the cost required to actually travel abroad.
It can cost as little as three or four dollars, Rushforth said.
Rushford controls which country the class is placed in, but the students get to control where they look within the environment.
The other type can be more open ended where I tell the students to get on their phones, drop themselves down into a city and once they're in that environment they get to choose where they go, Rushforth said.
Regardless of where they venture, virtual reality in the classroom is taking learning to new places.
( 2017 KENS)
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UTSA students use virtual reality to learn Spanish - KHOU.com
New York Times | Virtual Reality New York Times A woman played a game with the PlayStation VR last year. Sony's internal goal was to sell one million of the headsets in its first six months, by mid-April. Credit Corinna Kern for The New York Times. Have you ever experience virtual reality? If so ... Sony's Virtual-Reality Headset Confronts Actual Reality of Modest Sales We just got the first real look into how well virtual reality is selling What You Should Know About Each Virtual Reality Headset |
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Romania-based ATi Studios, the creator of the Mondly language learning platform, has released a virtual reality app for language education.
The VR app uses Mondly's conversational voice chatbot, released by the company in August 2016, which has self-learning technology.
It combines voice chatbot technology with speech recognition in virtual reality to create a new way for users to learn a new language.
The Learn Languages VR by Mondly app allows people to experience lifelike conversations with virtual characters.
The company created the VR application based on what users need to effectively learn a new language: instant feedback and an "immersive, real-world experience to build their confidence."
The technology uses speech recognition that understands phrases and words in 28 different languages. It has learned millions of new phrases and responses since its release, due to its self-learning technology.
Its language-learning platform has been downloaded over 15 million times. The VR application intends to realize virtual reality's promise of immersive and automated educational experiences.
It gives instant feedback on pronunciation and suggestions to add to a learner's vocabulary, and it offers 'surprises' to turn learning a language into a fun experience.
The app aims to bridge the technologies behind chatbots, speech recognition, and VR with a new automatic voice detection system so that the speech interaction feels natural in a VR environment.
The system calibrates to the room's background noise and ignores unintentional sounds.
The first version of the app offers three scenes across 28 languages, such as a restaurant scenario where users can practice ordering food and drinks in a small bistro.
Other scenarios include the Eurotrain, where users can have a conversation and make new friends on a train in Europe, or they can check into a boutique hotel and secure a room with a view.
Alexandru Iliescu, the CEO and co-founder of ATi Studios, said: "Because VR is so immersive, we quickly realised that traditional speech interaction models that require a tap or a voice command to enable speech recognition would kill the flow of the experience."
He added: "So we developed our own automatic voice detection system. The result is amazing, the conversations with the virtual characters happen as naturally as real-life conversations - they just flow."
VIDEO: Jaguar unveils first electric vehicle using HTC Vive VR headsets
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Mondly launches virtual reality for learning languages, powered by chatbots - ZDNet
BARCELONA, SpainGoogle has ambitions plans to broaden its virtual reality operations this year, as the company pushes deeper into both hardware and headsets.
Its only been a few months since Google began selling its ViewVR headset, but the company is hoping that 2017 is the year the emerging technology becomes more mainstream. In fact, the company is hoping to equiptens of millions of smartphones this year with VR software, according to Amit Singh, vp of business and operations of Googles VR unit.
Singh, speaking in Barcelona at Mobile World Congress, said the company already hashad some success with its most basic form of a VR hardware, the Google Cardboard. According to Singh, Google has already shipped 10 million of the inexpensive headsets. On the software side, the Cardboard app has been downloaded 160 million times.
For a lot of people, the first VR interaction might be that bite-sized chunk to get them excited about something, Singh said.
However, even while buzz and business continues to build (DigiCapital reports that $2 billion was invested in VR and augmented reality last year), the question remains, how many people are actually interested? According to a survey of 3,200 U.S. adults conducted by IBB Consulting, 71 percent said they werent interested in VR.
However, that doesnt mean nobodyis buying it. IBB found that of those who are interested, 30 percent already have their own VR equipment. And while 44 percent said they got it for free or as part of a bundle, another 30 percent paid up to $99about the same price as Viewor Samsungs Gear VR. Another 20 percent said they spent between $100 and $500.
Content will be key to driving interest, said JeffersonWang, a senior partnerat IBB.
Not surprisingly, gaming is still the most popular type of content, with 37 percent responding they are most interested in the genre. However, travel was also a key interest for 20 percent of those surveyed, while another 17 percent said theyre interested in movies, TV and news.
We think that brands have a great opportunity to use VR to sell or advertiser their products to consumers, saidArthur van Hoff, chief technology officer and founder ofJaunt, a VR app maker.
There are now more than 100 titlesincluding apps, movies, games and newson Daydream, Googles own VR platform that supports View. Singh said there are now more than 100 apps, with active users spending 40 minutes a week in VR.(Google says YouTube is itsmost popular VR app.)
People want that lean-back experience, they want immersive content, he said.
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Google Aims to Equip Tens of Millions of Phones With Virtual Reality Software - Adweek
I can count on two hands the collectors who are buying immersive media works, said Moving Image fair co-founder Edward Winkleman at a preview on Monday, kicking off Armory Arts Week in New York. But Im encouraged for the future by the number of lawyers and doctors who are buying virtual reality headsets for their kids, and might want to use them for something more than gaming!
Winkleman started the Moving Image fair seven editions ago with his partner, Murat Orozobekov, to give video works a commercial platform and a place where they could have the concentrated viewing an art fair offers. Launched in New York, the fair has since gone global, adding an Instanbul edition. Over the last two years, the founders have turned their focus strongly to virtual reality and augmented reality, which make a strong showing at this small fair, with about a third of the 28 offerings engaging these technologies.
Winkleman and new-media curator Barbara London (a longtime Museum of Modern Art staffer, whose swan song there was a 2013 sound-art exhibition) chatted before the preview about the demands of presenting, selling, and conserving art in newer mediums. Even for video art, collectors and dealers are still hashing out templates for purchasing contracts that can cover issues like optimal presentation environments and terms for possible future conservation, which can include upgrades to newer technologies. Otherwise, said London, the piece dies.
Still from Naoko Tosa, Genesis Yellow (2016), courtesy Ikkan Art Gallery, Singapore.
Those kinds of questions go into overdrive with virtual or augmented reality, in which, Winkleman pointed out, there are many moving parts, including computer coding and headsets, which, in a single piece, may come from various companies. And hardware is changing rapidly in what he described as an arms race among makers of products like the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, both in evidence at Moving Image.
The headset-driven, immersive, VR works on offer engage a range of artistic interests. Uponentering the fair, the first you encounter is Jakob Kudsk Steensens Oculus Rift piece, Primal Tourism: Island (2017), a virtual visit to the island of Bora Bora, in which a tiny room of plywood and plastic becomes a French Polynesian paradise. Elsewhere, theres Rebecca Allens narrative study of hallucination and of the interior of a human brain, presented by Londons Gazelli Art House.
World and Place Evaporating(2016), by Christopher Manzione and Seth Cluett,impressed even tech geeks present with an eerie but subtly integrated moment in which, with the use of a camera mounted on the front of the headset, the participants own hands become visible as she wanders in a virtual forest.
All that work comes at prices that, Winkleman pointed out, are comparable to those for video works. The VR and ARworks come in editions of between three and eight, and prices range from $5,000 to $25,000. Steensens Bora Bora piece is tagged at $7,000, as is Manzione and Cluetts installation; both are in an edition of five. The priciest work in this category, at $25,000, isTamiko Thiel and Zara Houshmands Beyond Manzanar (2000), in which viewers use a joystick to explore World War II-era internment camps. It comes in an edition of three.
Installation view of Tamiko Thiel and Zara Houshmand, Beyond Manzanar (2000). Image courtesy Moving Image.
Behind the sometimes very impressive effects, some of the artists are engaging topics that stimulate artists in more traditional mediums. Steensens trip to Bora Bora, for example, partly imagines that setting (and hes imagining it too, since hes never been) in a post-ecotourism environment, after years of continuing climate change.
John Craig Freemans geolocated augmented reality piece (its based on some of the same tech that brought you Pokmon Go) overlays scenes from St. Petersburg, Russia with the topography of New York as you look at it on your phone or tablet. Freeman is exploring questions about the nature of the public sphere and public monuments in the digital era. (Its echo of suspicions that Russian intelligence helped nudge the president into the Oval Office is a nice bonus.)
For me, the most compelling piece was one without any such overt topical concerns. Brenna Murphys mesmerizing installation Lattice~Domain_Visualize (2017), on view with Portland, Oregons Upfor Gallery, places the participant in a swirling, kaleidoscopic, bright-hued tower that seems to extend nearly infinitely above and below, with a rushing soundtrack. It comes in an edition of three plus an artists proof, with a price tag of$8,500 including computer, HTC Vive, and floor prints.
In a 2014 interview with Art in America, Murphy expressed a hope for some kind of utopic digital commons, where we can use our connectivity to transcend our current state and bring a more advanced outlook to our place in the world. That belief in the possibilities of the new medium comes across in the exhilarating encounter withthe piece itself, in which digital means add up to an experience that can get mystical.
Moving Image New York is open through March 2 at Waterfront New York Tunnel, 269 11th Avenue, between 27th and 28th Streets, Monday-Wednesday 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., Thursday 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
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Market for Virtual Reality Art Gets Tested at Moving Image Fair - artnet News
LONDON, United Kingdom When Apples iPhone first appeared nearly 10 years ago, few could fathom the extent to which it would transform our daily lives. Today, much like mobile before it, a rising technology platform has the potential to create what Canadian media theorist Marshall McLuhan called new patterns of human association, unleashing a tsunami of innovation.
For years, Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) a view of the real world that has been augmented by layers of computer-generated content have been the stuff of science fiction. Both still have their fair share of sceptics. Yet, driven by Moores Law and the rapid advancement of processors, screens and other commodity components coming out of the smartphone supply chain, VR and AR are finally poised for mainstream adoption with some calling them nothing less than a new medium of human experience.
Back in 2014, early VR pioneer Chris Milk explained the profound power of VR: You read a book; your brain reads letters printed in ink on paper and transforms that into a world. You watch a movie; youre seeing imagery inside of a rectangle while youre sitting inside a room, and your brain translates that into a world. And you connect to this even though you know its not real, but because youre in the habit of suspending disbelief. With virtual reality, youre essentially hacking the visual-audio system of your brain and feeding it a set of stimuli thats close enough to the stimuli it expects that it sees it as truth. Instead of suspending your disbelief, you actually have to remind yourself not to believe.
So what does this mean for fashion?
In the past decade, the fashion industry has driven growth largely by tapping emerging markets, opening hundreds of new stores, particularly in China. But as Chinese demand has cooled, many have sought new growth online, which Luca Solca, head of luxury goods at BNP Exane Paribas, has called the new China.
A number of things have changed in the luxury industry. As you know, the luxury industry was growing 8 percent before now it is growing 2 to 4 or 5 percent in the next year and its going to stay there, said Olivier Abtan, a partner at the Boston Consulting Group. Now, in this slow growing market [brands are] considering digital very seriously, he added.
For some, virtual and augmented reality technologies offer a powerful new digital growth channel. When one thinks how engaging VR could be, I imagine that this will indeed be even more important than mobile in the grand scheme of things, said Solca. However, it took 20 years for e-commerce to reach an inflection point, he cautioned. Id imagine VR would need a similar amount of time to really shape our everyday experience in the same way as our mobile phones.
But momentum in the VR/AR space is building quickly. Late last year, HTC Vive announced a venture capital alliance for virtual reality technologies; comprising 27 firms, the initiative has amassed $10 billion dollars of deployable capital. Last October, digital distribution platform Steam reported adding 1,000 new VR users daily, with over 600 VR apps already on the platform. And technology heavyweights are doubling down in virtual and augmented reality. See Facebooks Oculus Rift to Snapchats Spectacles.
In this early stage of development, accurate projections of future market size are difficult. But according to Goldman Sachs, revenue from VR- and AR-related hardware and software is expected to reach from $80 billion to $182 billion by 2025.
Virtual reality and augmented reality could certainly become a powerful channel for brand-consumer interactions, much like mobile and social are today. But current pricing ($600 for an Oculus Rift headset, $800 for an HTC Vive) will slow mainstream consumer adoption for the moment, according to Goldman Sachs.
In the meantime, there are plenty of enterprise opportunities for fashion companies. The obvious first step in the apparel industry is designing and development tools, and we are working with a lot of brands and a lot of supply chain companies behind the scene on this, said Ari Bloom, CEO of Avametric, a San Francisco-based startup working in VR/AR. You think about the ability to have a more digital experiences: the amount of time and money you can save not having to sample thousands of garments to get to three or four hundred!
Virtual simulations of store environments could also be useful to retailers. In VR, specifically, you can [test] two different environments and that is really powerful, explained Bloom. ShopperMX, a virtual reality platform developed by Chicago-based firm InContext Solutions, allows retailers to experiment with signage, product display and layout without the time and resource commitment required to build and test these elements in the physical world.
But over the next decade, it is ultimately consumer adoption of VR/AR that will drive the most opportunity for fashion companies and already some brands are dipping their toes in the space. In October 2015, Tommy Hilfiger became the first major fashion retailer to deploy virtual reality headsets in its stores, inviting shoppers to immerse themselves in a 360-degree experience of the labels Autumn/Winter fashion show. This year, American accessible luxury brand Coach is following suite, installing VR headsets in stores in 10 malls across the US to provide consumers with full access to its latest runway show.
Gap, too, is experimenting. Last month, the retailer unveiled an augmented reality dressing room that allows consumers to try its ranges digitally. The experience, built with Bloom and Avametric in collaboration with Google, has its drawbacks. For a start, it only works with Google Tango smartphones, which have yet to be widely adopted by the market. But the specific limitations of the Gap experience aside, AR has lower barriers to adoption than VR, which is costly and comes with a steep learning curve for consumers. And in recent cycles, AR applications mostly geared towards trying on clothes have spread relatively quickly as fashion brands and retailers jump on the bandwagon.
Unsurprisingly, beauty brands have been early to AR. Within the last year, Sephora, Charlotte Tilbury and Rimmel have all launched AR applications that allow users to try on products via a filter on their phones.
But do these applications offer real value? Or are they just marketing gimmicks?
The number one difficulty has been that there are a lot of false prophets at this stage, said Tom Adeyoola, chief executive of London-based virtual fitting room company Metail, whose augmented reality try-before-you-buy solution aims to drive concrete business results. According to research conducted by Metail in conjuction with Tufts University and the Kellogg School of Management, the companys AR application can boost sales by 22 percent.
Its bigger potential lies in the power of data collection, however, illustrating how consumer-facing VR and AR applications can drive back-end benefits. Our big partner in India is using data that is coming through to re-cut their clothes to match the fact that India is not a one-size demographic people are taller in the North and shorter in the South. They are starting to rethink and recut clothes, said Adeyoola. For another retailer, for example, we saw that only 20 percent of their customers matched the clothes that were cut. By resourcing the garments, they could do a better job of matching that demographic.
For the moment theres little doubt that VR and AR remain in their infancy. And much like e-commerce 10 years ago, when fashion and luxury brands were reluctant to sell online, there are those who doubt the potential of these new technologies. But if the consumers are there, they have no choice, says Abten. If consumers complete their transition into VR/AR channels, brands even the luxury ones will have no choice but to embrace.
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Virtual Reality: Growth Engine for Fashion? | Fashion-Tech | BoF - The Business of Fashion
Posted March 01, 2017 16:32:56
A ground-breaking partnership between university researchers and a virtual reality start-up will allow people to experience the future before it arrives.
Researchers at the SMART Infrastructure Facility at the University of Wollongong design a wide range of projects, from roads and rail to tsunami warning systems in Jakarta.
In a deal to be announced on Thursday, they will team up with a couple of young tech entrepreneurs who specialise in creating virtual reality learning systems.
Although the entrepreneurs' company, Devika, was only founded eight months ago, the start-up is researching applications that would allow trainee firefighters to experience the inside of a burning house, or even what it is like to walk on the moon.
For professor Pascal Perez, the head of the facility, the opportunity is there for people to drive a road like WestConnex in Sydney and experience the benefits.
It was associate professor Robert Gorkin's encounter with a virtual reality blue whale that started the process.
He was so impressed by the virtual reality program created by the young entrepreneurs that he could see uses for it everywhere.
"'The first experience I had, you were actually sitting on a deck of a sunken ship, and you're watching all the sea life just swim by you. Every direction you look at, you see something different," he said.
Mr Gorkin specialises in connecting start-ups with universities.
Devika was founded by Ken Kencevski, 27, and his friend, Brennan Hatton, 24.
The two paired up after Mr Hatton returned from a stint in Silicon Valley designing augmented reality glasses.
"One of the things about communicating virtual reality is you can't do it justice with photos or videos," Mr Hatton said.
"It's something that you really just have to experience to understand.
"It's like explaining what Yosemite National Park is like. You can't actually experience Yosemite unless you go there."
Mr Gorkin introduced the pair to Professor Perez, who, in his earlier career, had done work on interactive simulation, plus a lot of serious gaming.
Professor Perez strongly believes the best way to change people's behaviour is not through words, but through experience.
"I used to tell my students that to enjoy a cake, the best way to have people enjoying the cake is to ask them to be part of making the cake in the first place," he said.
"If they've been part of the recipe, when everybody shares the cake at the end, there's maybe a better response than if you buy it from somewhere else."
Professor Perez saw the potential for virtual reality to allow people to experience the future before it happened, and therefore to discover that there was less to fear about it than they had once thought.
The Wollongong facility specialises in infrastructure planning, from roads to tsunami warning systems, and he sees virtual reality as an extraordinary tool for learning.
Although Mr Hatton concedes there are pitfalls to virtual reality that it will become more compelling than actual reality his view of the future is optimistic.
"I think there are a lot of people who have already retracted themselves from reality," he said.
"I think that they would be retracted from reality with or without this technology and this technology has a huge potential to connect them to reality.
"You can stay at home but you can still have a social experience. You can walk up and talk to people.
"You actually build those communication skills so much more than if you were just stuck at home."
Topics: information-technology, university-and-further-education, university-of-wollongong-2522
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The city plans to create the nations first publicly funded virtual reality lab. View Full Caption
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This hub is gettingcloser to reality.
The citys Economic Development Corporation and the Mayors Office of Media and Entertainment are planning to create the nations first publicly-funded virtual reality and augmented reality lab, announcing Monday a request for proposals for a space that will include $6 million in public and private funding.
The city is looking for bidders who will be able to provide space for VR and AR entrepreneurs with affordable, shared access to tools and technologies and gather academic, start-upand business communities to increase the talent pipeline and funding opportunities, as DNAinfo previously reported.
Proposals are due April 7.
VR and AR are fast-growing sectors in the media and entertainment space, and with this new facility we are positioning New York City to be a primary hub for new and growing VR/AR companies, MOME Commissioner Julie Menin said.
EDC President James Patchett said the lab would spur innovation.
By investing in growing companies with emerging technologies, we can create good-paying, 21st century jobs for New Yorkers, he said.
Theres been a recent uptick in virtual and augmented reality offerings across the city, from Samsungs flagship store in the Meatpacking District and the virtual reality arcade in the World Trade Center Oculus to the pop-up vr bar in Park Slope, occupying a small Union Street storefront for the winter months in a space normally run by the Peoples Pops in warmer weather.
There's also a virtual reality training lab coming to The Bronx's CUNY on the Concourse, a branch of Lehman College , which will offer an 11-month program starting in April to teach students about topics including 3D graphics, web design and animation.
The VR/AR industry has seen more than $50 million worth of investment and 125 percent increase in job demand over the past year, according to city officials. But the industry is still fragmented and funding still a challenge, they say, without a central hub to anchor it.
The focus on virtual and augmented reality is part of the de Blasio administrations pledge to foster 100,000 good jobs over the next 10 years in industries like tech, life sciences and high-end manufacturing.
Earlier this month, the administration released plans for a Union Square Tech Hub thats projected to create 600 jobs and includes awork and event space called Civic Hall for community organizations, tech companies, government agencies and entrepreneurs.
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