The HoloLens is the most impressive augmented reality HMD on the market now, and their developer kit is currently being deployed into production in industries which range from design, engineering, design, sales, medicine, and instruction. Microsoft is now taking a holistic approach with Windows Mixed Truth being chucked into Windows 10, meaning programmers can create a single application that could operate either on the HoloLens, on one of their spouse VR headsets, on a Surface tablet, or as a desktop app. In Microsoft Build now, they are announcing a brand new OEM VR partner with HP as well as inside-out, six degree-of-freedom input controls.
I had an opportunity to sit down for an hour with 2 agents from Microsoft to talk about the latest HoloLens updates, their VR cans, also their general Mixed Truth strategy. Brandon Bray contributes the Mixed Truth developer ecosystem, and Greg Sullivan is on the Advertising team for the Windows & Devices Group. We cover a lot of the high-level mixed reality strategies as well as the low cost details for programmers, as well as a wide assortment of themes from AI integrations with Microsoft Cognitive Services to the technical details of the new motion-tracked controls.
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Microsoft has leapfrogged the augmented reality competition with the mixture of having the best AR HMD with the HoloLens, a healthy ecosystem of business programmers, a suite of AI-driven cognitive solutions APIs, along with a forward-looking Mixed Truth plan. They have impeccable timing with taking a leap of faith to address a lot of really difficult problems so as to have made the HoloLens in the first place. Bray admits that there is still a lot of remaining problems to be solved with the restricted field of opinion, but there has been a tradeoff to be able to actually create a battery-driven, tetherless, holographic computing platform which you may wear on your head which may do inside-out positional tracking.
The HoloLens developer kits are priced at $3000, and so they are targeting business programs. But their VR plan appears to be aiming for your bottom to low-end portion of the marketplace with their 399 price point for a bundled Acer VR headset with the motion-tracked controllers. I had a opportunity to have a hands-on time with the Acer VR headset, and that I was not impressed with the motion-to-photon latency of the LCD display, poor excellent optics, build quality, functionality or consumer experience of putting the headset on.
These tradeoffs in comfort were made so as to bring the price down, but also the total experience feels like it is a small step up from a Daydream, however possibly on par with the GearVR or maybe even worse. The high resolution of the Acer VR headset makes it one of the very best VR HMDs to read text in and the inside-out tracking works pretty well with intermittent jutter. But the LCD display isn’t a low-persistent display that seasoned VR veterans have grown accustomed to, and so the resultant DK1 or DK2 era blurring if turning your head makes it feel more difficult compared to a Gear VR. But so long as you are not immediately moving around your head, then you’ll decrease the motion sickness triggers.
The 6DoF motion controls are inside-out and Bray explained they rely upon a sensor fusion blend of using a direct line of sight with the front-facing cameras to the VR headset, IMU sensors, and reverse kinematic probabilities. There weren’t any prototypes out there for testing, and so I really don’t have some direct experience with how they actually work. But I do have any issues with their approach based upon my own experiences with other line-of-sight controls like the Leap Motion. With the Leap Motion, you have to hold up your hands so they may be seen from the cameras onto the HMD, which may likely require developers to specifically design applications that optimize for this restriction.
This limitation of the input controls may signify that it might limit present room-scale Vive along with Rift VR adventures from being readily ported. If present Vive or Rift applications are not a good experience on these types of lower-end VR HMDs, then there is likely to be a huge gap of information to drive consumer adoption. If this lower price point is going to draw in more consumer-grade consumers, then they are likely to need content. If custom entertainment content is demand, then I doubt the Microsoft business programmers will create a whole lot of persuasive and interesting content.
But it might be that Microsoft is not concerned about using a library of amusement for regular users of those VR cans, and perhaps they are more interested in generating data visualization and business programs. But if that was the situation, then why don’t you create something on par with the Vive and cost enterprise rates? Most of the mobile VR articles made for a 3DoF controller hasn’t been nearly as persuasive as the full room-scale along with 6DoF content. These Microsoft VR headsets look to be in still another domain of quality and performance that’s marginally better than portable, but a lot worse than the greatest high-end content.
In case Windows Mixed Reality VR headsets will move anywhere, then there is likely to have to have content that’s compelling and compels adoption. Will these VR techniques meet the requirements of everything Microsoft has determined is that their target market? If it does, then all of this conversation is moot. But if not, then we’ll have yet another platform which is fractures the developer ecosystem and is left with no critical mass of compelling content.
Overall, I am very impressed with Microsoft’s holistic approach to blended reality. The HoloLens is the market leader for head-mounted AR right that’s actually being deployed into production. They’re positioned to really own the enterprise and expert AR marketplace as they make more integrations involving Windows Mixed Truth, their cloud hosting services, and AI-driven cognitive solutions.
There’s a whole lot of long-term promise in tetherless VR with inside-out tracking, however, the ancient Acer VR prototypes are disappointing and risk fracturing the VR ecosystem in potentially needing specially designed experiences so as to actually use the advantages of the platform.
Following Is a Variety of Twitter threads with additional ideas and opinions from Microsoft Build up to now
Live tweets of afternoon keynote of all Microsoft Build Conference
Impressed @microsoft CEO @satyanadella is extemporaneously delivering, not studying keynote.
Cited dystopian sci-fi for individuals do not desire pic.twitter.com/r9j8THz7WI— Kent Bye VoicesOfVR (@kentbye) May 10, 2017
Thread with highlights from the HoloLens YouTube station
There’s some wonderful stuff on @HoloLens’ YouTube station. This shows the potential of spatially customizing AR storieshttps://t.co/mUpX2SjjQV
— Kent Bye VoicesOfVR (@kentbye) May 10, 2017
Twitter Thread of Hands-On Impressions from Acer headset
Tried the Acer VR. Legible text. Edges of optics fuzzy like Daydream. A few jumps in inside-out-tracking when transferring head fast. #MSBuildpic.twitter.com/u1DylnIn7z
— Kent Bye VoicesOfVR (@kentbye) May 10, 2017
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Music: Fatality & Summer Trip
Source
http://voicesofvr.com/535-an-in-depth-look-at-the-microsoft-hololens-their-mixed-reality-ecosystem/
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