philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo will ship Windows 10 VR headsets, starting at $299

http://venturebeat.com/2016/10/26/acer-asus-dell-hp-and-lenovo-will-ship-windows-10-vr-headsets-starting-at-299/

At a Windows 10 event in New York today, Microsoft said that third-party companies will be coming out with “affordable” virtual reality (VR) headsets for Windows 10 PCs. With these headsets, users will be able to experience mixed reality content — like a 3D version of a real sandcastle — customized in the new Paint 3D app on desktop.

Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo will be bringing the headsets to market starting at $299, said Terry Myerson, executive vice president for Microsoft’s Windows and Devices Group.

By supporting the launch of these new devices, Microsoft wants to avoid the cost and complexity of powerful VR headsets like the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, and even Microsoft’s own HoloLens augmented reality (AR) headset. And because they’ll work with Windows 10 PCs, they might not require all the high-end specs you’d find on a powerful desktop VR rig — a laptop may be just fine on its own.

Earlier this month, Google introduced its own low-cost Daydream View VR headset that works with certain Android devices.

http://venturebeat.com/2016/10/26/acer-asus-dell-hp-and-lenovo-will-ship-windows-10-vr-headsets-starting-at-299/

Augmented reality app to teach Australians beach safety

Samsung have built the SLSA a technological tool box to ensure the app reflects current beach conditions. At the beginning of patrol, lifesavers will program the app with any present hazards and they are able to update it throughout the day.

Then visitors, once they have the app downloaded, can visit a signposted beach checkpoint to sync the app with any rips, as programmed by the lifesavers. When looking at the app, the smartphone's camera will show the actual beach with computer-generated signposts superimposed, as well as facts and strategies to avoid danger.

See the full story here: http://uploadvr.com/snapchats-toy-glasses-dominance/

Mall of America is stepping up its digital game with virtual reality, robots

The mall worked with Minneapolis-based firm Visual to create the 360-degree video, which it launched at the end of April. Since then, the mall’s tourism staff has taken it to travel blogger and tourism conferences around the U.S. as well as to one over the summer in Stockholm.

An added benefit of virtual reality, she added, is that the technology transcends language barriers that MOA staff often confront when traveling around the world.

But there are some potential liabilities, too, since some people have been known to become physically ill from the motion in virtual reality. That is why MOA’s digital team chose the slower-moving Ferris wheel rather than other head-spinning attractions in Nickelodeon Universe.

See the full story here: http://www.startribune.com/mall-of-america-is-stepping-up-its-digital-game-with-virtual-reality-robots/397948631/

Fascinating Ways That Virtual Reality and Cannabis Are Intersecting

Everyone loves smoking weed and playing video games. Virtual reality takes this combination further by immersing users in sight and sound.

Get an insider's view of your favorite dispensary with a virtual reality tour, like the one provided by Metropolitan Wellness Center in Washington D.C.

Are you planning to farm cannabis? Have you spec’d out your grow facility? Virtual reality CAD tools are quickly becoming part of the new wave of industrialization that enables users to sketch 3-D architectural plans, design functioning prototypes in a virtual world before committing large budgets to manufacturing, and 3-D print prototypes into reality. These innovations are allowing the new wave of cannabis entrepreneurs to create in ways limited only by imagination.

Music and cannabis go hand-in-hand. It’s no surprise that artists who’ve mastered the surreal are turning to virtual reality to further engage their fans.  Artists like Jeremy Couillard expand on these ideas, forging immersive gallery experiences using VR that encourage people to question: “Is life organic? Or is life a computer simulation?”

See the full story here: https://www.merryjane.com/culture/virtual-reality-technology-cannabis

Putting The Reality In Virtual Reality Audio

Scott Colburn has basically spent his entire adult life working in the audio business. In the past he’s been a music producer for bands like Arcade Fire, Animal Collective and Mudhoney. He’s done the audio for films. His current job is a sound designer at Microsoft. Colburn is working on their virtual and augmented reality projects. His goal is to get the audio experience of virtual reality to sound just as real as the visual part of it, something that he was inspired to do after going to a local film festival.

One example that Colburn gave was that of a crow on a wire. In real life, if you are walking down the street, and you see a crow on a power line in front of you, and the crow is chirping, you would be able to hear that the crow was in front of you. As you continued to walk towards the crow, and eventually find yourself underneath it, you would hear that the crow was right above you. And as you passed the crow, you would be able to hear that the crow was behind you. That is what Colburn said was lacking audio-wise in virtual reality. The full 360-audio experience to go along with the 360-visual experience. And that is exactly what Colburn is working to improve.

See the full story with audio podcast here: http://knkx.org/post/putting-reality-virtual-reality-audio

Black Mirror recap: ‘Playtest’

Black Mirror S1 EP5-6

With augmented reality and virtual reality, we’re being drawn further into the media we consume, and the hope is that this immersion will make the experience of playing a video game more real. But, is there a point where escapism through these gadgets goes too far? That’s the question asked in the second episode of Black Mirror’s third season, which takes the desire of escapism to deadly conclusion.

“Playtest” dives into these questions by following Cooper, a globe-trotting American who seeks to avoid dealing with a tragedy in the family by touring the world and diving into an immersive new augmented reality survival game that uses his own brain chemistry to scare the s–t out of him.

See the full story here: http://www.ew.com/recap/black-mirror-season-3-episode-2-playtest

34% Use Augmented Reality For Shopping; Top Items: Furniture, Clothing, Grocery

It turns out that shoppers like the idea of using AR to explore and learn more about their prospective purchases, based on a new study.

The study is based on a survey of 1,100 adult U.S. adult shoppers conducted by Interactions Consumer Experience Marketing.

To define augmented reality to the shoppers in the survey, Interactions included the following: “unlike virtual reality, which creates an entirely artificial environment, augmented reality allows users to integrate digital images into their view of the real world, in real time.”

Consumers can use augmented reality for a range of retail products. Here are the most popular, according to the survey:

• 60% -- Furniture
• 55% -- Clothing
• 39% -- Grocery
• 35% -- Shoes
• 25% -- Makeup
• 25% -- Jewelry
• 22% -- Toys

The survey found that more than a third (34%) of shoppers already use augmented reality while shopping and nearly half (47%) of those like to use it both online and in a store.

Most (77%) of those who have used AR want to use it to see product differences, such as change in color or style, while more than half (65%) want to use it to get more product information.

Those surveyed included 58% female, 40% 18 to 34 years old and 18% 55 to 64 years old.

See more data in the original story here: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/287217/34-use-augmented-reality-for-shopping-top-items.html

CastAR Finally Coming To Market In 2017

CastAR announced that its “mixed reality gaming and entertainment platform” will finally arrive some time in 2017.

The announcement that CastAR is coming next year was buried in a press release announcing a trio of hires for the company. New to the company, starting immediately, are Peter Dille, CMO; Mel Heydari, Head of Talent; and Arnie Sen, VP of Engineering.

“Individually they have launched some of the most beloved interactive platforms, recruited Silicon Valley’s most sought-after talent and engineered bleeding-edge technologies across gaming and visual optics. Their expertise scaling across industry giants such as Activision, Sony and Tesla will bolster the organization,” read a press release.

See the full story here: http://www.tomshardware.com/news/castar-launch-2017-augmented-reality,32898.html

A new VR program called SurviVR aims to train employees how to deal with an active shooter situation in the workplace

The program works with HTC Vive,...

An active shooter situation is when an armed person or people actively shoot in a confined, populated area with the intent to kill. There were 20 such situations in the United States last year and 20 the year before, according to FBI statistics, resulting in a total of 231 deaths. This year saw the deadliest active shooter situation in U.S. history, with 49 people killed in a nightclub in Orlando.

SurviVR is the result of a collaboration between The Safety Group, which does workplace safety trainings, and Human Condition Safety, which specializes in technology for workplace safety. The companies consulted with members of the FBI and the NYPD, various intelligence analysts, Navy Seals and other security, terrorism and survival experts to create the program.

In the training scenario, users have four options. They can lock themselves in the office. They can hide, perhaps in the office closet. They can run for an exit. Or they can use something in the office—a computer or a cup or a pair of scissors—as a weapon to fight the shooter. This is an improvement on standard active shooter training, Gallo says, which typically teaches people to lock themselves in place and hide. This “lock down” method is often ineffective, he says, and has resulted in numerous deaths in recent years.
Similarly, SurviVR can help identify the “alpha males and alpha females” who would be especially helpful in an active shooter scenario, Gallo says.

See the full story here: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/face-active-shooter-virtual-reality-you-may-be-better-prepared-to-survive-real-life-encounter-180960827/?no-ist

Innovations The airplane is preparing to land. Please remove your virtual reality headset.

To Skylights, that’s the future of in-flight entertainment.

The French start-up company manufactures a headset with a built-in screen that claims to offer a “middle-row movie theater field of view” for watching high-resolution 2-D, 3-D and virtual-reality content. On Thursday, Skylights released the second iteration of the wearable device, called Bravo, which airlines can rent and loan to their passengers for a fee.

Skylights has trialed the headsets on a handful of European airlines over the last year, including Air France, KLM and low-cost carrier XL Airways. In July, the company established an office in Palo Alto, Calif., with hopes of expanding into the U.S. market, said Laurence Fornari, the head of sales.

Skylights already has agreements to show films from 20th Century Fox and DreamWorks, Fornari said, adding that the headsets currently offer about 60 movie options and can run for six hours on a single charge.

See the full story here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2016/10/20/the-airplane-is-preparing-to-land-please-remove-your-virtual-reality-headset/