Category Archives: Virtual Reality

June 30, 2017 by Charles Anzalone This camera is used to create virtual reality scenarios for the student teacher training program. Credit: Meredith Forrest Kulwicki

Two University at Buffalo education researchers have teamed up to create an interactive classroom environment in which state-of-the-art virtual reality simulates difficult student behavior, a training method its designers compare to a "flight simulator for teachers."

The new program, already earning endorsements from teachers and administrators in an inner-city Buffalo school, ties into State University of New York Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher's call for innovative teaching experiences and "immersive" clinical experiences and teacher preparation.

Zimpher recently told The Buffalo News that SUNY teaching programs should be offering on-campus laboratories where students can simulate being in a classroom. The UB virtual reality classroom project directly aligns with this initiative.

A collaboration of the Neurocognition Science Laboratory and the Teacher Education Institute in the UB Graduate School of Education, the virtual reality classroom is meant to supplement existing clinical opportunities, according to Richard Lamb, GSE associate professor and director of the Neurocognition Science Laboratory.

"This is meant as a training simulator for pre-service and in-service teachers to garner experience in dealing with situations such as difficult student behaviors, teaching methods, classroom management in general and other activities as needed," Lamb says. "So when the teaching student steps into the classroom, they have some idea of what to do."

The training simulator Lamb compared to a teacher flight simulator uses an emerging computer technology known as virtual reality. Becoming more popular and accessible commercially, virtual reality immerses the subject in what Lamb calls "three-dimensional environments in such a way where that environment is continuous around them." An important characteristic of the best virtual reality environments is a convincing and powerful representation of the imaginary setting.

"It's not meant to fully replace clinical opportunities for teaching students," says Lamb, who is co-principal investigator of the project with Elisabeth Etopio, director of UB's Teacher Education Institute and interim assistant dean for teacher education. "The virtual reality-based simulated classroom is a tool that provides students repeated practice in an environmentwithout consequence to actual studentswhere they can target skills needed for successful teaching in the classroom."

The virtual reality teaching environment created by Lamb and Etopio differs from other teaching simulation platforms in that actual footage of student behaviors occurring within real classrooms will be used, enhancing the authenticity, fluidity and "immersiveness" of the experience. The program is partially funded by a $20,000 grant from the SUNY Innovative Instruction Technology Grant program, a SUNY-wide grant competition that funds campus innovations and initiatives in instructional technology and supports academic excellence and student success.

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The team partnered with Crosswater Digital Media to film seventh- and eighth-grade students at Enterprise Charter School using 360-degree cameras to create scenarios for pre-service teachers in handling classroom management. Armin St. George, vice chairman of Crosswater Digital Media, calls this teaching strategy the "next best way to teach." St. George has used similar techniques for medical students when teaching anatomy. A virtual reality cadaver gives the medical students the experience of working on the human body without a real body.

Like medical students, future teachers can use virtual reality exercises "to actually put themselves in an environment to experience what they are going to see in a school before they actually get to a school," St. George says.

Although still only a few months old, the simulated classroom environment created by Lamb and Etopio has earned high praise from teachers and administrators in Buffalo's Enterprise Charter School, which has used it to train in-service teachers in classroom management and to assist teachers with dealing with behavior management in the classroom.

Rebekah Lamb, a seventh- and eighth-grade social studies teacher at Enterprise, says having this virtual reality tool to supplement her pre-service training while she was in school would have been a valuable way to give education students a more authentic experience of what they will encounter in a real-life classroom.

"When you do student teaching, you have the student teacher and the classroom teacher," she says. "Normally, the classroom teacher will take control of the classroom and won't give it fully to the student teacher.

"So this helps it so the student teacher has the full role of classroom management without the classroom teacher interfering," she says. "Students who want to be teachers get a look inside the classroom without actually having to step inside the classroom."

Lamb's supervising administrators at Enterprise Charter couldn't agree more.

"Young teachers need to step back and understand that children's behaviors are a socioemotional response, not to be taken personally," says Julie Schwab, superintendent of Enterprise Charter. "The behavior could be related to an event that happened the prior night, or on the school bus.

"Virtual reality is a tool that can expose new teachers to some of these behaviors and give them practice responding in real time and honing the explicit language needed to gain understanding of what caused this child to be where they are at this time."

Michael Radosta, director of learning technology at Enterprise Charter School, notes that in a real classroom, teachers have to get their students to value what they are saying.

"This is a skill often lacking in new teachers," Radosta says. "So direct practice using responsive language within virtual reality environments has enormous potential."

The fact that the seventh- and eighth-grade students at Enterprise Charter School had so much fun playing the part of unruly students while filming the pre-service video was a bonus, according to the school's teachers and administrators. The four students who simulated disruptive students for filming the virtual reality program were chosen by Rebekah Lamb the same morning Crosswater Digital recorded their role-playing behavior on camera. And for these students, the bad behavior went against their nature, Lamb says.

"These are students who generally do what they are supposed to," she says.

The potential and promise of this method of simulating classroom situations for prospective teachers are profound, the educators say.

"Early virtual exposure with targeted practice of management skills could help young teachers pause, avoid potentially harmful responses with real children, and provide confidence in responding to students in sensitive and beneficial ways," Schwab says.

Explore further: A virtual reality classroom simulator for teachers in training

In a new pilot program, the University of Virginia's Curry School of Education will provide teachers-in-training instant feedback to help them clear the biggest early hurdle to becoming successful educators: managing the ...

Teachers who have an authentic teaching style are more positively received by their students, according to new research published in the National Communication Association's journal, Communication Education.

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Research by Victoria University of Wellington Faculty of Education senior lecturers has helped teachers around the Wellington region develop new ways of teaching science investigation in schools.

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Virtual reality simulates classroom environment for aspiring teachers - Phys.Org

June 29, 2017 At FutureLeap's booth, a young model kneels on a fluffy carpet as she tosses balloons in the air, blows bubbles and flirts with a man wearing VR headgear who is sitting some two metres (6.5 feet) away

It is Saturday night and you want to have a date with someone special, but you're too tired to get off the sofa.

Japanese firm FutureLeap claims it has just the thing for in-the-mood couch potatoes with a virtual reality system so realistic you'd swear that cyber date just whispered sweet nothings in your ear.

The company showed off its high-tech romance gear at the three-day Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality exhibition in Tokyo.

At FutureLeap's booth, a young model kneels on a fluffy carpet as she tosses balloons in the air, blows bubbles and flirts with a man wearing VR headgear who is sitting some two metres (6.5 feet) away.

He reaches out to touch her shoulder and gets nothing but air. When she whispers into the device though, he can feel the sensation of her breath on his ear.

Most virtual reality romance games feature an animated companion rather than a real person, said company employee Tomoyuki Takahashi.

But in this case, "you feel the real sensation as if you were together alone with a woman who is just your type," he said.

"This type of realistic sensation will become the main trend in virtual reality technology."

Other companies have even moved away from offerings that require a VR headset.

LiveCartoon CEO Shohei Tsuji, covered head to toe in motion sensors, demonstrated the company's newest product by showing off his best dance moves while a pretty female anime character mimicked his steps on screen.

The system, Tsuji said, could be used by retailers who want to interact with customers by having the cutesy character engage passersby while the person who controls the character remains out of sight.

"With this system you can have animated characters talking directly to customers," he said.

Explore further: Snapchat leads augmented reality gains: researchers

2017 AFP

Augmented reality is seeing strong gains among Americans thanks to social networks like Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook, a market research firm said Monday.

Microsoft on Thursday debuted hardware for reaching into virtual worlds powered by its technology as it looked to "mixed reality" as the next big computing platform.

Intel is diving head-first into virtual reality, announcing Tuesday at its annual developers forum in San Francisco that it is working on its own headset, collaborating with Microsoft to bring the medium to PCs, and opening ...

The Big Ten network is making Saturday's football game between Minnesota and No. 21 Nebraska available in virtual reality.

Facebook on Tuesday launched a mission to make smartphone cameras windows to augmented reality, focusing on what people have in hand instead of waiting for high-tech eyewear.

Apple has bought a company that makes augmented-reality software, which adds information or images to real-world scenes when viewed through a special headset or even a smartphone camera.

Neural networks, which learn to perform computational tasks by analyzing large sets of training data, are responsible for today's best-performing artificial intelligence systems, from speech recognition systems, to automatic ...

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Artificial intelligence experts from the University of Hertfordshire, Dr Christoph Salge and Professor Daniel Polani, have designed a concept which could lead to a new set of generic, situation-aware guidelines to help robots ...

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Researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham suggest that brainwave-sensing headsets, also known as EEG or electroencephalograph headsets, need better security after a study reveals hackers could guess a user's ...

Twice in the space of six weeks, the world has suffered major attacks of ransomwaremalicious software that locks up photos and other files stored on your computer, then demands money to release them.

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True romance in the air at Tokyo virtual reality show - Phys.Org

These virtual girlfriends are taking Tokyo by storm... but would you invite one into your bedroom?

LONERS can now feel the sweet, virtual breath of a woman upon their neck without bothering to find a lover.

Its all thanks toJapanese firm FutureLeap, which has created a virtual reality system so realistic youd swear that cyber date just whispered sweet nothings in your ear.

Getty Images

The company showed off its high-tech romance gear at the three-day Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality exhibition in Tokyo.

At FutureLeaps booth, a young model was seen kneeling on a fluffy carpet as she tossed balloons in the air, blew bubbles and flirted with a man wearing VR headgear sitting some two metres (6.5 feet) away.

He reached out to touch her shoulder and got nothing but air, but when she whispered into the device, he was able to feel the sensation of her breath on his ear.

Most virtual reality romance games feature an animated companion rather than a real person, said company employee Tomoyuki Takahashi. But in this case, usersare able to feel the real sensation as if you were together alone with a woman who is just your type.

This type of realistic sensation will become the main trend in virtual reality technology, he added.

Getty Images

Other companies have even moved away from offerings that require a VR headset.

LiveCartoon CEO Shohei Tsuji, covered head to toe in motion sensors, demonstrated the companys newest product by showing off his best dance moves while a pretty female anime character mimicked his steps on screen.

"With this system you can have animated characters talking directly to customers," he said.

Virtual reality pornography could be available in thousands of European hotels room within six months.

Men have been urgedto spice up sex with their long-term partner by strapping on a virtual reality helmet during romps.

But experts fear it's so realisticthat people will start to think its okay to cheat in real life, scientists have warned.

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Creepy Japanese virtual reality girlfriends are so realistic they mimic ... - The Sun

Even when Ren Pinnell launched Kaleidoscopes virtual reality festival in 2015, his vision had always been to build a funding platform to help independent VR creators and studios raise money for their original VR projects. Now that day is here. Today Kaleidoscope officially launched its invitation-only marketplace, limited to 500 members, where VR industry leaders can get a first-look at new virtual reality films, games and experiences available for pre-sales, licensing, and other partnership opportunities.

A small number of leaders from the VR entertainment industry can apply to join Kaleidoscopes hand-selected platform, which is launching with many of the most innovative projects from Sundance, Tribeca, and IndieCade as well as new work from established studios like Baobab and rising stars such as Eliza McNitt, Arnaud Colinart, and Arjan van Meerten. If selected, funders will pay $199/month to get a first look at curated projects from top artists; access to Kaleidoscopes growing library of over 100 titles ready for licensing, distribution, and location-based exhibitions; invitations to private events where select members demo and review new VR projects; and the opportunity to network and collaborate with important artists and innovators.

Kaleidoscope is also offering its members white glove service from custom curation to content bundling to personal introductions that help members form high-impact relationships that push their businesses forward.

Part of the monthly fee also goes to supporting independent artists from diverse backgrounds whose work tackles difficult subjects and advances virtual reality as an art form.

The biggest challenge to the future of virtual reality is funding, said Pinnell, co-founder and CEO of Kaleidoscope. And we want to solve that problem. Its a chicken-egg situation. Artists need funding to make killer content and funders need to prove there is a massive consumer market to sell to in order to justify their investment.

Pinnell sees a future where clunky VR headsets shrink to the size of ordinary glasses and virtual reality overtakes traditional gaming, film, and TV as the dominant form of entertainment. And this future is coming sooner than many realize.

Within 12 to 24 months the next generation of VR hardware will hit the market with major improvements in terms of both quality and price. Thats why the industry needs to rally around funding content now. It takes 12 to 24 months to produce high quality VR films, games, and experiences. We need to fund projects today so that when the next generation of hardware is released we have a deep library of amazing content ready to go. Only then will the industry take off, said Pinnell.

Marketplaces are notoriously difficult to establish which is why Kaleidoscope spent two years building up credibility with top VR creators and funding sources through its events, and by executive producing some high profile projects, such as APEX, Testimony, and Mad God, as well as organizing a successful content accelerator with Oculus called DevLab. A month-long program, DevLab selected leading VR artists from around the world to incubate new work, explore new ideas, and create the next wave of great virtual reality experiences. More recently, Kaleidoscope teamed up with 1stAveMachine to help VR artists find brands to fund their work.

There is money to be made by investing in virtual reality. The market for VR is projected to hit $25 billion by 2021. The challenge is that VR production costs are still very expensive, with even a modest project costing somewhere between $5,000 and $10,000 per minute.

Kaleidoscope has identified 120 different sources of potential financing, from companies like Facebook, Google, and HTC, as well as emerging sources such as Viacom, IMAX, Wevr, Within, Arte, Starbreeze and many more. These are the companies who are building VR hardware, VR software, VR distribution platforms, VR arcades, and VR cinemas and fund content to establish themselves as major players in this new entertainment landscape.

The role of Kaleidoscope is to get all of these industry players on one platform to better coordinate their support for talented VR creators and studios.

For further information regarding Kaleidoscope please visit: https://kaleidoscope.fund/

This is sponsored content which has been produced by Kaleidoscope.

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Kaleidoscope Launches Funding Platform For Premium Virtual Reality Content - UploadVR

Clay Bavor, VP of Virtual Reality for Google, introduces the Daydream View VR headset during the presentation of new Google hardware in San Francisco.Beck Diefenbach Reuters

There aren't many people currently using virtual reality yet, but that doesnt mean Google isnt looking at how to advertise to them.

Google debuted a new project Wednesday thats exploring ways to show online ads in virtual reality. The new project is part of Googles Area 120 workshop that the company is using for its employees to quickly test new ideas to see if they can become actual products.

It makes sense that Google is exploring advertising in VR, considering the search giant derives the bulk of its revenue from online ads. Google is also pitching the experiment as way for developers to eventually make money building VR apps, besides just selling them online, according a blog post.

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According to an animated GIF created by Google ( goog ) , the VR ad prototype resembles a small cube with corporate logos adorned on all sides. By either clicking on the cube or staring at it long enough, people can trigger the cube to generate a small screen above that shows a video ad, sort of like a small clown might burst out of a jack-in-the-box toy.

Googles work on VR ads is still early in development, so its unlikely people will see similar ads emerge in virtual worlds. The company is currently seeking developers to test the project via the Google cardboard headset, Daydream VR platform, and the Samsung Gear VR headset.

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Google did not reveal if versions of its VR ads would work on competing VR platforms, like Facebooks ( fb ) Oculus Rift headset, the HTC ( htc ) Vive headset, or Sony's ( sne ) Playstation VR.

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Google Is Experimenting With Virtual Reality Advertising - Fortune

Bryn Mooser is the co-founder of Ryot Films, which produces media for immersive formats like virtual reality and 360-degree video. He started thinking about transformative technology while working as a Peace Corps volunteer in West Africa, living on the edge of the Sahel in a region that had cell-phone towers--but had never had landlines. Ryot initially published news stories that enabled readers to take social actions, and then pivoted into immersive video. In 2016, Mooser and his co-founder, David Darg, sold Ryot to AOL. --As told to Jeff Bercovici

As someone who's covered humanitarian crises as a journalist and a filmmaker for years, I've always felt that traditional filmmaking and photography were limited. When you walk into a war zone or someplace after a natural disaster with a traditional camera or video recorder, you can capture only one thing. That's frustrating. There's nothing like actually standing where you can understand the scale of these things. When I saw VR for the first time a couple of years ago, I thought this could be an incredibly powerful medium to give people a totally new perspective.

We were the first group to show a VR film at the Tribeca Film Festival. It was about solitary confinement. At the after-party, a friend showed me a prototype of the Hero 360 rig, which is just a bunch of GoPros in a 3-D-printed case. That was when the light bulb went off for us. I knew all of our filmmakers around the world could shoot on GoPros and, more important, that they knew how to fix them in the field. I knew we could figure out the stitching part with our postproduction team.

Then, the next day, the Nepal earthquake happened. My business partner, David, was going there to provide humanitarian aid. I called up the kid who had the camera and David took it with him. Anytime he wasn't delivering aid, he put the camera on. I'd worked in Haiti with Susan Sarandon, and she agreed to do a voiceover. About a week later, we showed the video outside a film festival in Telluride. We couldn't get it programmed in the festival, so we just set it up on a park bench with a Samsung VR headset and we put it on people.

We called it the Nepal Quake Project. It was the first time VR had been shot in a natural disaster area. Every day, we'd go to the street corner to set up and there would be a line of people waiting, and a lot of those people, when they took off the headset, they were crying.

Our gamble was mobile-first, 360-degree storytelling for socially distributed platforms like Facebook and YouTube. If we could make more 360 films than anybody else, then the second those platforms launched, all those publishers and brands would call us. Sure enough, the day after Facebook launched Facebook 360, we got inundated with emails from media brands and advertisers.

As the company was growing and we had more interest in what we were doing, we were about 20 really scrappy kids in a garage in Venice, California. There were six of us at the time, including myself, who were sleeping on the floor of the office, because we were investing every single dollar back into the company. When our film Body Team 12 was nominated for an Oscar, we had no money for an apartment, no money for a tuxedo. I had worked in Haiti with Kenneth Cole, the designer, so I called him and he made tuxedos for David and me. I think I was probably the only Oscar nominee who didn't have a home to go back to.

What AOL loved about us was that spirit. At the time, a year and a half ago, we weren't really thinking about acquisition. We were focused on raising a Series A. We had a lot of options, but I realized I just couldn't raise money anymore. I couldn't go to another lunch and have a Cobb salad and iced tea and talk about how great my company was. It was taking me out of the field and out of being with my team. What we wanted to do was stop raising money and just put our heads down and start building big.

At Oath, which is what the merger of AOL and Yahoo is going to be called, you have two big companies that have their own ways of thinking about original content and branded content. I'm helping them rethink production and how original content is made and also bringing a lot of new formats to all the brands with virtual reality, augmented reality, and 360. We still bring the same spirit to our work every day. But now I can afford a house.

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This Scrappy Virtual Reality Company Sold to AOL. It All Started With a Nepal Earthquake, Some GoPros, and Susan ... - Inc.com

Designed by Pierpaolo Lazzarini from Italian company Jet Capsule. The I.F.O. is fuelled by eight electric engines, which is able to push the flying object to an estimated top speed of about 120mph.

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A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore

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A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore

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Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea

Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images

Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea

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The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie 'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company

Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images

Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea

Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images

Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi

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Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session

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A test line of a new energy suspension railway resembling the giant panda is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China

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A test line of a new energy suspension railway, resembling a giant panda, is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China

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A concept car by Trumpchi from GAC Group is shown at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China

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A Mirai fuel cell vehicle by Toyota is displayed at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China

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A visitor tries a Nissan VR experience at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China

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A man looks at an exhibit entitled 'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London

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A new Israeli Da-Vinci unmanned aerial vehicle manufactured by Elbit Systems is displayed during the 4th International conference on Home Land Security and Cyber in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv

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Electrification Guru Dr. Wolfgang Ziebart talks about the electric Jaguar I-PACE concept SUV before it was unveiled before the Los Angeles Auto Show in Los Angeles, California, U.S

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The Jaguar I-PACE Concept car is the start of a new era for Jaguar. This is a production preview of the Jaguar I-PACE, which will be revealed next year and on the road in 2018

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Japan's On-Art Corp's CEO Kazuya Kanemaru poses with his company's eight metre tall dinosaur-shaped mechanical suit robot 'TRX03' and other robots during a demonstration in Tokyo, Japan

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Japan's On-Art Corp's eight metre tall dinosaur-shaped mechanical suit robot 'TRX03'

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Japan's On-Art Corp's eight metre tall dinosaur-shaped mechanical suit robot 'TRX03' performs during its unveiling in Tokyo, Japan

Reuters

Singulato Motors co-founder and CEO Shen Haiyin poses in his company's concept car Tigercar P0 at a workshop in Beijing, China

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The interior of Singulato Motors' concept car Tigercar P0 at a workshop in Beijing, China

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Singulato Motors' concept car Tigercar P0

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A picture shows Singulato Motors' concept car Tigercar P0 at a workshop in Beijing, China

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Connected company president Shigeki Tomoyama addresses a press briefing as he elaborates on Toyota's "connected strategy" in Tokyo. The Connected company is a part of seven Toyota in-house companies that was created in April 2016

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A Toyota Motors employee demonstrates a smartphone app with the company's pocket plug-in hybrid (PHV) service on the cockpit of the latest Prius hybrid vehicle during Toyota's "connected strategy" press briefing in Tokyo

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An exhibitor charges the battery cells of AnyWalker, an ultra-mobile chasis robot which is able to move in any kind of environment during Singapore International Robo Expo

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A robot with a touch-screen information apps stroll down the pavillon at the Singapore International Robo Expo

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An exhibitor demonstrates the AnyWalker, an ultra-mobile chasis robot which is able to move in any kind of environment during Singapore International Robo Expo

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Robotic fishes swim in a water glass tank displayed at the Korea pavillon during Singapore International Robo Expo

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An employee shows a Samsung Electronics' Gear S3 Classic during Korea Electronics Show 2016 in Seoul, South Korea

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Visitors experience Samsung Electronics' Gear VR during the Korea Electronics Grand Fair at an exhibition hall in Seoul, South Korea

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Amy Rimmer, Research Engineer at Jaguar Land Rover, demonstrates the car manufacturer's Advanced Highway Assist in a Range Rover, which drives the vehicle, overtakes and can detect vehicles in the blind spot, during the first demonstrations of the UK Autodrive Project at HORIBA MIRA Proving Ground in Nuneaton, Warwickshire

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Chris Burbridge, Autonomous Driving Software Engineer for Tata Motors European Technical Centre, demonstrates the car manufacturer's GLOSA V2X functionality, which is connected to the traffic lights and shares information with the driver, during the first demonstrations of the UK Autodrive Project at HORIBA MIRA Proving Ground in Nuneaton, Warwickshire

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Ford EEBL Emergency Electronic Brake Lights is demonstrated during the first demonstrations of the UK Autodrive Project at HORIBA MIRA Proving Ground in Nuneaton, Warwickshire

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Full-scale model of 'Kibo' on display at the Space Dome exhibition hall of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Tsukuba Space Center, in Tsukuba, north-east of Tokyo, Japan

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Miniatures on display at the Space Dome exhibition hall of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Tsukuba Space Center, in Tsukuba, north-east of Tokyo, Japan. In its facilities, JAXA develop satellites and analyse their observation data, train astronauts for utilization in the Japanese Experiment Module 'Kibo' of the International Space Station (ISS) and develop launch vehicles

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The robot developed by Seed Solutions sings and dances to the music during the Japan Robot Week 2016 at Tokyo Big Sight. At this biennial event, the participating companies exhibit their latest service robotic technologies and components

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The robot developed by Seed Solutions sings and dances to music during the Japan Robot Week 2016 at Tokyo Big Sight

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Government and industry are working together on a robot-like autopilot system that could eliminate the need for a second human pilot in the cockpit

AP

Aurora Flight Sciences' technicians work on an Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automantion System (ALIAS) device in the firm's Centaur aircraft at Manassas Airport in Manassas, Va.

AP

Stefan Schwart and Udo Klingenberg preparing a self-built flight simulator to land at Hong Kong airport, from Rostock, Germany

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Google experimenting with new virtual reality ads that react to users' eyes - The Independent

Cambridge, U.K.-based virtual reality (VR) startup Hologram just beat tech giants like Google and HTC to the punch by releasing a standalone VR headset that works without a computer or a phone. Then again, Hologram is arguably playing in a league of its own: Its VRotica headset only plays porn, and nothing else.

Hologram started selling the VRotica headset for $220 online Tuesday, promising consumers access to triple-X-rated 3D VR content from Badoink, a studio that already operates a network of VR porn sites and has produced some 300 plus such videos to date.

The headset ships with six videos preloaded, and gives consumers the ability to buy additional content on a per-title basis.In the near future, Hologram aims to also sell content from other studios as well as user-generated uploads to VRotica users, with plans to have more than 1000 videos available before the end of the year. And eventually, the company plans to include live streaming as well as simple adult-themed games as well.

Virtual reality and pornography is not a new combination. Producers of adult content have been trying to capitalize on the new medium ever since Facebook-owned Oculus kicked off the new virtual reality boom in 2013. Most major VR headset manufacturers have tolerated adult content on their devices, but closed off their content and app stores to porn studios.

This has forced consumers to do whats often called side-loading to get access to this type of content: They have to download it to their PCs, or mobile devices, and then find ways to transfer and play the videos. Hologram co-founder Deniz Opal told Variety that his company was looking to simplify this process with the release of the VRotica headset. VRotica allows us to streamline the delivery of immersive adult entertainment, without any of the many distractions found on other systems, he said.

This focus on adult video content, as well as the comparably low price, also means that VRotica is essentially selling stripped-down hardware thats missing many of the features now common on other VR headsets. There is no external controller or touchpad to interact with the content. Instead, VRotica can be a controller via a series of simple buttons on both sides of the headset. And with its focus on VR video, the headset doesnt offer any type of positional tracking.

The headset, which Variety was able to review exclusively ahead of its official launch, features what can best be described as adequate video playback quality. VRoticas display comes with a resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixel, and a field-of view of 83 degrees. As a comparison, the latest Gear VR, when combined with a Samsung Galaxy S8, features a field-of-view of 101 degrees and a display resolution of 2960 by 1440 pixels.

In laymans terms, this means that the image quality of Samsungs Gear VR headset notably better than that of VRoticas headset. Then again, the content playable on the VRotica device also doesnt require a whole lot of bells and whistles.

Without getting into too many juicy details, most VR porn videos follow the same basic formula: One actor (typically but not always male) is filmed from the chest down, sitting or lying and initially not doing much else. Then another actor (typically but not always female) appears and initiates the undressing, and whatever else follows after. Its what the industry calls point-of-view, or POV, and it is meant to give viewers the ability to imagine themselves as part of the action.

Most of that action predictably happens more or less in the center of ones field-of-view, and can be viewed without ever really moving ones head. In other words: Theres really no reason to ever look over your shoulder or marvel at the scenery. That also explains why most adult VR videos at this point are recorded as 180-degree videos. Ironically, YouTube just realized that the same is true for many non-adult VR videos, which is why the Google-owned video platform introduced 180VR as a 180-degree video format.

Speaking of which: Its often said that the porn industry is leading the charge in adopting new technologies. Thats sort of true for the VRotica headset as well, albeit with some caveats. Both Google and Facebook have announced that they are working on standalone headsets that wont require computer or phones, and Googles hardware partners HTC and Lenovo are set to release standalone Daydream devices later this year.

Specs-wise, these devices surely will beat VRoticas hardware on many fronts, which also means that it wasnt that hard to get something much more basic out of the door. However, more advanced standalone devices will also likely cost at least three times as much which is a lot of money for people who primarily want to watch adult content.

Time will tell if thats really a big market, but Hologram is betting that focusing on just one slice of content is the right path forward for other content genres as well and the company has some experience producing VR content for a variety of genres, ranging from horror games to apps for medical treatments. Adult is the first niche we are looking at, but plan to use the same model for other niche markets, said Opal.

Excerpt from:

Virtual Reality Porn? VRotica VR Headset Starts Selling: First Look ... - Variety

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Wednesday, June 28, 2017, 10:53 PM

Queen and Adam Lambert have teamed up with Universal Music Group to bring their show directly into your living room.

The bands May 2016 concert at Barcelonas Palau Sant Jordi will now be available in full 360 through VRTGO, Universal Music Groups virtual reality platform, they announced Wednesday.

This is the fulfillment of a dream, Queen guitarist Brian May, whos credited as a project instigator, told Variety.

Through this unique Virtual Reality creation, fans around the world will for the first time be able to experience the excitement and energy of a Queen show in their own homes.

Adam Lambert cast in Foxs Rocky Horror Picture Show

Lambert has been touring with the rock band since last summer and recently came stateside, including two nights at the Hollywood Bowl.

VR the Champions is available for $9.99 for iPhone and Android devices and accessible through most web browsers.

Read the original post:

Queen, Adam Lambert team up for virtual reality concert - New York Daily News

Wednesday, June 28, 2017 at 7:50 a.m.

Lakewood entrepreneur Victoria Merchant wanted to create a fun, family-friendly alternative to late-night bowling alleys. In February, she had a lightbulb moment: virtual reality.

"VR has been on the back burner lately, I think," says Merchant. "Developers and makers wanted to go straight to consumers, but it didn't work as anticipated, because the equipment is still expensive."

Instead, Merchant saw virtual-reality arcades, where customerswould be able to try out and enjoy the latest, most advanced VR technology,as the next step in VR entertainment without the prohibitive costs.

The entrepreneur commissioned Nathan Hostetler, a techie acquaintance, to build computers for a soon-to-launch Denver VR arcade. After trying the virtual-reality equipment, Hostetler signed on.

This weekend, the duo will celebrate the grand opening of Head Games VR, the first virtual-reality arcade in the greater Denver area. AtHead Games VR, there will be three large play stations, where customers of all ages and backgrounds will be able to use HTC Vive headsets to engage in everything from experiential virtual reality to avid video gaming. More anxious customers might want to avoid games like Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes, where partners help instruct a friend to diffuse a bomb a terrifying scenario in virtual reality.

In the future, the entrepreneur hopes the facility will grow to include eight HTC Vive headsets, so friends can play four vs. four multiplayer games. Additionally, a "mixed reality" room is in the works, where customers will enter a green room and film themselves inside of a virtual world. Merchant also hopes to offer this room as a facility for developers to film demos for their games.

"We don't want this to be a typical mall arcade," she says. "We want people to enjoy coming here with friends and family, and we want to take suggestions from customers; we want to create a community."

On Saturday, July 1, Head Games VR will host an opening-night after-party for Comic Con, which runs June 30 to July 2. At the event, there will be giveaways, raffles, a tournament, and five minutes on the equipment per customer, free of charge. Game developers, including Colorado's LIMN Interactive,willdemo new titles.

The arcade opens its doors officially onJuly 2.

Head Games VR's Comic Con After Party, 8 p.m., Saturday, July 1, 9655 West Colfax Avenue, Unit C, Lakewood. For more information, go to Head Game VR's Facebook page.

Originally posted here:

A Virtual Reality Arcade Isn't Going to Be Science Fiction Much Longer - Westword