Virtual Reality: The Next Application Platform
Virtual Reality (VR) caught my attention over 18 months ago, during my quest for compelling applications that would drive the demand for bandwidth beyond 100Mbps and on to a gigabit. Previously, I’d largely ignored gaming as an interesting use case for VR, though I do expect gaming to be the primary driver of early adoption. That “slight” is because current games that are envisaged don’t demand high bandwidth, though they do demand low latency.
My focus has been on 360° content, which demands consistent high bandwidth. I’ve moved away from live content, since our society has little patience for waiting on downloads to complete before a piece of content can be viewed. Pre-recorded content can be compelling. Recent testing across a demographically representative sample (though still small at 48 people) showed that the current readily available Samsung GearVR headsets are comfortable, affordable, and create a VERY compelling experience for consuming 360° media. If we had any doubts about whether normal people saw benefits in the technology, or would consider buying it, they have long been dispelled.
The content tested was 4000x2000 ppi, 30 frames per second, and encoded at 40Mbps (using Advanced Video Encoding or AVC). It would still benefit from a resolution upgrade, as that 4000 pixels has to fill the entire 360° horizon, and the field of view of current VR headsets is more like 70° horizontally. That gives only 800 pixels in the field of view.
Advances in video encoding will likely double the video compression efficiency, but doubling the resolution to 8K will quadruple the number of pixels. Stereoscopic video, though it remains to be seen whether this will really be needed, could also double the bandwidth to north of 100Mbps. Mass-market adoption (not just gamers) will likely require wireless headsets like the Samsung GearVR. That creates a problem in the last ten feet, as consistent delivery of 100Mbps on home Wi-Fi is still something of a fantasy. Oculus pointed this out in their recent developers conference, declaring that they currently needed 30Mbps to deliver 360° video, but that home Wi-Fi typically delivered about 5Mbps. Advances to 802.11ac in smartphones might get us there, but we may need 802.11ad.
Content availability is also looking like a challenge. We’ve tested a few different content genres to assess what appeals to the public, and found that our initial biases (sports, live music) were not as compelling as travel and nature. A key concern of the consumers we consulted was availability of content. They are hesitant to invest a few hundred dollars into a VR platform with a limited catalog of content. While a few leaders in the production of 360° content (Immersive Media, JauntVR, NextVR) are working to stake out the high ground of VR media content, each forging alliances with top-tier talent like Taylor Swift and Sir Paul McCartney, or major league sports franchises, the arrival of professional content has been quite slow.
On the flip side, user generated and semi-pro content is already flourishing, with over 14,000 sequences on YouTube flagged as 360° content. Much of these were shot on hobbyist-level equipment, with 6 Go-Pro cameras that require a painful process of pulling 6 SD cards from the cameras and stitching together the partial scenes using fairly expensive software.
Consumer-grade cameras have started to emerge at under $500, with the likes of Ricoh’s Theta and Kodak’s SP360 being joined by startups like Bublcam and Giroptic. All of these are currently “low” resolution, shooting HD video for the entire 360° scene. There are mid-range cameras on the horizon with 4K 60fps 360° video from Sphericam and Nokia, priced at $1500 or more, which will certainly appeal to the early adopters who have struggled with multi-GoPro rigs until now. Surely it can’t be long before GoPro enters this market directly, and offers an easy-to-use unit for shooting VR video.
But what of the other uses? Games and VR Video are the initial use cases. Netflix just became available on the GearVR, so you can watch anything in the Netflix catalog immersed in a ski chalet on a virtual 105” screen. The resolution is low – because the resolution of the GearVR is low compared to watching an HD screen from your sofa – but the experience is compelling. It may not be THE killer application, but it is at least one. While I thought this was a “dumb” use case, having tried it, I realized I was wrong. If only I could turn to talk to a companion for social interaction during the movie we might be onto something…
Facebook didn’t buy Oculus for games – they bought it for social. They have already been funding research into digitally removing the headset so we can interact with avatars of one another more naturally. Science Fiction often portrays the future in ways that show incredible foresight, or at least to foretell the possibilities. “Ready Player One” by Ernest Kline (Oculus gave a copy to every attendee of their recent developer conference) foretells a world where we spend much of our time immersed in a metaverse, fed through a VR display and haptic suit. It seems like a script for the technology world of today to deliver upon. All the pieces are in place; they simply need to be
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http://www.cedmagazine.com/article/2015/10/virtual-reality-next-application-platform