iMyth

Tag: Vive

  • Boom Town: The Ultimate Immersive Experience?

    Boom Town: The Ultimate Immersive Experience?

    I recently came upon this Facebook article from the UK about, what they claim, the world’s most immersive experience: Boom Town.

    https://www.facebook.com/BuzzFeedUK/videos/2330089977077212/

    Before this posting I have never seen or heard of Boom Town before. It sounds a bit like an English variation of Burning Man mixed in with a music Festival. Music Festivals are wonderful immersive experiences. I love how Boom Town is a theme world integrated with the festival. I wonder if the theme world changes each year they put this festival together.

    As far as iMyth is concerned, I think it would be awesome to empower participants to participate in an immersive theme world, such as Boom Town. With the magic of the internet, participants may choose how they interact with the theme world; actively, semi-actively or passively.

    The most dramatic method would be active. Participants would be required to go to an immersive theme world arena, such as iMyth, put on the immersive equipment and jump into the fun. They would be able to physically act and react and participate with all of the sensory stimuli the theme world has to offer. Folks who participate in this method are the most adventurous and crave the most interactive of all experiences.

    Semi-actively, participants could join in the fun from their mobile devices or from their home computers. They will be able to experience the theme world from personal based HMDs such as Oculus, Vive, or even Magic Leap. The important aspect is that the participants would not be required to participate from an immersive theme world arena. However, they will not be able to Physically participate. They will contribute to the experience as interactors or non-physical participants. Folks who participate at this level may not be able to physically participate in an iMyth arena. They may simply wish to not interact as deeply; metaphorically wading into the water instead of diving in.

    The third option is to participate passively. Restricted once again to a mobile device or home computer, the participant will not be required to employ a visualization device, (HMD), but could view the activities of the theme world from their phone screen or monitor. The view options of this passive perspective are unlimited. However, the amount of interactivity and immersion are also the least. This perspective is for folks who wish to watch on the sidelines and sample the experience before venturing in deeper.

    Festivals such as Boom Town are an inspiring goal of where immersive theme worlds can get to. Since iMyth experience can exist on all three levels of interactivity and immersion, they might actually be able to become something even larger. This of course will need to be explored further once immersive theme worlds start gaining traction.

  • Creative Vive Tracking Usage

    Creative Vive Tracking Usage

    A couple of months ago, iMyth created a rough prototype of its immersive experience. One of iMyth’s key components is physical props and sets. We integrated very inexpensive props and sets into our experience. While not the most sturdy these set pieces did an outstanding job demonstrating the physically immersive concept.

    Bandai Namco has taken this concept one step further and created an experience based on the Doraemon Anywhere Door theme world. Using the HTC Vive, Leap Motion, and a few simple props tracked with attached Vive controllers, the team was able to create two very interesting interactive props.

    https://gfycat.com/SpiffyDisgustingHowlermonkey

    The first of these props is the door. Using a very simple props door placed cleverly inside the Vive play space in order to avoid loosing tracking. The use Leap Motion to track the participant’s hands which of course frees up the Vive Controllers. One of the controllers is placed on the edge of the door and is used to track the door opening and closing. It is a simple concept but the physical component is extraordinarily impact-full. What I really want to know is where did they get the great door prop? Notice that the prop doesn’t have a footprint larger that what it would have in real life. How did they anchor it? It looks solid.

    https://gfycat.com/ImpishCautiousGermanspitz

    The second object is a simple desk. Once again, all the creators did was attach a second controller to the drawer of the desk. The desk itself is stationary and never moves. Once again this is very effective use of a simple concept.

    I just place my order to HTC for 4 tracking “pucks”. We should get them by the end of the week. The pucks are going to be used to help track the interactor. However, I did forget that for every Vive there are two controllers. That means iMyth will now have 8 tracked objects to deal with. Where can we go from here?

  • Full Body Tracking

    Full Body Tracking

    Lat month, in December, iMyth Demonstrated full body tracking for its interactor using the Perception Neuron tracking outfit. It was an impressive bit of engineering to get the system up and working and coordinated with the Vive and UE4. For the prototype example this tech strategy worked well. The participant understood the interactor and there was never any “strong” concerns about the problems with the tech.

    Regretfully there were many Problems.

    1. The Perception Neuron was “sensitive”. Sometime it wanted to come out and play. Some days we could not get it to talk no matter what we did.
    2. IMU Drift. Because the Neuron suit was only implemented with IMU trackers the suit never really understood its world space location and the interactor kept drifting off.
    3. Spazzing out. Occasionally, the character was just sort of go into a seizure, freeze up or go a little crazy. For the prototype this was fine but we need a more consistent solution.
    4. Finger Tracking. Did the Perception neuron actually track the interactor’s fingers during the actual experience? Regretfully we never tested. I have a concern they did not work.
    5. The Perception Neuron Suit was actually owned by one of our Technical Producers, Andrew. We are very grateful Andrew allowed iMyth to use the suit. Regretfully the suite left when Andrew graduated.

    In Mid-December, I also attended journeyed to Seattle to get Vive Lighthouse training. The Lighthouse id the tracking technology Valve uses to track all of the objects in the environment. With this technology we could track an almost infinite number of objects and build our own Vive Controllers. I immediately started thinking about how we could use this technology to easily track the interactor and participant.

    It seems like a couple of other companies were thinking about the same thing. Steve Bowler at Cloadgate experimented with strapping Vive Controllers to his feet. He was able to get some pretty good results.

    Steve’s solution was a great first start. However it was a bit problematic since he required an entirely new Vive setup to get the controllers. He did not have any waist tracking, (Important for tracking overall body movement). Also, controllers strapped to your feet are a bit awkward.

    Now it seems like the folks at IKinema have taken things one step further and and created their own Vive tracker controllers which are mounted on the feet and waist.

    This demonstration looks really sharp and claim to have no post-processing. I believe them. However the imYth solution is still not quite there. Project Orion may still take some time to become commercially available. Their solution required two controllers, one in each hand. For iMyth I am seeking a hands free solution so we would require a tracking device on the wrists and eventually some IMU finger tracking. Ikinema is also a Motion tracking company so I I would not be surprised if we wanted their technology, we would also probably need to purchase a suite of re-targeting tools which would be overkill for what we want. I don’t know. I’d like to get in contact with the Ikinema guys and investigate their plans for release.

    So this leads ups back to iMyth creating their own tracking solution. I just received an email from Reid at Triad Semiconductor saying they just received the go ahead to produce the boards needed to create custom controllers. Those will be available in 8 weeks. This will be exciting since iMyth will not only be tracking the interactor and participant but multiple other participants and multiple set pieces and props as well. Very exciting times!

  • Body Presence in VR

    Body presence in VR has been one of those topics that folks knew could be achieved but really “had not gotten” around to working on. Steve Bowler at Cloud Gate Studio seems to be making strides towards this direction. He recently posted on tweeter a video with himself with hand and feet controllers as demonstrated in this video.

    What’s cool about Steve’s implementation is that he is using two Vive’s on Two Computers to track the participant. Based on the amount of control he had I would say he is holding the controllers in his hands; as shown in the videos. But he also has pretty good control of his ankles which means he has mounted the controllers on each of his feet. This means he is approximating waist position and probably using simple IK for Knee and elbow position. He admits on the video that he doesn’t have good control over the waist. By the looks of the video his wrists are detached from his arm. He probably is approximating the pole vectors for the elbows and knees as well.

    The iMyth experience used two Vive’s in tandem to track the participant as well as the interactor. It’s great seeing someone hook up two Vives on the participant to see what happens. In the future, iMyth will need to use multiple trackers on one character. If combined with some IMU hand tracking device such as the Manus Glove then I think all that would be necessary would be trackers at each wrist. Trackers would then need to be added for each foot and waist. I Think in order to get the leg rotation correct, trackers would be necessary for the knees. I’m not sure about the elbows at first. Somewhere down the liner they will be a necessity. However, since elbows are not a particularly popular point on the body to touch, I think their priority can be dropped.

    It will be exciting to see how much the Vive tracking pucks cost. Either iMyth will need to incorporate those pucks or create its own, home brewed version.

     

  • Wireless Vive

    I don’t normally write about improvements in technology. I would rather focus on Story and experience related topics. However this is groundbreaking and will have a significant impact on the HTC Vive.

    A Chinese company called TPCast has created a device add-on for the HTC Vive making it wireless. While some folks may balk at the $220 price tag on top of the $800 they already plunked down for the Vive, this may just be one of the key components needed to help get the VR Cade concept of the ground This is especially true with iMyth.

    [embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYMzuvjBbN4[/embedyt]

    One of the distractions for iMyth is we have created a 20’x20′ play space area. Regretfully this is longer than the actual cable is able to reach. We were planning to look into expanding the cable. However, for the new year, this wireless solution will be much better. Since the cable would have been very expensive, this more expensive alternative will be a welcome addition to the iMyth arsenal.

    Folks may not want to pay extra to have this wireless luxury at home. However, peripherals and accessories such as this may be just the hook to entice people to get out of their homes and have an iMyth experience!

  • Two Brothers Knocking it out of the park in Canada

    Here is an inspiring article about two brothers in Edmonton who are trying to do a lot of what iMyth is attempting and knocking it out of the park!

    Edmonton Brothers Creating Cutting Edge Virtual Reality Haunted House in Basement

    What is great about what these guys are doing is that there are two participants in the experience, each with a Vive Headset. This is a technological breakthrough that iMyth has just recently overcome. Of course the participants are not interacting with real props and sets and of course no interactor. However, they do seem to have a very simple formula and they are making it work. Haunted Houses are the first immersive media destinations. This new form of media will grow past the Halloween!

     

  • Room Scale VR Arcade

    This article is a bit old but I wanted to provide a link for it, Control V, First Vive VR Arcade.

    This does a good job explaining how a Facility could be created with several experiences going on at the same time.

  • Manus VR

    I wrote about this company about a year ago and they are still going strong.

    https://manus-vr.com/

    These guys may provide a good tracking solution for hands and the Vive.!

  • iMyth Post 4/29

    I figured I had better be documenting iMyth progress as things move along.

    I suppose I have been lax in doing so:

    • 4/25 – My Vive arrives via Fed-Ex. No one is home to receive it :(.
    • 4/26 – AT the end of the work day, I high-tail it to the Fed-Ex depot and pick up my Vive.
      • Yeah!
    • 4/27 – After spending the bulk of the day with class and students, I start focusing on installing my Vive. It does not work. I put together an impassioned message to Vive Support explaining my dilemma.
    • 4/28 – Muchos meetings all morning. AFter getting back from the meetings, I install the Vive on the Galley PC. It works! The Vive experience is pretty awesome!
    • 4/29 – I try to apply the feedback I received from Vive Support. To make a long story short, my computer is not VR compatible. After all this time I thought it was :(. Boy do I look silly. I Guess that sort of explains why the Occulus refused to work on my machine as well. Bryant, the fello from CAH says my iMyth machine will be arriving from Alienware today. Gotta keep my fingers crossed.

  • Extended Vive Capability

    I bit the bullet and pre-ordered my Vive yesterday. Now I just need to wait for it to arrive in early April.

    In the mean time I will continue researching adding extended range to the Vive.

    Developers Stress Level Zero are doing just that with the Vive Lighthouse. Evidently, the lighthouse is just a dumb laser and the sensor does all of the work, picking up the laser signal and using the information to calculate position and orientation. These guys at Stress Level Zero experiment around, pushing the limites of the Vive’s ranch. Here are some of their results as posted in the Road to VR article, Developer pushes Valve’s lighthouse tracking to its limits.

    Evidently the lighthouse chain can be strung together. However, as expressed in this video, some hacking may be required:

    This would be very cool to employ a volume of Lighthouse emitters to produce a 3 D Lazer Mocap studio.