philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Valve to Reveal “SteamVR Dev Kit” Next Week at GDC 2015

Gaming giant Valve has announced that they’ll be revealing a “previously-unannounced SteamVR hardware system” at GDC 2015. 

Now Valve seems ready to reveal their own VR headset. Writing on their website that Valve is “actively seeking VR content creators” for a “previously-unannounced SteamVR hardware system” which they’ll demonstrate at GDC 2015 next week. The company is soliciting folks who want to try the “SteamVR Dev Kit,” language which closely resembles that of Oculus and other VR hardware companies with publicly available developer hardware that to be iterated upon until a consumer release.

Apple Granted Patent for Gear VR-like Mobile Headset, Could Have “Broad Ramifications” for Such Devices

Yesterday, Apple was granted a patent for a Gear VR-like mobile headset which would use a portable device (like a smartphone) as the primary display. 

Back in 2008 though, when Apple filed a patent for a “Head-mounted display apparatus for retaining a portable electronic device with display,”—among the many patents the company has filed that sat on the shelf—who could have confidently said whether or not it would even come into play?

See the full story here: http://www.roadtovr.com/apple-granted-patent-gear-vr-like-mobile-vr-headset-broad-ramifications-possible-mobile-headsets/

Disney Imagineer to Share VR Learnings from past 20 Years at GDC 2015

Bei Yang, the ‘Creative Technologies’ leader at Walt Disney Imagineering, will be holding a talk on March 5th at this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC) and revealing VR strategies learned by the R&D arm of Disney over the past 20 years of its existence.

The talk is called ‘Practical Virtual Reality for Disney Themeparks‘ and will discuss game design principles and practical applications of VR headsets, but will also present valuable technical insight into some well-trodden ground for Disney’s Imagineering group: the CAVE (Cave Automatic Virtual Environment), a platform that displays a projected 3D image on an enclosed space that can offer virtual experiences to one or more people at a time.

Since 2007, Bei Yang has been helping to develop VR experiences and robotic animations for Disney themeparks worldwide at the Imagineering skunkworks, Disney’s own blending of ‘imagination’ and ‘engineering’.

Walt Disney Imagineering, being one of the original pioneers in VR in the late 1980s, has in truth never stopped playing with VR and using it.

Attendees will learn about some of the practical problems when creating VR experiences for the real world. This will include what causes nausea, what gives a sense of immersion, and the problems that arise when technically implementing VR from both a software and hardware perspective.

See the original post here: http://www.roadtovr.com/disney-imagineer-to-share-vr-learnings-from-past-20-years-at-gdc-2015/

Lionsgate Launches ‘Insurgent’ Virtual Reality Experience with Samsung

Lionsgate is partnering with Samsung Electronics America to create “Insurgent – Shatter Reality” as a four-minute virtual reality experience to promote the studio’s upcoming film “The Divergent Series: Insurgent.”

The visual work will features stars from the film including Kate Winslet, Miles Teller and Mekhi Phifer. The film opens in the U.S. on March 20.

“Insurgent – Shatter Reality” will be available starting Wednesday, first through Samsung Gear VRpowered by the Galaxy Note 4 in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Austin and San Francisco, prior to going live across all platforms and app stores.

The experience will also be available on Samsung’s Milk VR service starting March 1. Fans outside the tour areas will be able to view the experience on Samsung Gear VR during March 7-8 at select Best Buy stores across the U.S.

See the full story here: http://variety.com/2015/digital/news/lionsgate-launches-insurgent-virtual-reality-experience-with-samsung-1201436000/

Broadcasting everything your smartphone sees and hears could be the next trend in social media.

[Philip Lelyveld comment: LifeCasting is back!  Easier and with new controls.]

The premise was simple—everything his phone could see and hear, his followers could also see and hear.

It seems like just about everything you say and do might wind up on the Internet someday. But this was something different: with Yevvo, everything we said and did was on the Internet,right then and there. 

Yevvo, which relaunched last year with new features and a new name—Air—isn’t the only app to allow people to broadcast their lives live. With the spread of high-quality smartphone cameras, not to mention camera-equipped wearable devices, the use of such apps is sure to become more common. And such personal broadcasting could start to change the social media landscape.

Air’s users notify contacts when they begin a broadcast, and then anyone following that feed can push-notify their followers to check it out too. Nothing is saved or stored for later. If you missed it in real time, you missed it. 

Rubin and two others founded Yevvo after trying to figure out which parties to go to at a tech conference in Austin, Texas. They decided it would be nice to be able to actually show each other what a given scene was like.

...it is positioned at television media’s latest shift, from “being curated, and heavily produced, to tuning into who you want, based on who you know.”

See the full story here: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/535156/your-iphone-might-make-you-a-reality-tv-star/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20150218

Fashion Week Brings Virtual Reality To the Runway

Fashion designer Rebecca Minkoff debuted her Bohemian Fall 2015 collection down the catwalk last Friday. Filming the show using two high-tech cameras to see a 360-degree view of the show, Minkoff plans to release the show using virtual reality. It will be released in a few months since it will take around 50 days to get the experience ready for viewing.

Those who plan on attending the show through their Oculus Rift and Cardboard VR viewers can choose to view it from the photographer pit or from the beginning of the runway.

During London Fashion Week, TOPSHOP and Inition, a 3D agency, is allowing customers to experience their fashion show virtually, from their store located in Central London.

see the full story here: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/33133/20150216/fashion-week-brings-virtual-reality-runway.htm

Lockheed Is Using These Augmented Reality Glasses To Build Fighter Jets

[Philip Lelyveld note: new AR technology is now working its way back into the industries where VR and AR originated!]

Until recently, Lockheed Martin needed a team of technicians with years of training to wrench on its sophisticated machines. But now, in the advanced factory where the company is building the F-35, engineers are using augmented reality glasses and educational software that provide real-time visuals during the plane's assembly, ensuring that every part on the warplane is in the right place.

Lockheed is collaborating with NGRAIN on a trial in which employees wear $700 Epson Moverio BT-200 glasses, transparent glasses with a front-facing camera that uses motion and depth sensors to overlay images onto the technician's working environment. When a glasses-wearing engineer is installing a brake component on the landing gear, they look at the wheel and the chunky glasses show renderings of every bolt and cable, with the part numbers and ordered instructions showing where each part fits. It's like being able to see a hologram of the Legos you need to assemble a project overlaid with the instructions, as opposed to looking down and checking the instruction manual.

See the full story here: http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a13967/lockheed-martin-augmented-reality-f-35/

For LG’s G3, virtual reality is just a bundle away

LG is offering a free alternative to rival Samsung's $310 Gear VR headset, giving new buyers of the G3 phone a virtual-reality headset based on Google Cardboard.

The South Korean electronics company said Monday that it'll soon kick off a new promotion that offers a virtual-reality headset -- the VR for G3 -- for free for new buyers of its G3 flagship smartphone. The headset, which is based on Google's Cardboard device, uses the G3 as the screen, allowing owners to use it for VR apps and games downloaded from the Google Play store.

Both headsets are just one part of a growing list of virtual-reality and augmented-reality products being created, as tech firms work to add new technologies into those previously unrealized markets. 

See the full story here: http://www.cnet.com/news/lg-to-give-away-new-vr-for-g3-headsets/

Seebright Wave Smartphone-powered AR Headset Claims “Widest Field of View”, Heading to Kickstarter for $150

[Philip Lelyveld note: pure vaporware, but an interesting and different prototype design.]
Lang was able to try on the latest form factor prototype (photo above). It wasn’t functional, so we can’t comment on the field of view, but it was definitely more slim than earlier prototypes which had the phone mounted vertically. For the final design of the Kickstarter device, the company is aiming for something even more sleek, but there’s still a ways to go before we’d consider wearing it out and about.

See the full story here: http://www.roadtovr.com/seebright-wave-smartphone-ar-headset-widest-field-of-view-kickstarter-price/

Sulon Cortex ‘Augmented Virtual Reality’ Headset, Interview with Don Henderson

Sulon are not talking in detail about the Cortex’s hardware just yet, but Henderson was able to share an overview, “…it has a sensor built into it that allows it to scan the environment immediately when you put it on, within 20m in all directions,” he said. “…therefore it can sense what the environment is, scan it out and display to you what is in the room and also then convert that into a virtual reality experience as well.” As to what kind of power the untethered VR headset can offer, “The headset has many processors built into it, so you don’t plug into an external device like a PC or a laptop etc. which allows you to walk around.” The Cortex also houses dual, front-facing cameras that allow input through hand recognition.

See the full story here: http://www.roadtovr.com/sulons-don-henderson-cortex-augmented-virtual-reality-hmd/