ScaMP: A Head Guided Projection System

With the recent introduction of low cost head mounted displays (HMDs), prices of HMD-based virtual reality setups dropped considerably. In various application areas personal head mounted displays can be utilized for groups of users to deliver different context sensitive information to individual users. We present a hardware setup that allows attaching 12 or more HMDs to a single PC. Finally we demonstrate how a collaborative, educational, augmented reality application is used by six students wearing HMDs on a single PC simultaneously with interactive framerates.

2010

Abstract Immersive multi-projection environments are becoming affordable for many research centers, but these solutions needs several integration steps to be fully operational, and some of these steps are difficult and not in a common domain. This paper presents the most recent techniques involved in multi-projection solutions, from projection to computer cluster software. The hardware in these VR (Virtual Reality) installations is a connection of projectors, screen, speaker, computers and tracking devices.

2010

Immersive multi-projection environments are becoming affordable for many research centers, but these solutions need several integration steps to be fully operational; some of these steps are difficult and not in a common domain. This tutorial presents the most recent techniques involved in multi-projection solutions, from projection to computer cluster software. The hardware in these VR installations is a connection of projectors, screens, speakers, computers and tracking devices. The tutorial will introduce hardware options, explaining their advantages and disadvantages. We will cover software design and open source tools available, and how to administrate the whole solution, with tasks such as installing the computer cluster and configuring the graphical outputs. An introduction to tracking systems, explaining how electromagnetic and optical trackers work, will be also provided. At the end, we are going to present important design decisions in real cases: the project process, prob...

2010 25th International Conference of Image and Vision Computing New Zealand, 2010

Virtual environments (VE) are gaznzng in popularity and are increasingly used for teamwork training purposes, e.g., for medical teams. We have identified two shortcomings of modern VEs: First, nonverbal communication channels are essential for teamwork but are not supported well. Second, view control in VEs is usually done manually, requiring the user to learn the controls before being able to effectively use them. We address those two shortcomings by using an inexpensive webcam to track the user's head. The rotational movement is used to control the head movement of the user's avatar, thereby conveying head gestures and adding a nonverbal communication channel. The translational movement is used to control the view of the VE in an intuitive way. Our paper presents the results of a user study designed to investigate how well users were able to use our system's advantages.

1993

Several common systems satisfy some but not all of the VR definition above. Flight simulators provide vehicle tracking, not head tracking, and do not generally operate in binocular stereo. Omnimax theaters give a large angle of view [8], occasionally in stereo, but are not interactive. Head-tracked monitors [4][6] provide all but a large angle of view. Head-mounted displays (HMD) [13] and BOOMs [9] use motion of the actual display screens to achieve VR by our definition. Correct projection of the imagery on large screens can also create a VR experience, this being the subject of this paper. This paper describes the CAVE (CAVE Automatic Virtual Environment) virtual reality/scientific visualization system in detail and demonstrates that projection technology applied to virtual-reality goals achieves a system that matches the quality of workstation screens in terms of resolution, color, and flicker-free stereo. In addition, this format helps reduce the effect of common tracking and system latency errors. The off-axis perspective projection techniques we use are shown to be simple and straightforward. Our techniques for doing multi-screen stereo vision are enumerated, and design barriers, past and current, are described. Advantages and disadvantages of the projection paradigm are discussed, with an analysis of the effect of tracking noise and delay on the user. Successive refinement, a necessary tool for scientific visualization, is developed in the virtual reality context. The use of the CAVE as a one-to-many presentation device at SIGGRAPH '92 and Supercomputing '92 for computational science data is also mentioned.

… : Teleoperators & Virtual …, 2005

Proceedings of SPIE, 2005

Methods, systems, apparatus and devices for the lens design of an HMPD with eye-tracking capabilities. The integration uses a low-level optical configuration in order to achieve a compact, comfortable, easy-to-use system. The optical system is further designed and optimized for sharing of the optical path between the HMD and the Eye-Tracker with minimal performance loss for both tasks.

Smart Graphics, 2000

This paper describes hardware and software requirements for the development of a gaze-contingent virtual reality sys- tem which incorporates several cues to presence. The user' s gaze direction, as well as head position and orientation, are tracked to allow dynamic level-of-detail changes for render- ing. Users can see themselves, rather than representations thereof, within blue-screened virtual environments, and lim- ited

Real-time gaze tracking is a promising interactiontechnique for virtual environments. Immersiveprojection-based virtual reality systems such as theCAVEallow users a wide range of natural movements. Unfortunately, most head and eye movementmeasurement techniques are of limited use during freehead and body motion. An improved head-eye trackingsystem is proposed and developed for use in immersiveapplications with free head motion. The system is basedupon a head-mounted video-based eye tracking systemand a ...

2011

The display units integrated in todays head-mounted displays (HMDs) provide only a limited field of view (FOV) to the virtual world. In order to present an undistorted view to the virtual environment (VE), the perspective projection used to render the VE has to be adjusted to the limitations caused by the HMD characteristics. In particular, the geometric field of view (GFOV), which defines the virtual aperture angle used for rendering of the 3D scene, is set up according to the display's field of view. A discrepancy between these two fields of view distorts the geometry of the VE in a way that either minifies or magnifies the imagery displayed to the user. Discrepancies between the geometric and physical FOV causes the imagery to be minified or magnified. This distortion has the potential to negatively or positively affect a user's perception of the virtual space, sense of presence, and performance on visual search tasks.