By Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble

The Infinite Retina comprehensively documents everything you need to know about Spatial Computing and where it’s heading
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Spatial Computing, the fourth paradigm of personal computing, sounds like science fiction but isn’t. Unlike previous paradigms of computing, like working on a laptop or a mobile phone, Spatial Computing allows you to move around inside computing. You will be able to talk to new virtual beings who will know more about your world than any single human does and you will literally talk to and touch the computing that will be all around you, either within complete virtual environments or within new forms of augmented reality. R&D labs are already showing us that it will go beyond that, with sensors that will interact with your brain directly – not needing optics or keyboards. But for now, that’s five to 20 years further out.

In this article, we will explore the fundamentals and scope of Spatial Computing and how The Infinite Retina by Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble provides an insightful look at the future of augmented reality and Spatial Computing.

Spatial Computing, the fourth paradigm of personal computing, sounds like science fiction but isn’t
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Components and Scope of Spatial Computing

Spatial Computing includes all the software and technology needed to move around in a digital 3D world. That is software and technology associated with AI, including machine learning and natural language processing, Computer Vision, augmented reality, virtual reality, and all other apps that support the creation and the maintenance of a digital 3D world. We see great strides that will be made in how Spatial Computing is being used across many industry verticals, including Transportation, Technology, Media, and Telecommunications (TMT), Manufacturing, Retail, Healthcare, Finance, and Education. There are chapters in The Infinite Retina that detail our vision of where each of these industries will be when the Spatial Computing wave hits.

The current state of Spatial Computing and Augmented Reality

The holy grail of Spatial Computing is a pair of very light glasses, or contact lenses, that let computers completely change how we perceive the real world via next-generation augmented and virtual reality that some call “mixed reality.” While we have early devices that give us a taste, like Microsoft HoloLens, these big and expensive devices haven’t yet made their way onto consumers’ faces. That will change over the next few years as these devices become much smaller and more capable due to new 3D sensors, new Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision, and new hyper-small displays. The HoloLens is already changing industries, and the book describes how this new technology is being used in places like operating rooms and factories. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. We’ll see many more uses for this technology as the devices get smaller and become more capable. In other words, we are literally at the beginning of a new age in computing, the Spatial Computing Age. By the end of the 2030s, how we compute will be radically different than it is today and, we posit, much more enjoyable and more productive, to boot.

We see great strides that will be made in how Spatial Computing is being used across many industry verticals
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The inclination of big firms like Tesla, Apple, and Facebook towards Spatial Computing

Spatial Computing is a new paradigm of computing where humans, robots, and virtual beings move through computing. Companies like Tesla, Apple, and Facebook are investing heavily in it because of its capability to completely change how we access, organize, and use information. Instead of seeing computing on flat screens on laptops or phones, computing will literally be on everything and will be controllable with our hands, eyes, and voice. In addition, robots and autonomous vehicles will use Spatial Computing to move around and assist humans, which will lead to very deep economic and societal changes as well.

By the end of the 2030s, how we compute will be radically different than it is today
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The Impact of Spatial Computing

The world is about to radically change. Factories will become much more virtual. We are seeing not only new kinds of robots, called “cobots” because they work much more closely with humans, but they are also being virtualized to enable new kinds of training and remote working, too. This calibre of change will be seen across many jobs — from new kinds of retail experiences to massive changes to transportation.

The Infinite Retina by Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble provides an insightful look at the future of augmented reality and Spatial Computing
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Spatial Computing emerges as a major culture-changing force
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The objective behind The Infinite Retina

Our goals were to understand and record shifts to the business world and society that are currently underway due to Spatial Computing, and to gain perspectives on what its impact will be in three-to-five years and then ten years out. We talked with dozens of pioneers in many fields, from healthcare to retail to finance to entertainment. This is a hugely important book as a new paradigm shift (the fourth of the personal computing age) hits both consumers and enterprises. We documented this paradigm shift in The Infinite Retina.

The holy grail of Spatial Computing is a pair of very light glasses, or contact lenses, that let computers completely change how we perceive the real world
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Spatial Computing emerges as a major culture-changing force. In the book, readers will look at what is driving business to adopt robots, voice-driven user interfaces, immersive VR or AR training, along with Spatial Computing glasses that will change literally everything about computing. The book also introduces what this all means culturally, both pro and con.

The Infinite Retina lays out why Spatial Computing is the future of technology and why companies like Facebook, Qualcomm, Apple, Microsoft and others are each spending billions of dollars in R&D to make it happen. The book also explains why these shifts are already underway and why the next three-to-five years will see a huge wave of Spatial Computing devices and supporting technology.

Robots and autonomous vehicles will use Spatial Computing to move around and assist humans
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Irena Cronin is the CEO of Infinite Retina, a company based in Pasadena, California that helps businesses enter and succeed in Spatial Computing. She has advised many decision-makers on business strategies related to Spatial Computing which includes AR/VR, Artificial Intelligence, Facial Recognition, Robotics, Autonomous Vehicles, and other related technologies.

Robert Scoble is the Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) of Infinite Retina and a bestselling author. Over the course of his career, he has interviewed thousands of entrepreneurs and has been the first to see the creation of many new technology companies, from Siri to Tesla.

The post Looking Through the Infinite Retina appeared first on Tech Trends.

Why would we want to build a parallel reality populated by digital twins?

Sure, it sounds cool, yet this “virtual twinning” effectively extends the possibilities of both the “world of atoms and the world of bits“ as HoloLens inventor Alex Kipman eloquently put it in a TED talk which has been viewed over 3.5 million times.

There is already an entire ecosystem emerging around the challenges of sensing, mapping, and replicating objects from the real world into the digital – and vice-versa
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This is not some distant blue-sky thinking. There is already an entire ecosystem emerging around the challenges of sensing, mapping, and replicating objects from the real world into the digital – and vice-versa. In fact, one of the main applications of the 5G connectivity infrastructure rollout will be to mirror physical objects and environments digitally in real-time. That, in turn, would enable XR (extended reality) applications to be built which bring quantifiable value to users.

5G applications that consumers will “get”

“I don’t think the average person really comes close to realizing just how much of a quantum leap we’re talking about,” says Deeyook CEO Gideon Rottem. “They think it will be faster, but literally it will enable things that will make what we have now pale in comparison,” he adds.

Rottem’s Israel-based company has developed a self-learning tracking solution that measures the angles of wireless transmissions – tapping into the existing 1.7 billion wireless access points that already exist globally – to determine positioning of employees, items and assets (within 10 cm) without tapping into a company’s IT network and without invasive personal tracking or data capturing.

These mapping technologies are going to interact with the cloud differently, as it no longer becomes necessary to upload images in order to understand what the user is standing in front of. According to Rottem, once we achieve accurate positioning, we can also create accurate virtual worlds (largely automatically) so the integration between the physical and the digital can become seamless.

These mapping technologies are going to interact with the cloud differently, as it no longer becomes necessary to upload images in order to understand what the user is standing in front of
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A newly released report by research and consulting firm Strategy Analytics revealed that although consumers are intrigued by 5G, speed on its own is not enough to sell them on the idea of upgrading. This is partly because it is difficult to grasp what it will enable them to do. CSPs will need to solve existing pain-points and entice customers with new experiences.

In practical terms, spatial mapping technologies are crucial in enabling the type of integrated applications that not only address practical customer needs but also create these “wow” factors that will prompt mass adoption of 5G. The above research found that what got consumers most excited about the prospect were immersive experiences such as holographic conversations and XR field training.

A newly released report by research and consulting firm Strategy Analytics revealed that although consumers are intrigued by 5G, speed on its own is not enough to sell them on the idea of upgrading
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It’s not a surprise, therefore, to see many companies in the connectivity space embracing immersive technology and content as they seek to bridge this “imagination gap”.

An example of a CSP doing just that is UK mobile giant Three, which recently released a highly produced tongue-in-cheek advert which shows us what a 5G-enabled holographic future could look like.

“Hold on to your crumpets,” says Three in their recent 5G ads.

Many companies in the connectivity space embracing immersive technology and content as they seek to bridge the consumer imagination gap
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Moetsi is a company working to build the spatial mapping infrastructure to make that future happen by offering “sensor stream processing on the edge.” This effectively boils down to processing vast amounts of data in real-time and delivering it in a format that makes sense and is relevant to the context of where it is being applied.

We will see an explosion of XR applications that provide immense value industry and enterprise, as well as mind-blowing experiences for individual consumers
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To illustrate how an application could leverage this, Moetsi co-founder Adam Polak gives an example of someone about to cross a street getting alerted that the car moving towards them isn’t slowing down for the red light. At that point, all our decisions would potentially become augmented and informed by tapping into these edge-processed datastreams, fundamentally changing our relationship with technology, the world around us, and one another.

3D mapping in arts and entertainment

There are use cases already emerging of spatial mapping being applied to create, transform, and augment art. Award-winning immersive content studio HEAVY has partnered with the Marriott hotel group to build a “secret digital garden” at the JW Marriott Anaheim Resort which was  due to open in April. The project leveraged mapping technology from 6D.ai, a company that set out to build  “a 3D map of the world” and has since been acquired by Niantic, the makers of Pokémon GO.

This feature of persistence is key to understanding the value these real-time mapping technologies bring to such experiences. In this case, HEAVY produced a fine art installation blending physical, custom-made sculptures with augmented reality elements to create a serene space where resort guests and visitors can plant their own fantastical trees while enjoying playing among digital caterpillars and butterflies.

There are use cases already emerging of spatial mapping being applied to create, transform, and augment art
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What makes the zen-like experience more than a bit of fun, however, is the narrative backdrop for the magical plant’s evolution from sapling to tree. By performing the digital meditations, each guest will figuratively transform into a different kind of tree, personalized around their choices, which can then be further nurtured over time like a flora version of Tamagotchi. This means that the way users interact with and nurture their trees will affect how it develops, and consequently what type of experience each person generates and enjoys.

How will this technology come to life?

Improving the speed at which connected devices can stream information to an authoritative server will be a crucial piece of that puzzle according to Polak, as improvements in networking such as 5G will help reduce the latency and increase the amount of sensors that can communicate in a local area, something that the current generation of networking infrastructure simply cannot cope with.

“The engineering challenge is enormous: being able to interpret any sensor data correctly in a manner that can be used by application developers to provide value to end-users, basically not only seeing, but understanding anything a device can sense in the world,” Polak adds.”

So, are we there yet? Well, yes and no. A lot of this technology already exists but it is hampered by the fact that nearly every XR developer has to roll out their own solutions to build cross-platform applications that can be shared with all users.

According to Polak, initiatives like OpenXR are addressing the problem of having to build separate implementations for ARKit, ARCore, and MRTK (Microsoft’s Mixed Reality Toolkit) by enabling developers to access XR device data through a single interface.

A lot of this technology already exists but it is hampered by the fact that nearly every XR developer has to roll out their own solutions to build cross-platform applications that can be shared with all users
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Once we arrive at that convergence of 5G connectivity and the ability to interact with digitized objects in platform-agnostic experiences that are embedded in our own physical reality, our world as we know it will never be the same. We will see an explosion of XR applications that provide immense value industry and enterprise, as well as mind-blowing experiences for individual consumers.

So while wrapping your head around the concept of building a “Mirror World” might be difficult at first, once it clicks into place we’re likely to wonder how we ever settled for such an ordinary reality in the first place.

This article was originally published on Futurithmic

#SpatialMapping technologies are crucial in enabling the type of integrated applications that not only address practical customer needs but also create these WOW factors that will prompt mass adoption of #5G. https://t.co/2wC9FhIFdq pic.twitter.com/vnsLln2VPY

— Futurithmic (@futurithmic) May 1, 2020

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals, and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Digitizing our Existence appeared first on Tech Trends.

In manufacturing, the supply chain manager is responsible for the flow of goods and services, including all processes that transform raw materials into final products. One critical aspect of this is inventory management. In the most rudimentary (but surprisingly still common) scenario, inventory managers are tasked with counting and logging each piece of inventory, comparing these with the amounts needed, and determining what items need to be replenished, and when. Although on the surface, this appears to be a relatively straightforward task, a deeper examination suggests that inventory management places a heavy load on the cognitive system in the brain, and thus is prone to error.

Consider the inventory manager standing in front of the first collection of items. From a cognitive neuroscience perspective, one first has to count each item. This involves fixating on the first item and incrementing a counter in working memory from 0 to 1. Then an eye movement and attention switch must be initiated from the first item to the second item and the counter must be incremented to 2. Another eye movement and attention switch to the third item ensues, and the process is repeated.

Any time working memory load and executive attentional demands are taxed, one is more likely to make an error
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Critically, the inventory manager must follow some systematic approach to the eye movements and counting process to ensure that they do not miss any items or count items twice. The process of counting and systematic shifts of eye fixation places a heavy burden on working memory and attentional processes. Next, the inventory manager must rehearse the final count in working memory while shifting attention from the actual inventory to the inventory log. On the log, they must find the appropriate location, then write the number down that they have been mentally repeating. This number must then be compared with some threshold number and a decision must be made whether to order more of that inventory item or not, and that decision must, in turn, be logged. The inventory manager moves on to the next inventory item, again in some systematic fashion to ensure counting all of the inventory, and repeats the process all over again.

The cognitive neuroscience research is clear that each of these repetitive steps requires an enormous amount of cognitive capacity (in the form of working memory) as well as cognitive energy (in the form of executive attention). Any time working memory load and executive attentional demands are taxed, one is more likely to make an error and miscount, double count, or forget the count completely and have to start over. Because this process is error-prone, it is impossible to know if the inventory counts are correct and where errors might be.

When it comes to inventory management, the advantages of a hands-free, wearable device should not be underestimated
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To optimize and increase the efficiency of inventory management, the cognitive load on working memory and attention must be reduced. Augmented reality (AR) tools offer significant promise for efficient inventory management because they reduce the cognitive load, and utilize the manager’s visual field and visualization processes in the brain.

Consider the same task, but where the inventory manager is wearing AR glasses. They enter the inventory room and visually scan it. Using visual assets such as text or colored arrows, the AR display directs them to the first set of items. They fixate each item and either manually count the items, or the AR system automatically counts the items. This value is then input into an electronic system either through eye fixations to locations on the AR glasses or through verbal commands.

Budgetary constraints can determine the sophistication of the AR algorithms to be used
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When the inventory is low, a warning is presented and the individual tags that inventory for immediate replenishment, again through eye fixations or verbal commands. Throughout this whole process, the manager is looking toward the inventory with minimal load on working memory and few attention switches. The glasses then direct the individual to the next item and the process is repeated. The path taken through the inventory is optimized to require the minimum number of steps to complete. Attention switching is almost nonexistent because the counting and tabulating tool are always on the AR screen. The cognitive load is minimized because the system is doing most of the calculating and tabulating. The number of physical steps taken by the employee is minimized and optimized by the system. In a nutshell, it works the way our brains work, creating an optimal environment for inventory management with a reduced likelihood of error.

If your organization is considering an AR inventory tool, they come in many forms and budget ranges. Although hand-held AR devices are more budget-friendly than hands-free devices, when it comes to inventory management, the advantages of a hands-free, wearable device should not be underestimated, as the ability to reduce eye movements and attention switches is far superior with a wearable device.

If you are considering do-it-yourself AR authoring tools, be mindful of the risk of cognitive overload
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Beyond that, budgetary constraints can determine the sophistication of the AR algorithms to be used. For example, whether counts are manual or automated, and whether the path through the inventory space is determined by the inventory manager or is optimized by the AR system. Consideration must also be taken to the human factors of the system. Augmented information can reduce the cognitive load, but can also overload the user with unnecessary information.

Look for vendors who address these issues specifically and can present data to support the effectiveness of their offering. If you are considering do-it-yourself AR authoring tools, be mindful of the risk of cognitive overload. Good experimental testing and modification to optimize your tool are in order. Your goal is to provide users with “what” they want, “where” they need it, and “when” they need it.

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals, and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Todd Maddox is Science, Sports and Training Correspondent at Tech Trends, and the CEO of Cognitive Design and Statistical Consulting. Follow him on Twitter @wtoddmaddox

The post Report: Managing the Supply Chain With AR appeared first on Tech Trends.

Anyone who manages to walk away from that without feeling a little bit like a Harry Potter wizard (or witch) casting a successful spell, is likely leading a fairly jaded and joyless existence. There is something fundamentally satisfying, almost primal, to the empowerment of watching the world change as you command it to.

Yet even the naysayers can probably agree that voice-based technologies driven by artificial intelligence represent a huge market opportunity. Millions of us now own some sort of room-based voice device such as Google Home or Amazon Echo and the global voice and speech recognition market size is estimated to reach USD 31.82 billion by 2025. We are now witnessing a convergence of various emerging technologies in that space – such as voice recognition, natural language processing, and machine learning-powered by 5G connectivity and the AR cloud.

Millions of us now own some sort of room-based voice device such as Google Home or Amazon Echo
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In this screenless world of spatial computing, interfaces will need to become more intuitive, efficient, and empathic
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Immersive experiences like those afforded by the HoloLens offer a tantalizing glimpse of where this is all headed: a screenless world where our natural human interactions plug into the digital realm, creating an entirely new form of hybrid reality. In fact, Gartner predicts that by 2020, 30 percent of web browsing will be done without a screen. The next technology revolution will usher in the era of spatial computing, where multisensory experiences allow us to interact with both the real and digital worlds through natural, intuitive interfaces such as haptics, limb and eye-tracking, and even elements such as taste and scent.

In this screenless world of spatial computing, interfaces will need to become more intuitive, efficient, and empathic. Let’s take a look at three ways in which voice technologies are already enabling this.

1 – Intuitive UX

Spatial audio and AI-driven voice technologies are crucial elements for creating compelling immersive experiences. As Kai Havukainen, Head of Product at Nokia Technologies explained in an interview for Scientific American, “building a dynamic soundscape is essential for virtual experiences to really engender a sense of presence.” Humans, he added, are simply hardwired to pay attention to sound and instinctively use it to map their surroundings, find points of interest and assess potential danger.

There are, however, design considerations that must be taken into account when tackling the challenges of an entirely new medium together with these fast-evolving technologies.

Tim Stutts, Interaction Design Lead at Magic Leap, highlights the sheer complexity of these UX challenges, “A level of complexity is added with voice commands, as the notion of directionality becomes abstract—the cursor for voice is effectively the underlying AI used to determine the intent of a statement, then relate it back to objects, apps and system functions.”

“For voice experiences, you need to have a natural language interface that performs well enough to understand different accents, dialects, and languages,” adds Mark Asher, director of corporate strategy at Adobe, who believes the advancement of voice technologies will serve to “bring the humanity back to computing,”

There are still many hurdles to overcome before we reach that utopian vision, however. As we move towards more pervasive and complex experiences where users have multiple applications open at the same time, they will need to circumvent problems such as unintentionally commanding a hologram when you’re actually talking to the person next to you.

Spatial audio and AI-driven voice technologies are crucial elements for creating compelling immersive experiences
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Yet looking at the exponential way AI technologies have developed over the past decade, it isn’t unreasonable to extrapolate that the next few years we will usher in real-time contextual applications that accurately identify and action commands based on accurate assessments of your surroundings (both real and virtual) your personal preferences, and even your biofeedback.

2 – Voice Biofeedback

XR technologies already deploy a multitude of sensors that enable collection of biofeedback, yet voice provides a rich vein of data which can be collected in a non-invasive way without the need for cumbersome wearables.

Apart from deliberately using commands to interact with the world around us, our voices provide the scope for AI to contextualize our XR experiences based on subconscious factors such as our mood and physical health. Cymatics – the name given to the process of visualizing soundwaves – gives us some insight into the depth and complexity of the unique patterns projected by our voice.

XR technologies already deploy a multitude of sensors that enable collection of biofeedback
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To produce speech, the brain communicates with the Vagus Nerve and sends a signal to the larynx, which vibrates out stored information through the vocal cords. Since vocalization is entirely integrated within both our central (CNS) and autonomic nervous system (ANS), there is an established correlation between voice output and the impact of stress.

Researchers have been developing methods for voice stress analysis (VSA) and computerized stress detection and body scanning devices for many years. Companies such as Insight Health Apps already leverage this rich data to feed corrective waveforms and patterns back into the body in the form of “Quantum Biofeedback”.

3 – Bridging the Uncanny Valley

When I was first invited to test social VR platform Sansar, I was shown around some of its virtual worlds by Linden Lab’s CEO Ebbe Altberg. To this day, my lasting impression of that demo was how our interaction felt very natural in spite of us being 5,000 miles and several time zones apart (I was in London and he in San Francisco) and the fact that his avatar looked nothing like his real-world persona.

Not only did Ebbe’s digital self have the face of a woman, but that face was attached to a cartoony blimp-like dinosaur bodysuit. Still, when he spoke, the avatar’s lips, teeth and facial muscles synchronized to the sounds in a way that my brain registered as true. It demonstrated one of the peculiar things about designing virtual experiences: the malleability of “reality,” and the fact we are more willing to suspend our disbelief for some aspects of it than others. Hence an avatar’s appearance doesn’t matter nearly as much as these subconscious prompts that form the core of human interaction.

It was an interesting way of avoiding the pervasive problem known as the “uncanny valley” which describes that awkward sense of unease you feel when a character or avatar appears human-like yet “not quite there.” Speech Graphics developed the technology that creates this notoriously difficult-to-achieve illusion that an animated face is the source of the sound you hear. Their pipeline merges powerful speech analysis with procedural animation techniques. To achieve this, the algorithm replicates not only the movement of the lips, but also decodes from that speech the energy and emotion of the speaker.

“In the sound of speech there is a wealth of information about what the speaker was doing when he or she made the sound—including the movements of the mouth as it produced the sound, and the energetic state of the speaker, from which we can deduce facial expression. From syllables to scowls,” its website reads. And because it is a universal physical model, it works for any language and any type of character, from realistic humans to cartoonlike avatars.

The Future

As digital experiences move beyond the familiar constraints of screens, our modes of interaction with the digital world are also evolving. Paradoxically, that evolution is taking us back to basic and instinctual forms of natural human interaction, hence the enduring relevance of Clarke’s law. Technology will soon be sufficiently advanced so that it will become an invisible layer of our reality rather than a separate realm requiring special skills to access. And in that hybrid reality we will experience an entirely new type of magic.

In the sound of speech there is a wealth of information about what the speaker was doing when he or she made the sound
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This article was originally published on Futurithmic

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Unlocking the Magic of XR With Your Voice appeared first on Tech Trends.

Vancouver-based start-up Precision OS just introduced a new multiplayer feature for VR surgical training platform. This means that surgeons and nurses can work together in the same operating room even if they are physically thousands of miles apart.

The functionality allows up to five avatars at a time, with the collaborative feature bringing multiple users into a single virtual Operating Room
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The functionality allows up to five avatars at a time, with the collaborative feature bringing multiple users into a single virtual Operating Room (OR).

“Multiplayer now permits simultaneous access to the same virtual OR by many users. Each user receives an avatar along with their colleagues while performing surgery,” explained Dr. Danny Goel, a practicing orthopedic surgeon and Chief Executive Officer of Precision OS.

In an era of rapidly advancing technologies and procedures, training is often a rate-limiting factor
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The lack of access to high-quality surgical education is also affecting medical device companies. In an era of rapidly advancing technologies and procedures, training is often a rate-limiting factor. Current training approaches vary in effectiveness and are not helping to address cost, and, most importantly, surgical mastery. It is a well-established fact that by reducing the cognitive load on the brain, training powered by immersive technology allows for better and more efficient training.

Even before the coronavirus, traditional training was simply not up to the challenge of educating today’s surgeons
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Even before the coronavirus, traditional training was simply not up to the challenge of educating today’s surgeons, especially not in the numbers needed to cope with demand. This situation, needless to say, has now become greatly exacerbated by the circumstances brought on with the COVID-19 outbreak. Surgery residents are getting less hands-on experience than ever, and it’s affecting their confidence and autonomy. A significant percentage didn’t feel ready to independently perform core procedures upon residency completion, and over 90% opt for an additional fellowship year. In an effort to address this, The American Board of Surgery (ABS) recommended: “rather than increasing the number of cases, we should be increasing the quality of teaching both clinical and procedural skills.” Immersive technology proved a crucial game-changer.

The lack of access to high-quality surgical education is also affecting medical device companies
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As the new normal imposed by the coronavirus pandemic settles in for the long-term, it’s crucial that we continue to explore and implement these XR collaborative tools
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Precision OS is backed by the AO Foundation and is currently the only scientifically validated, peer-reviewed and published immersive virtual reality product on the market. It was founded by a team of clinical orthopedic surgeons and game developers to create the most relevant and applicable medical-grade simulation experience.

The new enhanced collaboration feature builds on the notion of double-loop learning, an educational concept grounded in search, exploration, and decision-making with the “why” in mind. Unlike single-loop learning methods like lectures or videos via tablet, the Precision OS module is interactive and encourages the user to delve deeper into an ultra-realistic simulation while allowing for failure in a constructive learning cycle.

“Through technology, we’re now able to assemble multidisciplinary teams for training without anyone having to travel,” Goel adds. Recently, Precision OS trained more than 300 medical device sales representatives using virtual reality in just 30 minutes. With multiplayer, Dr. Goel said he envisions surgeons remotely collaborating with other surgeons, trainees, and key OR personnel. including device reps.

The Precision OS platform runs with the Oculus Quest headset, making it a portable and cost-effective option that could be used anywhere
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The enhancement grants multiple users in different locations simultaneous access to the same learning module. The platform runs with the Oculus Quest headset, making it a portable and cost-effective option that could theoretically be used anywhere in the world.

“Multiplayer is literally and figuratively adding another dimension to our proficiency focused training platform. Enabling this type of collaboration and knowledge-share typically found in a clinical setting is of great significance,” concludes Goel.

As the “new normal” imposed by the coronavirus pandemic settles in for the long-term, it’s crucial that we continue to explore and implement these XR collaborative tools, especially where it comes to training essential healthcare workers in the age of remote working and social distancing.

This article was originally published on VRScout

Precision OS Launches Multiplayer Tool For VR Surgical Training via @alicebonasio https://t.co/aEUhi2W1nx pic.twitter.com/GS3DvGHxXO

— VRScout (@VRScout) March 23, 2020

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Virtual Collaboration in the Age of #COVID19 appeared first on Tech Trends.

In the midst of the growing coronavirus pandemic, holding any sort of normal conference is entirely out of the question. But although it might seem like the entire world is grinding to a halt, life goes on and there are still some exciting announcements coming out of the tech world.

XR offers us new ways to enable collaboration, remote work, and all manner of interaction which (at least for a while) might be difficult or downright impossible in real life
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But in fact, there has never been a more opportune time to push for advancements in (and adoption of) immersive tech. As so many of us are asked to work from home or find ourselves isolated from one another, XR offers us new ways to enable collaboration, remote work, and all manner of interaction which (at least for a while) might be difficult or downright impossible in real life.

In the midst of the growing coronavirus pandemic, holding any sort of normal conference is entirely out of the question
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There has never been a more opportune time to push for advancements in (and adoption of) immersive tech
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So we’re excited to see this first all-digital Facebook: Game Developers Showcase which promises many announcements, trailers, developer interviews and more this week.

Things kicked off with a major update to the Oculus Quest system experience that makes VR more flexible, social, and easy to use. It comes with a completely redesigned universal menu, new immersive overlays, and multi-window support for 2D apps starting with Oculus Browser— these updates are launching as experimental features later this month.

The personal dashboard lets you navigate between immersive environments and 2D apps, control your device, and stay connected with people and with your system’s status while in VR
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Redesigned universal menu

The personal dashboard lets you navigate between immersive environments and 2D apps, control your device, and stay connected with people and with your system’s status while in VR. The new design organizes information more clearly to help users navigate to commonly-used system apps like Explore, Store, Browser, and TV more quickly, as well as access key settings like brightness and volume. It also brings recently and frequently used apps front and center so it’s easy to jump back into the action.

Immersive overlays

These make it possible to bring up content, like the universal menu, without leaving the app you’re in. That means it’s easier than ever to find and control system functions without returning to the home screen. This should provide more seamless access to functions like making a friend request, casting, or live streaming. This will be available in WebXR apps launched from Oculus Browser to start and will come to more apps on the Oculus Platform as developers add support, so over time, you’ll have instant access to your menu anytime and anywhere in VR.

Oculus Browser supporting multiple windows

Users can now multitask, opening, closing, and rearranging windows from a new control box above the window. Support for multiple windows will first come to Oculus Browser, with support for more 2D apps like Chats and Store coming later.

These updates continue to evolve the Quest experience and represent a step toward VR becoming the next computing platform
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Together, these updates continue to evolve the Quest experience and represent a step toward VR becoming the next computing platform. It all starts rolling out this month, users can opt-in by going to the Experimental Features section in Settings and toggling the new features on.

The VR platform of the future must enable people to multitask easily, navigate between apps seamlessly, stay connected with others, and quite simply do more. From gaming to media and entertainment, from social experiences to getting work done, VR as the next computing platform will support the full spectrum of uses that people expect from their devices, like phones and laptops, today.

New Timbaland Music Pack Announced for Beat Saber

Launching March 26^th, gamers will be able to access new music by the legendary rapper, created specifically for the game. It features hit artists like Bruno Martini, Kaydence, Common Strangers, Sid Tipton, and Timbaland himself. The pack, priced at $7.99 (or $1.99 per song) on Oculus Quest and Rift, includes the following tracks:

• Sid Tipton, Timbaland – Has A Meaning
• Kaydence, Timbaland – Dumb Thingz
• Wavezswavesz – While We’re Young
• Nash Overstreet, Karra & Common Strangers – What I Like
• Bruno Martini, Timbaland – Famous ft. Jake Davis

On launch day at midnight, these tracks will also be available on iTunes, Apple Music, and Spotify

Beat Saber has also proven a viable way for artists and entertainers to connect with their fans
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Beat Saber continues to dominate the charts and has gone Double-Platinum, selling over 2-million copies worldwide across all platforms. In addition to breaking records within the VR community, the game has also proven a viable way for artists and entertainers to connect with their fans, as the packs have sold 10 million songs through downloadable content from artists like imagine Dragons, Green Day, K/DA, and others.

Beat Saber continues to dominate the charts and has gone Double-Platinum, selling over 2-million copies worldwide across all platforms
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Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Building the VR Platform of the Future appeared first on Tech Trends.

The BIFF is widely recognized as one of the world’s coolest film festivals, and this year is the first time the event is dedicating an entire pavilion to XR experiences, a move that celebrates the evolution of storytelling and recognizes the integral role technology plays in filmmaking. It will feature curated VR films and AR art from around the world, an opening kick-off party, industry meetups, interactive workshops, and the Boulder XR Science Fair highlighting VR and AR innovations from local university labs, tech teams, and professionals.

The BIFF is widely recognized as one of the world’s coolest film festivals,
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BIFF attracts more than 25,000 film enthusiasts, media and industry every year
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BIFF attracts more than 25,000 film enthusiasts, media and industry every year. Now in its 16^th edition and celebrating 100 years of cinema to boot, they are still keen to look to the future as much as celebrating the past. Featured films will include Disney’s “Cycles” and “Myth: A Frozen Tale” as well as keynotes and events where you’ll get to hear from Disney Animation creatives such as Jose Luis Gomez Dias and Jeff Gipson.

“The future of storytelling will be an amazingly new and exciting experience that we can’t even imagine today,” said Kevin Smith, executive producer for BIFF. “The XR Experience provides a glimpse into this ground-breaking new medium while providing a great community event to mix, learn and experience.”

The pavilion space will also prominently feature a retrospective of large-format Augmented Reality artworks from 2011-2018 by HEAVY, a multiple award-winning creative studio that specializes in using immersive technology to reclaim public spaces for civic engagement, enlightened interactivity, and fun & thoughtful experiences. The HEAVY team manages to do this mostly through large-scale art installations that utilize XR technologies to explore the intersections between philosophy, art, and design, utilizing the talents of a mixed group of developers, artists, and academics.

The future of storytelling will be a new and exciting experience that we can’t even imagine today
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Our own personal data has become a digital avatar that often carries a higher degree of perceived value than our physical presence
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Since 2011, the company has pioneered the use of Augmented Reality to engage audiences with fine art installations that explore the building tensions created by a historically analog world quickly transitioning to digital life. Their installations have not only graced events such as SXSW and Google i/o, but also taken over Times Square, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Brussels to the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Wynwood Walls in Miami, and the iconic Bowery Wall in New York.

“It’s really nice to get this recognition for our traditional body of work from over the years, but it’s also a reminder of how far XR has come, both in terms of the tech itself and also as a compelling storytelling and artistic medium in its own right,” says Chris Nunes, Head of Studio at HEAVY.

The high demand for truly innovative experiential art is illustrated by the fact that the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam recently lost its top place as the most popular single-artist museum to Tokyo’s MORI Building DIGITAL ART MUSEUM: teamLab Borderless (or “Borderless” for short).

Since 2011 HEAVY has pioneered the use of Augmented Reality to engage audiences with fine art installations
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And this is a trend that Nunes believes will start gathering significant momentum over the coming months and years as technologies and creative approaches to using them evolve and become more ubiquitous.

“I was at the Tate Modern gallery in London recently and I got really excited imagining the possibilities of making a dedicated art installation for such an amazing, forward-thinking cultural institution. We’ve been engaging with people in urban environments for years as they go about their daily lives, and that’s fantastic, but I think we [in the XR industries] have reached a real tipping point where artists and art fans are actually purposefully seeking out these experiences because of what they add to our understanding of reality and each other’s perspectives. These technologies live with us -in our pockets, under our pillows- and rightfully, are becoming an integral part of the artistic spark and expression, as opposed to something simply added onto the underlying art,” he concludes.

At the BIFF retrospective for HEAVY, visitors will get to experience a range of the studios’ most popular installations, such as “More Human Than Human” [MHTH]. It’s a fascinating use of data visualization and Augmented Reality that debuted in 2018 in Moscow’s Zaryadye Park. The team took datasets from the City of Moscow’s Open Data Portal – specifically, the latitude and longitude of all of the theaters, exhibition halls, and museums in Moscow – and digitally interconnected those waypoints with a 3D lattice that was meshed over a skull model. The idea they wanted to represent through the artwork was that our society’s sense of “self” has become increasingly defined by the accumulation, aggregation, and interpretation of massive amounts of personal data.

“With the rise of ever-present high-powered mobile devices, social media, and artificial intelligence, our own personal data has become a digital avatar that often carries a higher degree of perceived value than our physical presence,” HEAVY Creative Director BC Biermann explains.

Also featured in the exhibit is “Digital Neuron,” which was originally commissioned by the University of Geneva in Switzerland in 2016, and has since won an Auggie at the Augmented World Expo (AWE), was a 2019 Merit winner in education and was named a Top 100 Artistic Destination award by CodaWorx. The piece depicts the neuron’s central importance in human cognition and as the deeper engine of medical research, also using neurons as a visual metaphor for how ideas are spread between people.

These technologies live with us - in our pockets, under our pillows - and rightfully, are becoming an integral part of the artistic spark and expression
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Digital Neuron – augmented reality from Heavy.io on Vimeo.

“Parabola,” is yet another interesting interactive mural included in the retrospective, which featured in San Francisco’s Design Week 2017. It depicts a fractal background with a digital sculpture of a chair in the foreground built by impossibly interlocking and twisted parabolas (the parabola is a foundational design form found in everything from natural forms to product design and DaVinci sketches). Using AR, you can change the scene by moving the chair to different parts of the virtual room, its colors and the design and lighting of the room, and even exploding the entire suite as a form of design protest.

The BIFF XR Experience will be free to attend and runs from March 5th to the 7th at tech co-working space Galvanize
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In the meantime, the HEAVY team continues to push the envelope creatively, and they’re just putting the final touches on a 3 sculpture installation for the newest JW Marriott 5-star hotel in Anaheim which marks the first time they have integrated custom-made 3D sculptures with an AR experience. As far as Nunes and Biermann know, this installation will be the first time anyone has done that, so these are heady times indeed.

The BIFF XR Experience will be free to attend and runs from March 5th to the 7th at tech co-working space Galvanize with the VR Theater moving to the main Festival Tent for a few hours on Sunday, March 8.

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Experiencing Immersive Art in Colorado appeared first on Tech Trends.

This looks to be the year where we move beyond tentative experimentation into scalable deployment of immersive tech in the workplace. That’s the consensus that seems to emerge from “Top 2020 Trends: Enterprise AR & VR” a report published today by Unity Technologies, where 15 industry experts (yours truly among them) outlined how Mixed Reality (or XR depending on what flavor acronym you favor) will supercharge and transform the world of work.

XR has proven to be a paradigm shift for enterprise in terms of boosting productivity, cost-savings, and learning and development
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According to the report, we can expect even cautious companies to finally follow in the footsteps of their pioneering counterparts as XR becomes more accessible and mainstream, driven by a wave of new and improved HMDs, mobile AR and standalone VR, and the onset of 5G networks.

This looks to be the year where we move beyond tentative experimentation into scalable deployment of immersive tech in the workplace
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XR has proven to be a paradigm shift for enterprise in terms of boosting productivity, cost-savings, and learning and development, particularly in relation to highly skilled and specialized areas ranging from surgery to spacecraft engineering. Yet where so far we have seen pioneering companies work largely on an experimental trial-and-error basis, this next decade will see research catching up to meaningfully support this deployment on the ground.

We can expect even cautious companies to finally follow in the footsteps of their pioneering counterparts as XR becomes more accessible and mainstream
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Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, enterprise stakeholders will increasingly have the information and expert guidance at their disposal to tailor and customize solutions optimized for their specific industry, goals, and needs.

A recent Harvard Business Review Analytic Services study found that 87% of large companies are currently exploring, piloting, or deploying Mixed Reality, but the vast majority of those are still in the exploratory or proof-of-concept stages.

Academic research is now being conducted all over the world to investigate not if XR works but how it works and what considerations must be taken into account when designing content. One recent example is this article published on Frontiers in Psychology, which identifies significant differences in how people retain information in the short and long term depending on whether content is delivered in “active” or “passive” VR modes.

In the last couple of years, major companies everywhere ran proof-of-concept XR projects with uniformly positive results
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As more such studies are conducted, and more use cases are shared among enterprise stakeholders across an expanding ecosystem of different industries, we will move on from the heady days of experimental exploration and marveling at the power of immersive technologies towards more targeted, considered, evidence-based and industry-specific approaches. In other words, enterprise XR is about to enter its grown-up phase.

A Harvard Business Review Analytic Services study found that 87% of large companies are currently exploring, piloting, or deploying Mixed Reality
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“After a few years of testing applications, many verticals and use cases have proven ROI. The perception of gimmickry has given way to real business value,” says Maria Fernandez Guajardo, Facebook’s Director of Enterprise AR/VR, adding that 2020 is going to be a critical, if not glamorous, time for enterprise VR. “The industry will need to put in the arduous work of scale: establishing infrastructure, integrating workflows and connecting a comprehensive ecosystem,” she says.

With its effectiveness well established, the time has come for XR to move beyond “fancy demos, proof-of-concepts and pilots” to become “an indispensable digital productivity tool” used across the entire product lifecycle, from R&D to marketing to maintenance the report reads.

Academic research is now being conducted all over the world to investigate not if XR works but how it works and what considerations must be taken into account when designing content
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Yet these new opportunities also bring new challenges. Timoni West, Director of XR Research Unity Labs says UX designers will have to adjust in order to meet the demand for these new kinds of experiences. “Instead of making responsive design just for different devices, they’ll have to start thinking about responsive design as computers react to everything in the real world. Gestures, voice, gaze, time of day, how many people are in the room, and where you are: all of these variables are now new user inputs that have to be taken into account,” she explains.

According to Vinay Narayan VP, Platform Strategy and Developer Community HTC VIVE, this upcoming year will present the most robust ecosystem of innovations yet. “Technological innovations will make XR experiences a widely accessible tool for industrial enterprises of any scope and size,” he says.

There is also a lot of hard work to be done on the infrastructure and connectivity side for this promise to be delivered: “We can expect that enterprises will be spending less time on UX experiments and more time on designing a solid infrastructure around the data,” says Andreea Raducan, Head of Marketing at Innoactive, adding that whether we’re looking at 3D assets, VR apps, internal processes information, or lines of code, data needs to flow across platforms and reach various locations in real-time.

“As 5G networks come online, graphics and compute will increasingly be served from the network edge,” adds NVIDIA’s Director of Virtual Reality David Weinstein. “In the last couple of years, major companies everywhere ran proof-of-concept XR projects. The results were uniformly positive: faster time to market, lower total costs, better trained employees, happier customers, healthier patients. These early results will drive a virtuous cycle of growth and innovation,” he concludes.

Enterprise XR is about to enter its grown-up phase
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You can download the full report for free here

Want the latest insights from industry experts in enterprise AR & VR? Look no further!

Read our blog to see how 2020 will be a defining year https://t.co/zyibVIsMR8

— Unity (@unity3d) February 12, 2020

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Enterprise XR is Coming of Age appeared first on Tech Trends.

If it’s true what they say that time flies when you’re having fun, then 2019 must have been a really good year for immersive tech, because here we are gearing up for the holidays and I haven’t sent a single Christmas card. Literally, where has this year gone? Still, it has been such fun looking back at all the milestones we’ve experienced in immersive computing over the past 12 months, and I actually had a hard time picking out just 25 of them to share again with you.

A pretty compelling picture is starting to emerge of the paradigm shift towards spatial computing
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These stories are ranked in no particular order, and are a mixture of some pretty momentous stuff that has happened in the industry and a sprinkling of use cases that illustrate how these technologies are already impacting every aspect of our lives. When taken together, a pretty compelling picture starts to emerge of the paradigm shift towards spatial computing, and as we look back at the last year and wrap up another decade, it’s a reminder of how far we’ve come, and what’s in store for the future. Will the 2020’s finally hail the age of XR? I think they very well might, and hopefully, we’ll stick together on that journey.

The Oculus Quest saw console-like engagement from users as well as strong sales
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The Oculus Quest was a hit

At this year’s year’s E3 conference, Facebook’s Vice President of Special Gaming Strategies Jason Rubin told audiences that the Oculus Quest was seeing “console-like” engagement from users, selling $5 million worth of content in first 2 weeks since the device started shipping back in May. In fact, the device sold out at retailers such as Amazon, Walmart and Newegg. Since then, Facebook has continued to roll out new features such as native hand tracking and Oculus Link, which allows users to experience PC VR HMD quality on the standalone headset. By October, it was reported that Oculus Quest sales were responsible for significantly boosting the company’s non-advertising sales, which jumped to $269 million during the third quarter, a 43% year-over-year increase. “Quest is growing and doing quite well. We’re selling them as fast as we can make them, the demand has been strong and the content is starting to pick up,” Mark Zuckerberg said at the time.

The HTC Vive was phased out in October
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HTC Vive Retires

2019 said good-bye to the headset which was largely responsible for enthusing people about the possibilities of VR in recent years. The HTC Vive was phased out in October, replaced by the Vive Cosmos, which was priced at $699. But although industry pundits such as Venturebeat’s Dean Takahash called the new HMD an “engineering marvel” it came with a number of difficult trade-offs in terms of cost, visual quality, accessibility, and mobility.

There could be challenging times ahead for Magic Leap, and this could have a negative knock-on effect for the AR industry as a whole
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Bumpy Road For Magic Leap

As the year draws to a close, things are looking rather worrisome for what is arguably immersive tech’s most hyped-up company. First came the news that the company had signed control of its patents to JPMorgan Chase as collateral, closely followed by announcement of a new funding round, culminating with key resignations from high-profile executives including CFO Scott Henry and Senior VP of Creative Strategy John Gaeta (a special effects industry veteran who has worked on movies such as The Matrix). Magic Leap then announced it was pivoting towards enterprise customers following damning reports of extremely weak sales. Taken together, this could signal challenging times ahead for the start-up and possibly have a negative knock-on effect for the AR industry as a whole.

Cows Like VR Too

Dairy farmers in Russia started testing Virtual Reality on their dairy cows. According to Sarah Webber, a Research Fellow in Human-Computer (and Animal-Computer) interaction at the University of Melbourne, there is little evidence that the cows appreciated the content on the same level as we might, but argued that seeing animals interacting with technology could positively impact their lives by changing our persceptions and creating an empathetic bond between people and animals.

Dairy farmers in Russia started testing Virtual Reality on their dairy cows
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Google Ends the Daydream

The key message to come out of Google I/O this year was that the company largely abandoned its plans to push forward the development of headsets and content for VR effectively retiring the Daydream and focusing on Augmented Reality features for the Google Lens instead.

Trippy VR

The ‘Cyberdelic Incubator’ in Melbourne, Australia, is promoting a more conscious approach to technology through immersive media. The group’s lead Carl H Smith told the Guardian that XR’s power to instigate empathy can help us create more meaningful human connections, allowing us to experience what it’s like to be another gender, or to have a mental health condition such as schizophrenia. One of the incubator’s projects “Death is Only the Beginning” even went as far as simulating a near-death experience, and was subsequently adapted for use with palliative care patients.

Immersive Masterpiece

Visitors to the Mauritshuis museum in Holland were able to use AR to step into Rembrandt’s haunting painting “The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp” which was painstakingly recreated – with actors standing in for each character in full period costume and makeup – and captured with 600 reflex cameras to produce 3D scans. The intention, says Dutch design agency CapitolaVR, was to ‘create a portal to the past, to the moment the painting was created.”

Visitors to the Mauritshuis museum in Holland were able to use AR to step into one of Rembrandt’s most haunting paintings
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#MeToo

The words of sexual assault survivor Chanel Miller were brought to life with an AR project undertaken by her fellow students at Stanford following a dispute with the university about how her ordeal should be memorialized. The “Dear Visitor” guided AR exhibit placed her own words, spoken in court, on the spot of the attack she suffered. “It goes beyond what a physical plaque could do,” says Hope Schroeder, a graduate who was part of Stanford’s augmented reality club, 4 AR/VR that developed the project.

Sony’s Next Move

Although the PSVR has proven to be the most commercially successful VR hardware to date – selling over 4.2 million units so far – there are high expectations that its next generation headset will bring significant improvements including wireless connectivity. At the same time, the company has also signaled that it is not ignoring the Augmented Reality market, launching a frankly awesome AR location-based Ghostbusters experience back in October.

The words of sexual assault survivor Chanel Miller were brought to life with an AR project
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Valve’s Long Game

In June Valve released its Index headset priced at a hefty $999, which got mixed reviews for providing a good experience, but only under very controlled circumstances. In short, the headset was hard work to setup properly and not very user-friendly. But the company’s ace in the pack was yet to be revealed in November, when it announced that its new Half-Life game would be released as a VR exclusive in 2020.

In June Valve released its Index headset priced at a hefty $999
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Nintendo Dips it Toes Into VR 

Arguably the best-loved company in gaming, there is always excitement whenever Nintendo starts to dabble with VR, and the success of the Labo kits was proof that the company could actually have a better chance of enticing the average consumer to engage with immersive tech than some other bigger players in the space, not least because they still hold the IP for some of the world’s all-time most popular games such as Super Mario and Zelda, both of which were supported in VR.

Arguably the best-loved company in gaming, there is always excitement whenever Nintendo starts to dabble with VR
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Virtual Immortality 

A $2.5 million project funded by the Dallas museum and created by Steven Spielberg’s USC Shoah Foundation immortalized holocaust survivor Max Glauben as a hologram able to share his WW2 experience with future generations. The project involved a week of filming, during which Glauben was captured answering over 1,000 questions by 18 cameras placed at 9 different angles.

A $2.5 million project funded by the Dallas museum and created by Steven Spielberg's USC Shoah Foundation immortalized holocaust survivor Max Glauben as a hologram
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Rising From The Ashes

Following the devastating fire at Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, visitors turned to VR to experience the magnificent building and its destroyed iconic spire. Several virtual tours remain available, highlighting the potential of such immersive technology to help preserve at least the essence and significance of historical monuments for future generations.

Talk Show Fun

Jimmy Fallon has proven to be a bit of a VR champion, showcasing it in fun ways on mainstream media. In April the Tonight Show host played Beat Saber against Captain Marvel star Brie Larson, followed by a hilarious game of Virtual Reality Pictionary with Kristen Stewart, Gaten Matarazzo of Stranger Things

Jimmy Fallon has proven to be a bit of a VR champion
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Holographic performances

Artists have embraced immersive tech with gusto in 2019. Bjork launched her Vulnicura VR album, David Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust” character was brought to life with real-time motion capture technology and Madonna performed at the Billboard Music awards alongside no fewer than five of her Augmented Reality personas. Meanwhile, Facebook hosted a concert by GRAMMY award-winning singer/songwriter H.E.R. and Dean Takahashi tested an app that let him remix AR audio at a live Elton John concert.

Artists have embraced immersive tech with gusto in 2019
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Virtual Worship

Churches across the US are embracing technology, including conducting whole services in Virtual Reality.  “We are leaving the information age and entering the experience age of VR and AR,” said D.J. Soto, pastor of VR Church, where roughly 150 avatars regularly attend services in AltspaceVR. Soto believes these virtual churches are much more inclusive, allowing for conversations to happen which would be difficult in physical places of worship.

150 avatars regularly attend church services in AltspaceVR
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Snapchat

Snap has emerged as a major player in the AR space thanks to its popular filters and lenses, even releasing a Gucci-themed version of its proprietary spectacles hardware. Most significantly, however, 2019 has seen a creative community start to grow and earn substantial revenues around the format. AR lenses were used to promote blockbusters such as “X-Men: Dark Phoenix” and “Joker” or the new latest adaptation of Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” as well as indie films such as Borley Rectory which turned users into a character from a classic ghost tale for Halloween.

Snap has emerged as a major player in the AR space
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Training for Just About Anything

By far the most compelling use case for immersive tech at the moment is in training and simulation, and those applications are virtually endless. From teaching firearms safety to Kentucky gun owners to helping train police in identifying cases of human trafficking or teaching veterans how to cope with hostile job interviews, all the way through to a “Thief Simulator” (which does exactly what it says on the tin) and even an active shooter training which was deployed in the Walmart Academy experience to help its employees prepare for such scenarios following recent shootings.

Losing One’s VRginity

No technology can be considered successful if it doesn’t attract use cases in the adult industry, so it is actually encouraging to see stories emerging such as that of porn company VRBangers charging couples around $15,000 to make their own naughty VR movie, or of Anna Petukhova, a Russian fashion model and entrepreneur who launched a global franchise of VR sex clubs called VRayu, which caters equally for men and women looking to explore their sexual fantasies in a safe virtual environment.

Anna Petukhova, a Russian fashion model and entrepreneur, launched a global franchise of VR sex clubs called VRayu
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Shut-Downs and Acquisitions

One notable casualty in the AR ecosystem this year was Daqri, which shut down in September in spite of raising $275 million in overall funding. There were also some significant acquisitions in the space, such as Jaunt XR being bought by Verizon, and Apple acquiring UK start-up Ikinema.

VR Therapy

A University of Barcelona study documented the therapeutic effects of virtual body swapping. Results showed that subjects holding conversations with themselves – while inhabiting an avatar of Dr. Sigmund Freud – showed improved mood compared to talking about problems in a virtual conversation with pre-scripted comments. Researchers believe that this method could be a useful tool for clinicians in the future.

A University of Barcelona study documented the therapeutic effects of virtual body swapping
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MacGyver Escape room

MacGyver creator Lee David Zlotoff teamed up with “Lawnmower Man” director Brett Leonard to create a VR escape room experience called MacGyverWorld slotted for release in 2020. The experience will use 3D capture technology, which scans participants as they enter a location-based VR venue so that friends can see each other as holograms and work collaboratively.

MacGyverWorld is slotted for release in 2020
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HoloLens Army

A version of the HoloLens designed for military use has been tested by the US Army earlier this year, following an announcement that Microsoft accepted a $480 million deal to supply thousands of HoloLens units to the army, in spite of strong objections from many of its employees. The system – which is still in the prototype phase and is not expected to deploy until 2022 at the earliest – also collects data to highlight areas that need improvement and further training.

A version of the HoloLens designed for military use has been tested by the US Army
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Minecraft

After releasing a teaser trailer in May and unveiling the first gameplay footage of “Minecraft Earth” at Apple’s conference in June, Microsoft proceeded with gradually rolling out what was arguably the most anticipated AR title of 2019 with a Beta version released in several cities including London and Seattle in July, followed by broader public releases in the following months. As of the end of November, the game had reportedly surpassed 2.5 million downloads.

As of the end of November, Minecraft Earth had reportedly surpassed 2.5 million downloads
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Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Top XR Stories of 2019 appeared first on Tech Trends.

The history of technology is rife with failure and the immersive industry is certainly no different. But as we look back at these top ten products and ideas which have not “quite” made it over the years, we should bear in mind that experimentation is crucial for progress, and that many of these have represented significant advances that have brought us closer to the realization of the spatial computing revolution.

The history of technology is rife with failure and immersive tech is no different
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Nintendo Virtual Boy

The Nintendo Virtual Boy is widely considered one of the company’s greatest failures, yet it has also become a cult object, and learning a bit more about it also provides us with useful context on how the company has approached its latest (and much better received) efforts with the Nintendo Labo VR. So while the console itself has been a failure, it was also ahead of its time in many respects, with the technology developed by Nintendo has since been incorporated into many of its products to this day. And should you come across one at a garage sale somewhere, snap it up quickly, as fewer than 800,000 units were made worldwide, making it a valuable collector’s item.

The Nintendo Virtual Boy is widely considered one of the company’s greatest failures
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The Virtual Boy was is a 32-bit table-top video game console touted as the first of its kind to offer stereoscopic 3D graphics that promised to totally immerse the players in their own private universe. Content fell well short of expectations, however, with only 22 games ever being released for the system (a problem arguably still plaguing VR today) At the time of its release in 1995, Nintendo of America projected hardware sales of 1.5 million units and software sales numbering 2.5 million by the end of the year. Nintendo had shipped 350,000 units of the Virtual Boy by December 1995, around three and a half months after its North American release. Panned by critics and plagued by health and safety concerns, sales fell well short of expectations and production ceased by early 1996. The Virtual Boy created an illusion of depth through the effect known as parallax. In a manner similar to using a head-mounted display, the user looks into an eyepiece made of neoprene on the front of the machine, and then an eyeglass-style projector allows viewing of the monochromatic (in this case, red) image. Nintendo claimed that a color display would have made the system too expensive and resulted in “jumpy” images, so the company opted for a monochrome display.

Sensorama

Morton Heilig was known as the father of Virtual Reality, and for good reason. His Sensorama machine, which he patented in 1962, is one of the earliest examples of multimodal technology. Heilig was a multimedia creator in a time when the term hadn’t yet been invented. His concept of multi-sensory theater-like experiences was laid out in his 1955 paper The Cinema of the Future, where he talks about being inspired by the concept of ‘feelies’ — movies enhanced with sensory elements — imagined in Aldous Huxley’s seminal Science Fiction tale Brave New World. It’s probably fair to say that Heilig was ahead of his time, as he never did get funding to take his design into commercial production, so eventually abandoned it. Heilig passed away in 1997, yet his website — which bizarrely still says it’s “under construction” lists the Sensorama machine for sale to a serious collector or museum. The reported price tag on this piece of VR history is $1.5 million.

Morton Heilig was known as the father of Virtual Reality
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He went on to build the Sensorama prototype to showcase that concept in practice. To experience a two-minute immersive experience, the user would insert a token, straddle a bucket seat, grasp a pair of handles, and place their eyes on viewing holes (safe in the knowledge that the clever design even incorporated UV lights that sterilized the equipment after each use) surrounded by vents. There were five films to choose from, all shot by Heilig himself using a 3D camera he also invented and built from scratch, which filmed side-by-side 35mm simultaneously, had capacity for two 400 ft magazines, and yet was small enough to be used as a hand-held device. Intriguing titles included Belly Dancer, Dune Buggy, and, I’m a Coca-Cola Bottle. In Motorcycle, the simulation took you for a ride through New York as you felt the wind on your face, heard the noises of the city, and even smelt the food in the snack shops and the exhaust from the bus in front of you.

Samsung Gear VR

It sometimes seems strange to call something that happened just five years ago a “throwback,” but if tech time works like dog-years, in the immersive space things can move so fast it can feel more like fly-years. So as I cast my mind back when I first unwrapped my Samsung Gear VR and plugged what now seems like a very old and clunky phone on its front, it seems like another world from the sleek experience I can get from an Oculus quest for not that much more money. This is why we’ve seen such a sharp fall in demand for mobile VR which finally caused Samsung to drop support for the Gear VR on its latest Samsung Galaxy models, although it held on as long as it could. Yet the fact we seem to be moving on from mobile VR shouldn’t make us overlook the contribution that the format — and the Samsung Gear VR in particular — have had on the ecosystem. Although far from perfect, the price point and accessibility they offered bridged the gap between the ultra-basic cardboard introductions to the medium and the full-blown setups required by the HTC VIVE and Oculus Rift. And there are still not many VR devices out there that can claim to have been sold out on the day of their release.

We seem to be moving on from mobile VR
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The Samsung Gear VR was developed as a collaboration between Samsung and Oculus. Although the Samsung Gear VR consumer edition was released in November 2015, Samsung had obtained a patent in 2005 detailing the use of a mobile phone as the display for a HMD. However, mobile phone technology at the time limited the degree of quality and performance possible. Samsung continued to research VR and HMD internally. When in use, a compatible Samsung Galaxy device acts as the headset’s display and processor, while the Gear VR unit itself acts as the controller, which contains the field of view, as well as a custom Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) for rotational tracking, which connects to the smartphone via USB-C or micro-USB. The Gear VR headset also includes a touchpad and back button on the side, as well as a proximity sensor to detect when the headset is on.

Transitions

Thirty-three years ago the National Film Board of Canada commissioned a production called Transitions to be showcased at the country’s Expo 86 in Vancouver, the first-ever IMAX presentation using polarized glasses. It was also the first full-color 3D IMAX film. In an article published in The Province newspaper in June 1986, film critic Michael Walsh described how the experience was sure to be “every small child’s single most treasured memory of Expo 86.” So perhaps when we look at the past five years or so since this latest wave of enthusiasm for immersive technologies has started, it is useful to ponder on how long the technology has been enthusing people for. The difference now is that they no longer need an IMAX setup to do so. And although a portmanteau of random special effects would probably not be enough to keep audiences interested for long nowadays, Walsh’s experience also demonstrates how engaging content is key to getting people to embrace it.

Transitions was the first full-color 3D IMAX film
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From a fixed position, McNabb’s camera puts dressed lumber, a gymnast and that wonderful teddy bear within our apparent reach. Parallel tracking shots follow voyageur canoes along a wilderness river and a historic steam locomotive across the country. When McNabb tracks forward, the audience drives down a rural road behind a vintage automobile, trots around a track just inches ahead of a harness racehorse and, briefly, sits astride a speeding motorcycle.”

Forte VFX1 Headset

The Forte VFX1 Headset was the most advanced, complex and expensive consumer VR system that appeared on the market during the mid-1990s VR craze. It was released in 1995 and cost about $599. It comprised a helmet, a handheld controller, and an ISA interface board. For those keen on indulging in some retro gaming, you can still occasionally find operational headsets for sale — one sold on Ebay recently for $240 — and there is a surprising amount of content available for it, including classic games such as Duke Nukem 3D.

The Forte VFX1 Headset was the most advanced, complex and expensive consumer VR system that appeared on the market during the mid-1990s VR craze
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The helmet — which in looks and functionality comes pretty close to what was portrayed in the 1992 classic “Lawnmower Man” — featured Two Degrees of Freedom (2DOF) head tracking with internal sensors for pitch (70 degrees), roll (70 degrees), and yaw (360 degrees) in addition to stereoscopic 3D and stereo audio. It even had cool features which we see in modern VR headsets, such as a “smart visor” that could be opened to allow the user to look at the outside world, without taking off the whole thing. The visuals, which by all accounts were very impressive for the time, were delivered by dual 0.7″ 263 x 230 LCD displays capable of 256 colors. Optics comprised dual lenses with adjustable focus and interpupillary distance, with a 45-degree diagonal Field of View (FOV). The helmet also included built-in stereo speakers and a condenser microphone. A hand-held controller called the Cyberpuck offered three buttons and internal sensors for pitch and roll. Audio, video, and tracking information was transmitted via the VIP Board, a 16-bit ISA card that received video input from the video card’s 26-pin VESA feature connector. Making this complex setup work was not for the faint-hearted though, as it required a lot of calibrating and setup with good old MS-DOS. For starters, the system’s “VIP” card needed to be installed into an ISA slot of the host PC. This worked together with the PC’s video-card connected via VESA bus to provide stereoscopic imagery on both screens of the HMD.

View-Master

After Nintendo Labo announced the release of its VR software system, which includes a cardboard headset brings to mind some of the similar formats that populated our childhood experiences, such as the View-Master. Though the View-Master wasn’t technically considered virtual or augmented reality, the 3-D stereoscope film reels of everything from planets in the solar system to movements of dinosaurs captured my attention with each flick of the plastic lever.

Originally created in 1939, the View-Master quickly became popular for looking at high-quality images of tourist destinations
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Originally created in 1939, the View-Master quickly became popular for looking at high-quality images of tourist destinations shortly after the advent of color photographs. After going through a few interations and discoveries of practical uses, the View-Master ultimately became visual entertainment for children. As a way to stay modern with the times, View-Master traded in its iconic film reel for and SDK to create the View-Master Virtual Reality Viewer. Though View-Master is doing what it must to continue providing visual stimulation to children, I will never forget how important the View-Master was to my childhood.

DisneyQuest

As far as I’m concerned, 2016 was a pretty good year for VR. People were starting to get really excited about the technology and some significant advances were being made, and I wrote my first article about VR Porn for Playboy. But it was also the end of an era as Disney announced that it would be closing down its pioneering Indoor Interactive Theme Park, DisneyQuest. It was a relatively early proof of concept as to the appetite for location-based VR entertainment, something that companies like The VOID are now reviving in a big way. Not only that, but DisneyQuest was also the launchpad for many prominent careers in the immersive field, as those who worked for the company are still shaping the industry ecosystem. Case-in-point being Avi Bar-Zeev, who after working for them in the 90s moved to Microsoft and then Apple, where he was rumored to be involved in the development of their AR glasses.

Multi-sensory rides such as “Aladdin’s Magic Carpet” and “Ride the Comix” proved really popular for years
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Originally opened in 1998, the Orlando five-story indoor interactive theme park cost an estimated $90 million and boasted (for the time) cutting edge computer graphics and HMDs (whenever you moan about how bulky VR headsets are, do take a look pictures like the one below to put things into some perspective). Multi-sensory rides such as “Aladdin’s Magic Carpet” and “Ride the Comix” proved really popular for years, but by the end of the ’90s it was suffering from a lack of investment, before finally closing its doors permanently and making way for a new attraction on July 3, 2017.

Telesphere Mask

Most people associate Morton Heilig with the iconic Sensorama machine, yet he invented something even before then, and eight years before the Sword of Damocles which is widely credited with being the first-ever VR headset. Yet in 1960 Heilig patented yet another pioneering VR invention: The Telesphere Mask, which to me looks much like an aluminum version of the Gear VR, and in a very real way, it actually was. The only real difference is that instead of connecting to a yet-to-be-invented smartphone, it linked to miniaturized TV tubes. Heilig describes it in the patent filing as “a telescopic television apparatus for individual use where the spectator is given a complete sensation of reality, i.e. moving three-dimensional images which may be in color, with 100% peripheral vision, binaural sound, scents, and air breezes.”

In 1960 Heilig patented another VR invention: The Telesphere Mask
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The amazing device was (unlike the Sword of Damocles) light enough to wear on your head, with adjustable ear and eye fixings. Like Sensorama, the mask proved a commercial failure way ahead of its time, and even as the second coming of VR dawned in 2016 it remained an obscure footnote in the history of immersive tech. His widow, Marianne Heilig, repeatedly tried to donate the historic piece to a museum that would display it, but was flatly rejected by places such as the Hollywood museum even when she offered it for free. In an interview for Tech Radar back in 2016 she said the whole thing made her feel very sad and demoralized: “I’ve almost given up on this whole thing, but I’m not just going to give it away after a lifetime of struggle. I’m still working just to pay interest on the debt because I refuse to go bankrupt,” she told Holly Brockwell at the time

3D TV

While 3D cinema is still a thing, especially in Asia, major manufacturers such as Samsung have pulled 3D TV from their offering, signaling the demise of the once-promising format. Given the fact that a lot of the companies involved in developing these 3D display technologies are also involved in making AR/VR headsets, we are also likely to see some of the key innovations “recycled” into new products. It is difficult to envisage a future where we are still buying giant screens to put into our homes for much longer, however, when displays are already emerging that allow for high-resolution immersive content to be consumed anytime, anywhere.

The buzz around 3D TV hit its peak around 2010
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The buzz around 3D TV hit its peak around 2010, with companies hailing its immersive powers as the future of entertainment. And the fact that all that investment has turned into one massive flop certainly fuels arguments for VR naysayers who are keen to draw parallels between the two. There are certainly some lessons to be learned around the fact that no matter how cool a technology might be, if it doesn’t hit a sweet spot between practicality, price, and compelling content, it won’t snare consumers — certainly not in the numbers needed to make it “the next big thing.” However, the straight-up comparison is rather unfair if we look at the broader spectrum of immersive technology (i.e. XR and Spatial Computing rather than narrower AR/VR applications) as opposed to 3D TV’s very narrow utility scope.

Sega VR

Back in the early 90s, Sega attempted to get into VR in a very similar way in which Sony has done with the PSVR — building peripheral Virtual Reality hardware for its most popular console. But things did not go well for the gaming giant. The Sega Genesis VR headset was a gigantic flop that never even got a proper release. Given that this all happened 26 years ago (don’t know about you, but as someone who can still clearly remember losing myself in those Mega Drive games, that makes me feel old) it does put into perspective just how far things have advanced over the past few years. There’s no doubt that for anybody who bothers to look into the history of VR, that it’s a slow burner with plenty of pitfalls that will trip even the mightiest companies.

In 1991 Sega began development on a home VR headset, the Virtua VR
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So what went so terribly wrong? In 1991 Sega began development on a home VR headset, the Virtua VR, which was later rebranded as Sega VR. The company introduced the headset — with its rather sleek (in a retro sort of way) wrap-around-glasses design — at the 1993 Consumer Electronics Show with an announced target price of $200. It got broadly covered in the press and became one of the most eagerly anticipated holiday product releases of the year. Yet when it came to testing the device in action, there were severe problems with it causing widespread motion sickness, something that the VR industry has been working hard to address even to this day. In the end, it seems to have been a classic case of PR panic that caused the company to simply cut its losses and pull the plug on the release of the Sega VR. Some of the technology developed was eventually repurposed onto the company’s arcade machines, but it certainly steered clear of the consumer VR market since.

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Alice Bonasio is a VR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

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