Slashdot Mirror
Ready for a CyberWalk?
Roland Piquepaille writes "Even with recent improvements in virtual reality technology, it's still almost impossible to physically walk through virtual environments. Now, European researchers have started a project named CyberWalk and they'll demonstrate next week their omni-directional treadmill, named CyberCarpet. According to ICT Results, the researchers 'had to address five key issues: providing a surface to walk on, controlling the surface in a way that minimized forces on the user, developing a non-intrusive tracking system, displaying a high-quality visualization, and ensuring a natural human perception of the virtual environment.' The researchers think that their new virtual environments would be used by architects and the gaming industry." Additional details are also available via the project website.
Actually I'm pretty sure there's no way for this to convince someone it's real. You know that the ground is moving under you when you take a step so you'll always know you're not really going anywhere. Plus, people can sense acceleration.
... gettin' there ...
Which is mostly done in the inner ear: Three "rate gyros" per ear (the semicircular canals) plus three linear accelleration sensors ditto (nerve cells with calcified masses on the ends).
But it turns out these can be fooled by elecrtostimulus from varying magnetic fields generated by coils mounted on a headpiece near them.
There has been at least one slashdot article on these - including adding them to a headpiece to mimic the head acceleration that would match a moving screen image to reduce "barfogenisis" and improve simulation game experience. Adding them to a 3-D VR simulation would be the next logical step.
With wall screens and projection onto the moving floor you could create the necessary visual illusion.
Gettin' there
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Unless it can simulate smell, I think your dog will find the VR world quite lacking.
There was a science fiction short story involving just such a reverse trackball - though larger than ten feet - being used to trap a victim. Once on the ball, feedback rotated the ball to bring him to the center and keep him there, no matter how he ran, jumped, or dodged.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Somehow I didn't expect a link to a treadmill to be so quickly slashdotted. O.o
The article seems to have undergone the /. effect, so I can't tell if this treadmill will do things for elevation change. Steps might be too much at this point, but what about hills?
Anyway, while going through a virtual world as if I were really there sounds cool, especially in the realm of video games, I think virtualization technology better fits the office, though it might see harder adoption.
How many people need to be in an office building for a meeting? (Nevermind how useful the meeting actually is.) How many people travel thousands of miles to give one presentation, then fly back?
Why not move phone conferencing to the virtual age? Obviously, having everyone represented by an avatar would make the meeting a bit ludicrous for those not used to it. So, why not take a page from the movie industry and go blue screen?
The way I see it is that at various locations around the globe, there is a building full of meeting rooms. Large tables, nice chairs, but no decoration and it's all one color (say, blue). When people enter, they don a set of VR goggles. Cameras in both their goggles and around the room record people and project that real world scenario into this virtual world, then seen through the VR goggles. Then, whoever is "hosting" the meeting can set up or choose from various themes to decorate the virtual rooms. Various tools allow people to project into this virtual world, to get up and walk around, hell even virtual notes.
Obviously, something would need to be done about the goggles such that either they were more like sunglasses or they were somehow removed in the digital projection. And it would take some serious hardware to do a good projection as well as including real-time video. But I believe that this kind of thing would be a big boon for international visits- now you only have to worry about time zones, not planes, hotels, and car rides. Fuel savings, cost savings (once the tech gets there), time savings. If done well enough, there would be no difference than if you were in person. Handshake aside, do you often make physical contact with the people you meet with? No dinner afterwards, unfortunately.
You could have a meeting with potential clients in Japan and be home in an hour.