Vrvana's Totem HMD Puts a Camera Over Each Eye

The Verge reports that Montreal startup Vrvana has produced a prototype of its promised (and crowd-funded) VR Totem headset. One interesting aspect of the Totem is the inclusion of front-facing cameras, one over each eye, the output of which can be fed to the displays. Reviewer Mike Futter has worn a prototype, and seems to be generally impressed, writing at Game Informer: Vrvana’s device offers 1080p resolution and features 90-degree field of view (the same as the Project Morpheus, but less than the Oculus Rift's 100-degree FOV), an OLED display, and adjustable lenses that can compensate for lens prescription. The HMD is usable by glasses wearers, but the tuning provides an option for those that don't want to wear corrective lenses while in VR. The system connects via HDMI to any source, and can model 3D (side-by-side) from game consoles as virtual reality right now. The Totem is currently compatible with all Oculus developer kit 1 applications, and Vrvana is working on getting DK2 experiences working. The prototype I wore was a good proof of concept, but didn't yet feature the OLED screen. This led to increased persistence due to the LCD. The head tracking also wasn't perfect, requiring some software tuning to prevent drift (something easily surmountable down the road). The clarity was impressive, rivaling some of the best experiences I've had with a Rift or Morpheus.

Comments

Re:FOV question

[Thanshin]

The approximate field of view of an individual human eye is 95 away from the nose, 75 downward, 60 toward the nose, and 60 upward, allowing humans to have an almost 180-degree forward-facing horizontal field of view. With eyeball rotation of about 90 (head rotation excluded, peripheral vision included), horizontal field of view is as high as 270. About 12–15 temporal and 1.5 below the horizontal is the optic nerve or blind spot which is roughly 7.5 high and 5.5 wide.