Distributed interactive 3D, VR Sectors
Background
The traditional VR (Virtual Reality) market is nowadays a “dead” market. The reason: there are already many applications available (Covise, OpenSG, ...), all well developed, ready to buy, many users. Just doing VR rendering alone is nothing new.
The VR scene has recently changed a bit since the technology has become much cheaper, as have projection technology, and computers. This means new application areas could appear, such as museums, cultural heritage sights, entertainment, shopping, advertising, and design in different fields not using VR technology today.
The novelties in Uni-Verse are the combination of high quality audio with visual rendering and the support for distributed development and application. The currently available VR systems do not handle audio very well so there is a need for new systems that can handle audio, from authoring-tools to rendering software. Current tools don’t support collaborative development in any efficient way either. When Uni-Verse tools for the content creation of Virtual Worlds become mainstream it is natural that the visualization and simulation are also done within the Uni-Verse system instead of transferring the content to some other system. Some areas that we consider as VR do not have the high demands for efficiency as the game market and it would be easier to stay within the Uni-Verse system instead of running some other system for efficiency reasons. We should try to find applications that combine the novelties of Uni-Verse with the changes in the available technology.
Below is a list of possibilities, including several examples of applications:
- Conference and meetings using augmented reality solutions. 3D sound has important features that adds value to video conferencing.
- Applications that use VR to connect space at different geographical positions, like the - Virtual sport stadium or a virtual distributed theatre. As an example: a room in a pub with audio and visual rendering system which is connected to other pub with similar system and to a real sport stadium.
- Interactive, distributed furnishing design. A place like IKEA can have home furnishing consultants working over the web and help you to design your home. See how your choices of wallpaper, pain and furnisher would appear in your apartment and hear how it will affect the acoustics.
- Noise analysis and control in city, landscape planning and architecture: The traditional tool for acousticians to perform noise analysis is directed towards quantitative measures. The results are given as numbers and tables that are very difficult for others then experts to understand. It is also be a problem to focus only on the level of the noise and not considering the quality. There are cases where increasing the noise level by masking one noise with another perceptually gives a better sonic environment. Much would be gained by simulating the noise to make a qualitative analysis and to present the results in a form that is understandable for most people.
- Interior of skyscrapers / office buildings (e.g. is the sound level in the offices ok, even if there are many visitors going in and out in the hallway)
- Distributed consultant tool for loudspeaker placement for home theatre.
Three application areas can be extracted from the above: VR sound design systems, Interactive distributed design support and distributed meeting spaces.
Use Cases
1. Distributed meeting spaces
There are a number of projects known to members of the consortium that are exploring the possibilities to use VR to connect geographically spread locations. These kinds of applications have not been economically possible before because the technology was too expensive. But as that has recently changed, there is now a great market potential in these types of applications. By adding 3D sound it adds new values to virtual meeting applications. Using this type of applications in the entertainment area has a great commercial potential.
2. Interactive distributed design support
This demonstrator can have several scenarios. A customer is sitting at his home computer. He connects via the web to IKEA’s home furnishing and design support. A consultant is answering at the other side of the connection. The customer has a scanned blueprint of his apartment, and the consultant make a 3D model of the apartment. Now the customer together with the consultant is painting and furnishing a room in the apartment. When the customer is satisfied he is offered the possibility to buy the things needed for the redecoration. Another scenario would be in the shop itself but with more advanced visualisation like a Cave or Heyewall.
3. VR sound design system
“VR System to design and simulate sound behaviour of products”
- VR immersive device together with audio devices. This calls for new design of the presentation situation. The acoustic design of the presentation space has to be considered. Well designed acoustics in the presentation space is needed for the audio to become truly immersive. There are often very bad acoustics in the presentation spaces today. The worst case are the Caves, especially the 6-wall Cave where there are huge problems with the small-room acoustics created by the projection screens.
- Possibilities for VR: Full scalable from PC (Monitor) over projection walls (Heyewall) to Cave
- Possibilities for Audio: Use several loudspeakers or tracked headphones (position, orientation)
- (Schematic graphic:) Cave + surrounding loudspeakers
