Memory Capture & Virtual Tourism for the Benefit of Those with Physical Disabilities

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roy-sherrillRoy Sherrill is enabling the time travelers from the future to get a sense of presence at a number of different tech and cultural events around the San Francisco Bay area. Roy’s been shooting a lot of 360 videos from his wheelchair at a number of different VR events this Spring and Summer, and he thinks of his selfie stick with a 360-degree bubblecam as a “wizard staff” and “portal stone.” When asked to explain why he’s recording all of this footage he says, “I capture slices of reality one moment at a time and save it in a bubble so that I can project others into it in the future so they can get the sense of presence as if they’re there themselves.” He’s enabling future members of the Society for Creative Anachronism to have a more direct experience of history as it unfolds.

Take an Immersive Drive Through the World’s Most Secretive Country

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North Korea is one of the most secretive states in the world, but one man received permission from the nation’s strict regime to capture a drive through its capital Pyongyang. It’s a rare and immersive peek into a world few are allowed to witness.

Samsung’s New Standalone VR Headset May be Called ‘Odyssey’

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Samsung reportedly confirmed back at the company’s own developer conference that a new, standalone VR headset was on it’s way and new trademark filings may indicate it’s name.

HTC Vive Accessory Store Now Stocks Things You Actually Need

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Want to know how much a replacement HTC Vive Base Station or SteamVR controller would set you back should the worst happen? HTC’s Vive accessory store has been updated to include these items, along with some eye opening prices.

New Magic Leap Videos Shows AR Shopping and Voice Control

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A new video of Magic Leap’s augmented reality tech in action was shown at a conference in China today.

Facebook CEO: ‘In Five to Ten Years AR Will Be Where VR is Today’

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Zuckerberg walks by an audience seeing a VR demo | Image courtesy Mark Zuckerberg

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the company is working seriously on augmented reality R&D, but he believes it will take time for the technology to catch up to where VR is today.

Immersive Game Design Lessons from ‘Pokémon Go’

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kayla-kinnunenPokémon Go has quickly become the #1 mobile game of all time, and while there’s been some debate as to whether it should be considered Augmented Reality or not, it’s clear that location-based gaming has taken to the next level.

I had a chance to unpack some of the game design principles to see how it’s optimized to facilitate cooperative social gameplay with Roadhouse Interactive’s VR Director Kayla Kinnunen at Casual Connect this week. Kayla talks about how Pokémon Go has connected her to more strangers in two weeks than in 15 years, how it’s changing her relationship with her wife, encouraging her to walk more, as well as some of the social contract issues and deeper lessons for the future of augmented and virtual reality gaming.

NVIDIA’s Next-gen Titan X Has 11 TFLOPS Performance, 12GB of Memory, and Costs 1 Arm and 1 Leg

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NVIDIA's GTX Titan X GPU

This evening at an artificial intelligence event at Stanford, NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang revealed the next-gen Titan X, the company’s crazy-powerful, crazy-expensive high-end GPU.

PlayStation VR Game Prices Previewed in Amazon Listings

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Listings on Amazon have revealed prices for some PlayStation VR games, giving an idea of what Sony plans to charge for the first wave of virtual reality titles to hit the console platform.

NVIDIA Says New Foveated Rendering Technique is More Efficient, Virtually Unnoticeable

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NVIDIA Research has demonstrated a new method of foveated rendering which the company says is nearly invisible to users. Researchers behind the new approach say the method can drastically reduce rendering workload, allowing for more detailed virtual reality scenes.

Designing a VR Experience for Streaming Spectators on VREAL

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Tadhg-KellyWhat are the game design considerations for creating a VR experience that will be compelling for not only the primary player, but also the spectators who may be watching it on a livestream with VREAL? This was the big question that I discussed with VREAL’s Director of Developer Relations Tadhg Kelly, who has been collaborating with VR developers to make sure that an experience works for both third-person spectators as well as the primary player.

OSVR Launches Pre-orders for HDK 2 VR Headset, Begins Shipping July 29

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Starting today OSVR is taking pre-orders for the HDK 2, the modular, open source ‘Hacker Development Kit’ VR headset which the organization says will ship starting on July 29th.

Five Theories of Motion Sickness Triggers in Virtual Reality

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jason-jeraldWhen people dream about what they want to do in VR, it inevitably involves actually moving around within a virtual environment. But VR locomotion triggers simulator sickness in a lot of people, and solving it is one of the biggest open problems in virtual reality. NextGen Interactions’ Jason Jerald wrote a comprehensive summary of much of the pertinent academic research about VR in The VR Book, and in Chapter 12 he summarizes the five major theories of what may cause simulator sickness.

Valve’s Only VR Title, ‘The Lab’, is the Highest Rated Game on All of Steam

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Among more than 9,000 games on Steam, Valve’s VR title The Lab is heading the platform’s list of top rated games.

‘Mr. Robot’ 360 Experience Set to Stream to all Major VR Headsets For Limited Time

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photo courtesy of the USA Network

Mr. Robot fans take note: a special one-time-only 360 experience is headed your way for Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, Gear VR and Google Cardboard-enabled smartphones exactly at 10:45 AM PST on Thursday, July 21st.

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