While virtual reality control schemes are still being explored, many developers have turned to the Razer Hydra as an effective input for use with the Oculus Rift. The Hydra uses magnetic tracking to determine the absolute position and orientation of two Wiimote-like controllers held in the player’s hand. The controllers also have joysticks and buttons which make for a highly flexible virtual reality input system. Today-only you can buy the Razer Hydra for $40 from my favorite deal-a-day site, Woot.com.
Can’t get enough Google Glass? After combing the depths of the web, I bring you a Google Glass gallery of 100 unique pictures for your enjoyment. Ok maybe it’s not every Glass photo, but definitely all of the good ones! I painstakingly sourced every photo (where possible), roll over the photo to see the source link. Click then click again on the next page to get high resolution versions of each photo (some are higher than others).
Have a photo to add or want a picture removed? Send me link at ben at roadtovr.com!
Google Glass is an exciting forthcoming wearable display produced by the company’s semi-secret ‘Google X’ lab. Units first became available for pre-order to attendees of the Google IO 2012 conference for $1500. Recently Google ran the #ifihadglass contest where they asked what people would do if they had Glass. That contest is now closed and winners will be picked soon. The Google Glass release date is expect to be toward the end of 2013.
Funny stuff aside, there’s a lot to be discussed about what it will mean to have such quick access to information. A few generations after Glass we’ll likely have instant access to Wikipedia which will extend our knowledge beyond our own brains… but that sounds like a topic for another day!
In the mean time, how do you think girls will use Google Glass?
Battlefield 3 could be getting Oculus Rift support along with future titles from EA-owned developer DICE. According to a recent internship posting, EA and DICE are looking for someone to “investigate and implement support for Occulus Rift SDK in the Frostbite Engine” which powers many of the company’s games, including Battlefield 3. MTBS3D spoke with Frostbite Creative Director Frank Vitz who says he’s “really eager to see how the Oculus Rift works with Frostbite.”
Palmer Luckey and Nikolay Tolmachev testing sensor algorithms
Oculus employee and VR enthusiast Brant Lewis (aka Brantlew) opens his Kickstarter Dev Kit
Oculus Rift developer kits will soon be leaving the Chinese factory and making their way into the hands of eager developers. What’s happened since our last news bits update? Oculus says that shipping is going according to schedule. They’ve also confirmed that pilot run units were recently send out to top developers. Oculus has made it into the New York Times, and famed developer Chris Roberts swung by Oculus HQ.
Oculus VR Inc announced the Oculus Latency Tester in the company’s latest update. The device, which Oculus has been working on in the background, will allow developers to rapidly iterate during development of their virtual reality games and software by making latency testing quick and easy. The company, which expects the unit to sell for less than $100, is now taking ‘reservations’ for the Oculus Latency Tester which is sort of like a pre pre-order — it’ll secure your place in line once the pre-orders start.
Google Glass could be the first product to take augmented reality into the mainstream. The forthcoming minimal head mounted display promises to make our interaction with technology more seamless and natural. There are many who will welcome it. There are many who will hate it. Regardless of which side you’re on, we’re synthesizing everything we’ve learned after months of following every bit of Google Glass news.
Despite a recent deluge of Google Glass news, the company has been extremely quiet regarding Glass specs. There are still big gaps in our knowledge of the device. However, there have been hints to glean along the way for those paying attention.
First I’ll start by painting the clearest technical picture of Google Glass specs from the available information:
Appears to use a temple-mounted projection in combination with a prism/waveguide. Field of view is likely no higher than 15 degrees. Display appears in the top right of your vision as a transparent color image (1).
Likely an ARM processor such as those available in modern smartphones. 1GB of RAM is my best guess based on space restrictions.
Battery Life:Unspecified battery
Unless Google has struck some major battery breakthrough, expect 2-4 hours of continuous display usage, less if recording video, using WiFi, or taking photos (2).
Connectivity:WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS on-board, but no 3G or 4G for cellular data (1)
Glass can tether to iPhone, Android, and other devices for data.
Controls: Touchpad on the side, a physical button, and voice commands (1)
“Ok Glass…” is used to start command phrases. Touchpad must be tapped to start Glass listening for command phrases and can also be tapped to make selections. Gestures on the touchpad allow you to swipe left or right to slide through lists or down to go back. Tilting your head up slowly will also prompt Google Glass to start listening for voice commands (13).
Sensors: Gyroscope, magnetometer, and accelerometer (13)(3)
One unidentified sensor rests on the inside of the projection arm, near the eye (10). An anonymous source tells us that it is neither a camera for eye-tracking or a proximity sensor to detect when glass is worn. However, SlashGear says they have a source “close to the Glass project” that says it is indeed an infrared eye-tracking camera (13). We’re still lacking corroboration on that front though.
Ports: MicroUSB seems to be the only port on Google Glass(4)
Makes us wonder how Glass will charge, maybe it’ll use inductive charging? If a MicroUSB port is present it could have support for MHL which would provide HDMI output.
Camera: 3.1MP CMOS camera, focal length 2.8 mm, f/2.4 aperture (5), front-facing microphone appears to be just beneath the camera (11).
Technically capable of 1080p video but we’ve only ever seen 720p video from Google Glass, likely due to hardware restrictions (6).
Weight: ~36 grams (7)
Google Glass Frames, Lenses, and Colors
Google has shown a number of frame and lens styles for Google Glass.
Google says that the latest version of Glass has a screw that allows you to remove the frame and swap it out for a new one (1). At the moment they won’t say if they’re naming any partners that will be making frames, but the New York Times says that the company is in negotiations with Warby Parker on Google Glass frames (12).
Previously we’ve seen a prescription lens Google Glass prototype with traditional frames at Google IO 2012:
Colors:
As for the Glass unit itself, Google has showed off a variety of colors including Charcoal (black), Tangerine (orange), Shale (grey), Cotton (white), and Sky (blue) (10):
Waterproof Google Glass?
One picture we dug up shows someone using Google Glass covered in water droplets… will the unit be water resistant?
Google Glass Features
What can Google Glass do? The most recent video, ‘How it Feels Through Glass’, gives us a glimpse of what Google Glass features we can expect. The company says that the entire video was filmed using the Google glasses. Though the overlay that you see is added in post-production, it is true to what Google Glass can do and how it works, according to Joshua Topolsky’s time using Glass (1):
Elsewhere we have heard and seen what Glass can do; here’s a list:
Take pictures
Send photos
Record video
Make phone calls
Show the time
Show weather
Flight status notifications (possibly a subset of Google Now functionality)
Arrival and destination airports
Airline
Flight number
Departure time
On time/delay status
Terminal
Gate
Search Google
Images
Translation
Search results that appear to come from Google’s Knowledge Graph, which includes tons of useful info like real time sports scores, unit conversions, bios on people, info snippets on objects, forthcoming holidays, etc.
Stream video via Google Plus Hangout
Dictate text
Notifications
Send SMS
Get directions vis Google Maps
Driving
Biking
Walking
Google Glass Interface / Google Glass OS
SlashGear has a source “close to the Glass project” which has shared what appear to be official images from the Google Glass interface (13):
In a sense, Glass has most in common with Google Now. Like that service on Android phones, Glass can pull in content from all manner of places, formatted into individual cards. Content from third-party developers will be small chunks of HTML, for instance, with Google’s servers supporting the various services that Glass users can take advantage of.
Some of the cards refer to local services or hardware, and a dog-ear folded corner indicates there are sub-cards you can navigate through. The most obvious use of this is in the Settings menu, which starts off with an indication of battery status and connectivity type, then allows you to dig down into menus to pair with, and forget, WiFi networks, toggle Bluetooth on or off, see battery percentage and charge status, view free storage capacity and firmware status (as well as reset the headset to factory settings), and mange the angle-controlled wake-up system.
In effect, each card is an application. So, if you ask Glass to perform a Google search – using the same server-based voice recognition service as offered on Android phones – you get a side-scrolling gallery of results cards which can be navigated by side swiping on the touchpad. It’s also possible to send one of those results to your phone, for navigating on a larger display.
Google Glass Price
The first opportunity that the public had to pre-order Google Glass was a Google I/O 2012. U.S. based attendees were able to pre-order the ‘Explorer Edition’ of Glass for $1500 (8).
In the last week, Google announced the #ifihadglass campaign where people could submit short responses to the hashtag in order to have the opportunity to pre-order Google Glass, which would also cost $1500.
The Google Glass price will be “less than $1500” when it launches, according to The Verge (14).
But of course we knew that… Google Glass product director Steve Lee says that they expect millions of people to use Glass (1); that won’t happen if they want $1500 for each pair of Google glasses.
So from here we have only speculation. My best guess is that you will be able to buy Google Glass for $500 when it first launches, but I’m really hoping that Google can trim that figure down to $200 for widespread availability.
$500 is going to be a hard sell as a mere addon for a smartphone — after all you’ll need one to tether a data connection to use most Google Glass features. $200 would of course still be expensive, but not much more than some would expect to pay for a nice pair of sunglasses.
There’s no official word on how many pre-orders were placed at Google I/O 2012 or how many people will be accepted into the Explorer program through the #ifihadglass campaign. Around 6000 people attended Google I/O 2012 and pre-orders were restricted to U.S. attendees only. My best guess for total Google Glass pre-orders from I/O 2012 is around 2000 units.
Google Glass Release Date
Expect to hear more about Google Glass at IO 2013
The company says that they expect the Google Glass release date to be before the end of 2013. That leaves up to 10 months for the team to continue to refine Glass before launch.
While Google IO 2013 would be a great place to launch, I don’t think the company will be ready to let people buy Google Glass as IO 2013 is only three months away. You should expect to hear more about Google Glass at IO 2013 though — maybe that’s when they’ll launch the Explorer Edition of Glass?
The holiday season is a better guess for the Google Glass release date; it gives them more time to work on the unit and is a popular time for smartphone sales and accessories like glasses!
Oculus Rift developer and community VR enthusiast Nathan Andrews has managed to port his Half Life 2 Oculus Rift for Crysis and has released a video showing how this classic PC shooter might work in tandem with the Rift.
John Carmack, the famed developer who helped put the Oculus Rift on the map, has been doing plenty of virtual reality research as of late. Carmack is particularly interested in latency. Specifically, he’s interested in reducing latency to a point that looking around inside of a virtual reality world with a VR headset feels genuinely real. Recently he’s published a paper discussing “latency mitigation strategies.”
Low latency is vital in order to feel like you’re really inside of a virtual reality game. It isn’t as simple as slapping a fast head tracker into a head mounted display and calling it a day. There’s a pipeline of hardware that needs to work in symphony to correctly render the game world according to your head movements, and the round trip through that pipeline can take a significant amount of time.
If the end-to-end latency isn’t low enough, it will mean that your view into the virtual reality world feels sluggish. Carmack writes:
A total system latency of 50 milliseconds will feel responsive, but still subtly lagging. One of the easiest ways to see the effects of latency in a head mounted display is to roll your head side to side along the view vector while looking at a clear vertical edge. Latency will show up as an apparent tilting of the vertical line with the head motion; the view feels “dragged along” with the head motion. When the latency is low enough, the virtual world convincingly feels like you are simply rotating your view of a stable world.
Too much latency not only breaks the illusion of virtual reality, but can also contribute to motion sickness and even make games difficult to play. Minimal latency is essential for a virtual reality experience and it’s a problem that’s not yet solved.
Oculus Inc. said at CES 2013 that they have their end-to-end Oculus Rift latency down to 80ms — though it’s likely that they’re continuing to work that figure down.
In the paper, published at #AltDevBlogADay, Carmack proposes several measures that could be taken to reduce end-to-end latency to acceptable levels. According to him, anything under 20 ms is largely imperceptible. And while it is possible to reach that level with current hardware, it will take some careful work to make it happen.
According to Carmack, in an ideal world sensor data is sent to the computer from the head mounted display and then…
The operating system immediately processes the update, and immediately performs GPU accelerated rendering directly to the framebuffer without any page flipping or buffering. The display accepts the video signal with no buffering or processing, and the screen phosphors begin emitting new photons within microseconds.
“In a typical VR system,” he continues, “many things go far less optimally, sometimes resulting in end to end latencies of over 100 milliseconds.”
It isn’t the hardware itself that’s the issue, it’s simply that modern games don’t require such levels of latency optimization, so the industry has largely avoided techniques that could be used to reduce it.
The paper goes on to describe, at a rather technical level, what steps can be taken to reduce end-to-end latency. If you are a developer looking to make virtual reality games for the Oculus Rift, you’d do well to read this as a primer on some of the latency challenges that you’ll face.
Google Glass is an exciting wearable computing project that the company hopes will be ready for consumers by the end of 2013. The Verge’s Joshua Topolsky recently got to demo Google Glass for himself — something that only a select few outside of Google have done.
While it’s generated plenty of buzz, Google has been very quiet about the technical specifications of Glass, and even what it can actually do. This past week, Google made a concerted effort to show people what it’s like to wear Glass. In addition to a video and a new gallery of Google Glass photos, the company even got cozy with a bit of press — Topolsky relayed his Google Glass demo in an editorial and the video below wherein he interviews product director Steve Lee and lead industrial designer Isabelle Olsson:
One interesting thing to note from Topolsky’s experience with Glass is that he says using it is very similar to what Google showed in a recent video:
Let me start by saying that using it is actually nearly identical to what the company showed off in its newest demo video. That’s not CGI — it’s what Glass is actually like to use. It’s clean, elegant, and makes relative sense. The screen is not disruptive, you do not feel burdened by it. It is there and then it is gone. It’s not shocking. It’s not jarring. It’s just this new thing in your field of vision. And it’s actually pretty cool.
Would You Wear Google Glass?
Topolsky, who I’ve always thought of as a huge nerd, repeatedly wonders “who would want to wear this thing in public?” It’s a strange question for me to read because I’d wear Google Glass in public in a second. But then again — I’m a huge nerd. That said, I don’t think that Glass looks dorky. I actually think it looks pretty damn cool. Am I alone?
However, Topolsky sounded ready to wear them in public by the end of his Google Glass demo:
…I walked away convinced that this wasn’t just one of Google’s weird flights of fancy. The more I used Glass the more it made sense to me; the more I wanted it. If the team had told me I could sign up to have my current glasses augmented with Glass technology, I would have put pen to paper (and money in their hands) right then and there. And it’s that kind of stuff that will make the difference between this being a niche device for geeks and a product that everyone wants to experience.
But that’s beside the point. For me, the real determining factor in wearing Glass would be how useful it is.
At the moment it seems like there is a limited set of things that Glass can do. Take a picture, record a video, search Google, get directions, read/respond to texts and maybe a bit more. That’s great, but if Google expects people to wear these things around on a regular basis, it’s going to need to do more. I’d need to do a Google Glass demo for myself to see how useful it would be before pulling the trigger.
Google almost definitely understands this, and that’s one reason why they hosted two ‘Glass Foundry’ developer events in late January / early February. At these events, folks who pre-ordered Glass for $1500 from Google I/O 2012 were able to try out Glass and were broken into teams to develop useful functionality for the device. Unfortunately, those events were locked down with a strict NDA, so we’ve yet to hear much about what types of Google Glass apps were developed.
I imagine they’ve got a lot of work yet ahead of them if the Google Glass release date is expected to be in 2013. While I’d love to see Glass launch at Google I/O 2013, that’s less than three months away — likely too early. We’ll probably see it closer to the holidays.
So far the Google Glass price has been $1500 for pre-orders, but I’m doubting they’ll sell many to the mainstream at that rate. $500 or less seems like a more reasonable price, but would still be hard to justify for many — $200 would probably be the sweet spot.
The Oculus Rift is expected to be delivered to developers next month (and is already in the hands of a select few). This coincides nicely with the ever popular Game Developers Conference (GDC) where we expect to hear much about virtual reality and the Oculus Rift. In addition to details about Valve porting Team Fortress 2 (TF2) to virtual reality, Oculus Inc. Founder Palmer Luckey and CEO Brendan Iribe are teaming up to talk about how “virtual reality is poised to revolutionize the way we play games.”
Along with the new video that we pointed out earlier, the company has released some cool new Google Glass pictures. One of the photos shows something we haven’t seen before; on the inside of the eye-boom there is a vertical slit with what appears to be some sort of sensor inside:
My best guess is that it’s a proximity sensor which tells Glass when you have it on your face. This would allow it to turn the display off to save battery life when you aren’t using it. However, it could just as easily be an ambient light sensor or even a camera to detect eye-movement. We can only guess until detailed specifications are released.
Nuggets of news regarding Glass are tough to come by then, so when things do surface it’s of great interest. Today, Google posted a new video named ‘How It Feels [through Glass]’ — which seems to detail Google’s vision for how Glass might work in reality. The video is filmed entirely in the first person and looks through the eyes of a lucky but anonymous avatar enjoying various activities whilst wearing a set of Google Glass[es].
It’s clearly a promotional piece designed to generate buzz for the project, but it actually does gives an enticing glimpse into the possibilities Glass might bring and, more interestingly, the practicality of wearing and using them. The video demonstrates the user triggering actions verbally with sentences prefixed with “Glass” then followed with “..take a picture”, presumably leveraging a version of the company’s ‘Google Now’ voice recognition technology already present in its Android mobile OS. Less clear is the hint that physical actions (say by pointing / sliding with your hand in close proximity to the visor) also trigger actions — although I may have misinterpreted this.
How to Get Google Glass
The video is actually part of a new promotional website, pushing the Glass brand seemingly with the aim to introduce the general public to the idea of Glass and the ideas behind augmented reality with a solidly visual / text-light approach. The website also offers a chance to get a set of Google Glass for yourself:
We’re looking for bold, creative individuals who want to join us and be a part of shaping the future of Glass. We’d love to make everyone an Explorer, but we’re starting off a bit smaller. We’re still in the early stages, and while we can’t promise everything will be perfect, we can promise it will be exciting.
Using Google+ or Twitter, tell us what you would do if you had Glass, starting with the hashtag #ifihadglass.
Whoever Google chooses from the #ifihadglass campaign will still have to pay $1500 and head to New York, San Francisco or Los Angeles to pick up the unit.
It certainly seems that Google are shifting the Glass’ profile up a gear in preparation for getting units out there into the wide world. Let us know whether you’ve applied for a unit and what you said to blag your way into the program, we’d love to here from you over on our forums.
Stanford uses their virtual reality lab to study the consequences of avatar embodiment. A ten minute presentation by the lab’s director, Jeremy Bailenson, reveals some enthralling findings showing that how we see ourselves in virtual reality can measurably impact our actions in real life.
Overview of Stanford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab (VHIL)
The VHIL lab is what you might call a premium virtual reality setup — far outside of the budget of most individuals. In addition to a CAVE, they’ve got a ‘multisensory’ room which features 22 point surround sound. There’s even special floor-shaking speakers embedded in the floor which could be used to simulate the rumble of a falling virtual object, among other things.
The head mounted display (VR headset) they are using in the multisensory room appears to be the ~$36,000 nVisor SX111. The unit has a 1280×720 display and a 102 degree horizontal field of view. Optical tracking looks to be used for positional tracking.
The Consequences of Avatar Embodiment
When I stepped into the Holodeck, one of the most exciting things was avatar embodiment — having my entire body represented within the virtual reality game world.
While my avatar was indeed quite blocky, it still felt like me. After all, when I moved my arms in real life, my avatar moved its arms in the virtual world. And when I walked around in the real world, my avatar moved the very same way. For each real-world action, my avatar responded convincingly in the virtual space.
Project Holodeck’s director, Nathan Burba, accompanied me during my time in the Holodeck. As he spoke to me within the virtual world, I looked in the direction of his avatar just like I would have looked at him in real life; despite his avatar having a square head and no eyes, it still felt natural because I was so immersed.
While I thought a lot about my experience after the demo, I had no idea that the virtual world could leak out and affect my real-life actions.
That’s what the director of Stanford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, Jeremy Bailenson, says he’s demonstrated through numerous experiments. I recently came across this enthralling presentation and was very surprised at the myriad of findings:
Markus "Notch" Persson (left) poses with Rift dev kit in 2012
Markus “Notch” Persson (left) and Jens “Jeb” Bergensten (right) pose with Oculus Rift developer kits.
Mojang, the company that developed everyone’s favorite indie game success story, Minecraft (2011), might be the first in the world to have received the Oculus Rift developer kit. Two weeks back, Oculus Inc. shared the latest on their manufacturing progress. The first Oculus Rift pilot run had been completed which resulted in 40 developer kits. Though Oculus said they still had some changes to make after the pilot run, we speculated that some of those 40 kits would be going out to prominent developers and it seems we may have been right.
One of gaming’s most feared foes wears the Oculus Rift
The photo above, which shows Markus “Notch” Persson and Jens “Jeb” Bergensten wearing the Oculus Rift developer kits, was reportedly tweeted earlier today by another Mojang employee and taken down shortly thereafter. ‘DullDieHard’, a quick-thinking Reddit user, appears to have saved the image before it was taken down.
Notch has formerly said that he’d definitely be making his latest game project, 0x10c, compatible with the VR headset. He’s also said that Minecraft Oculus Rift support is likely. He claims to have backed the Oculus Rift Kickstarter with $10,000, which would mean 33 developer kits for his company, Mojang.
I’m doubting that all 33 kits were delivered today along with the two shown above. Rather, these are likely pilot run units which Oculus Inc. sent to Mojang as thanks of their support of the Kickstarter. It’s also possible that Notch didn’t order a full 33 kits, but rather donated some extra cash because he wanted to see the project make it through the Kickstarter.
If Mojang ended up with the Rift units from the pilot run, it’s likely that other developers will be receiving them too. If I had to guess, I’d say that the Oculus sent units to the following: Valve / Michael Abrash, Adhesive Games (Hawken), Epic Games, id / John Carmack, Roberts Space Industries (Star Citizen), Cliff Bleszinski, and Unity.
Update, 2/19, 9:47 AM: It looks like the reason for the removal of the photo is that Mojang accidentally broke an embargo set by Oculus. Notch acknowledged the mistake just a few hours ago:
If we ever received something like the Oculus Rift, we’d probably be stupid enough to tweet pics of it immediately, despite agreeing not to. — Markus Persson (@notch) February 19, 2013
Of course, if that hypothetical situation arose, we’d apologize for it. — Markus Persson (@notch) February 19, 2013
