News - Atlas Kickstarter 'Holodeck' project works with the Oculus Rift

[HEXUS]

You will need a large room/space for this real-space VR system to work well.

Read more.

[whitejackal]

Totally getting sued when some idiot runs into a wall at top speed.

[Output]

Totally getting sued when some idiot runs into a wall at top speed.

You could call it the "Platform 9¾ Simulation".

[edzieba]

I'm skeptical that the chain of:
camera -> discriminate AR tag -> un-skew AR tag -> decode AR tag -> transmit location, skew and ID of AR tag to PC -> backproject camera location from ID tag location estimate
Can be reliably and accurately done within the few ms required not to give you a headache from incorrect and/or stuttering head motion. Maybe the accelerometer is used as part of a sensor fusion algorithm, but that just adds further processing issues (not to mention integral drift to deal with).

[hapilynvraftr]

Somehow i feel excited for a future Virtual MMORPG, but i agreed with edzieba. + i think it's not really safe to use this specially outside your house or room.

[crossy]

And they complained about the amount of space that Kinect needs - this is surely a lot worse!

Dumb question perhaps, but is movement done the same way as WiiFit etc, so to walk you just march on the spot rather than actually move? Just that the article implies that you actually have to move, in which case what happens when you run out of rug?

Use of an iPhone makes it a non-starter for me anyway, no way would I be buying an iPhone just to use with this. Would an iPod Touch be usable?

[edzieba]

Use of an iPhone makes it a non-starter for me anyway, no way would I be buying an iPhone just to use with this. Would an iPod Touch be usable?

It's using standard AR tags, so anything with a camera and a WiFi connection (or just a regular USB webcam if you have a backtop setup) should work, barring any sort of "one mobile OS is best" nonsense.

Dumb question perhaps, but is movement done the same way as WiiFit etc, so to walk you just march on the spot rather than actually move? Just that the article implies that you actually have to move, in which case what happens when you run out of rug?

It is not tracking your feet, so you have to physically move around a space. There's two ways to deal with this: One) make sure your virtual space is the same size or smaller than the physical space you have available (I assume they deal with this by sticking AR markers on the walls to define the boundary. Two) use a technique called 'redirected walking'. You need a large (20m-40m square) space to do this, but by taking advantage of the fact that when you can't physically see your surroundings the human body is rubbish at judging direction, you could feel like you are waling infinitely in any direction while still staying inside a limited area.

[Pleiades]

I'm skeptical that the chain of:
camera -> discriminate AR tag -> un-skew AR tag -> decode AR tag -> transmit location, skew and ID of AR tag to PC -> backproject camera location from ID tag location estimate
Can be reliably and accurately done within the few ms required not to give you a headache from incorrect and/or stuttering head motion. Maybe the accelerometer is used as part of a sensor fusion algorithm, but that just adds further processing issues (not to mention integral drift to deal with).

Yeah, what he said ^^

[crossy]

Totally getting sued when some idiot runs into a wall at top speed.

To be honest, I would have been more inclined to put some Kickstarter money into the Omni, see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22807205, since that strikes me as a lot more useful than this Atlas project.

Certainly more compatible with the postage-stamp sized rooms we have here in the UK.

[Odeas]

Have to agree with crossy, the Omni looks much more suitable for most rooms and won't require markers plastered about your room and you can't walk into walls or trip over things.