A

SEMINAR REPORT
on
VITUAL REALITY

DEOGADE SHOBHIT PRAMOD

(PRN NO 2130331372058)

UNDER GUIDENCE OF
Prof. SENHAL GAIKWAD

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR TECHNOLOGICAL

UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRONICS
AND TELECOMMUNICATIONSS
ENGINEERING
2021-2022
 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR TECHNOLOGICAL
UNIVERSITY
"VIDYAVIHAR", LONERE-402103, Tal; Mangoan, Dist: Raigad,
(Maharashtra State), INDIA

CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the Seminar entitled “VIRTUAL REALITY” submitted by

DEOGADE SHOBHIT PRAMOD (PRN:- 2130331372058) is record of bonafide work
carried out by him under my guidance in the partial fulfillment the requirement for the
award of Degree of B. Tech. in Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering course of
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University, Lonere (Dist. Raigad) in the academic
year 2021-2022.

Dr. Sanjay L. Nalbalwar Prof. Snehal Gaikwad

HOD Guide

Department Of Electronics and Department Of Electronics and

Telecommunications Engineering Telecommunications Engineering

EXAMINAR 1:

EXAMINAR 2:

Date:

Place: Lonere - 402103, Raigad

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It ours privilege to express deep sense of gratitude towards all those who helped me to prepare
my report titled as Virtual Reality. I take this opportunity to thank our guide Prof. Snehal
Gaikwad of Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering Department for their help
whenever required. I am grateful to our respected teachers and supporting staff of Department
of Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering for providing inspiration and guidance
for my project. I am thankful to Head of Department of Electronicsand Telecommunications
Engineering for giving such an opportunity to present our project. I am highly obliged to my
project coordinator and my guide for their valuable instructions, guidance in our project and
its presentation. Finally I express sincere thanks to all those who have helped us directly or
indirectly in our ways in completion of this project.

DEOGADE SHOBHIT PRAMOD

(PRN:- 2130331372058)
Department of Electronics and
Telecommunications Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar
Technological University Lonere, Raigad.
 Virtual Reality
History, Applications, Technology and Future
Shobhit Deogade
Department of Electronics
&
Telecommunications Engineering
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University Lonere, Raigad Maharashtra

Abstract
Virtual Reality (VR), sometimes called Virtual Environments (VE) has drawn much attention in
the last few years. Extensive media coverage causes this interest to grow rapidly. Very few
people, however, really know what VR is, what its basic principles and its open problems are.
In this paper a historical overview of virtual reality is presented, basic terminology and classes
of VR systems are listed, followed by applications of this technology in science, work, and
entertainment areas. An insightful study of typical VR systems is done. All components of VR
application and interrelations between them are thoroughly examined: input devices, output
devices and software. Additionally human factors and their implication on the design issues of
VE are discussed. Finally, the future of VR is considered in two aspects: technological and
social. New research directions, technological frontiers and potential applications are pointed
out. The possible positive and negative influence of VR on life of average people is
speculated.

1. Introduction
1.1. History
Nowadays computer graphics is used in many domains of our life. At the end of the 20th
century it is difficult to imagine an architect, engineer, or interior designer working without a
graphics workstation. In the last years the stormy development of microprocessor technology
brings faster and faster computers to the market. These machines are equipped with better and
faster graphics boards and their prices fall down rapidly. It becomes possible even for an
average user, to move into the world of computer graphics. This fascination with a new
(ir)reality often starts with computer games and lasts forever. It allows to see the surrounding
world in other dimension and to experience things that are not accessible in real life or even not
yet created. Moreover, the world of three-dimensional graphics has neither borders nor
constraints and can be created and manipulated by ourselves as we wish – we can enhance it
by a fourth dimension: the dimension of our imagination...
 But not enough: people always want more. They want to step into this world and interact
with it – instead of just watching a picture on the monitor. This technology which becomes
overwhelmingly popular and fashionable in current decade is called Virtual Reality (VR). The
very first idea of it was presented by Ivan Sutherland in 1965: “make that (virtual) world in the
window look real, sound real, feel real, and respond realistically to the viewer’s
actions” [Suth65]. It has been a long time since then, a lot of research has been done and
status quo: “the Sutherland’s challenge of the Promised Land has not been reached yet but we
are at least in sight of it” [Broo95].

1.2. What is VR?

At the beginning of 1990s the development in the field of virtual reality became much more
stormy and the term Virtual Reality itself became extremely popular. We can hear about Virtual
Reality nearly in all sort of media, people use this term very often and they misuse it in many
cases too. The reason is that this new, promising and fascinating technology captures greater
interest of people than e.g., computer graphics. The consequence of this state is that nowadays
the border between 3D computer graphics and Virtual Reality becomes fuzzy. Therefore in the
following sections some definitions of Virtual Reality and its basic principles are presented.

• “Real-time interactive graphics with three-dimensional models, combined with a display

technology that gives the user the immersion in the model world and direct
manipulation.” [Fuch92]
• “The illusion of participation in a synthetic environment rather than external observation
of such an environment. VR relies on a three-dimensional, stereoscopic head-tracker
displays, hand/body tracking and binaural sound. VR is an immersive, multi-sensory
experience.” [Giga93a]
• “Computer simulations that use 3D graphics and devices such as the DataGlove to allow
the user to interact with the simulation.” [Jarg95]
• “Virtual reality refers to immersive, interactive, multi-sensory, viewer-centered, three-
dimensional computer generated environments and the combination of technologies
required to build these environments.” [Cruz93a]
• “Virtual reality lets you navigate and view a world of three dimensions in real time, with
six degrees of freedom. (...) In essence, virtual reality is clone of physical
reality.” [Schw95]

Although there are some differences between these definitions, they are essentially equivalent.
They all mean that VR is an interactive and immersive (with the feeling of presence) experience
in a simulated (autonomous) world [Zelt92] (see fig. 1.2.1.1) – and this measure we will use
to determine the level of advance of VR systems.

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 (1,0,0) (1,1,0)

Autonomy

(1,0,1) (1,1,1)
Virtual Reality

(0,0,0)
Interaction

(0,1,0)

Presence
(0,0,1) (0,1,1)

Figure 1.2.1.1. Autonomy, interaction, presence in VR – Zeltzer’s cube (adapted from [Zelt92]).

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1.3. Applications of VR
1.3.1. Motivation to use VR
Undoubtedly VR has attracted a lot of interest of people in last few years. Being a new
paradigm of user interface it offers great benefits in many application areas. It provides an easy,
powerful, intuitive way of human-computer interaction. The user can watch and manipulate
the simulated environment in the same way we act in the real world, without any need to learn
how the complicated (and often clumsy) user interface works. Therefore many applications like
flight simulators, architectural walkthrough or data visualization systems were developed
relatively fast. Later on, VR has was applied as a teleoperating and collaborative medium, and
of course in the entertainment area.

1.3.2. Data and architectural visualization

For a long time people have been gathering a great amount of various data. The management of
megabytes or even gigabytes of information is no easy task. In order to make the full use of it,
special visualization techniques were developed. Their goal is to make the data perceptible and
easily accessible for humans. Desktop computers equipped with visualization packages and
simple interface devices are far from being an optimal solution for data presentation and
manipulation. Virtual reality promises a more intuitive way of interaction.

The first attempts to apply VR as a visualization tool were architectural walkthrough

systems. The pioneering works in this field were done at the University of North Carolina
beginning after year 1986 [Broo86], with the new system generations developed
constantly [Broo92b]. Many other research groups created impressive applications as well –
just to mention the visualization of St. Peter Basilica at the Vatican presented at the Virtual
Reality World’95 congress in Stuttgart or commercial Virtual Kitchen design tool. What is so
fantastic about VR to make it superior to a standard computer graphics? The feeling of presence
and the sense of space in a virtual building, which cannot be reached even by the most realistic
still pictures or animations. One can watch it and perceive it under different lighting conditions
just like real facilities. One can even walk through non-existent houses – the destroyed ones
(see fig. 1.3.2.1) like e.g., the Frauenkirche in Dresden, or ones not even created yet.

Another discipline where VR is also very useful is scientific visualization. The navigation
through the huge amount of data visualized in three-dimensional space is almost as easy as
walking. An impressive example of such an application is the Virtual Wind Tunnel [Brys93f,
Brys93g] developed at the NASA Ames Research Center. Using this program the scientists
have the possibility to use a data glove to input and manipulate the streams of virtual smoke in
the airflow around a digital model of an airplane or space-shuttle. Moving around (using a
BOOM display technology) they can watch and analyze the dynamic behavior of airflow and

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easily find the areas of instability (see fig. 1.3.2.2). The advantages of such a visualization
system are convincing – it is clear that using this technology, the design process of
complicated shapes of e.g., an aircraft, does not require the building of expensive wooden
models any more. It makes the design phase much shorter and cheaper. The success of NASA
Ames encouraged the other companies to build similar installations – at Eurographics’95
Volkswagen in cooperation with the German Fraunhofer Institute presented a prototype of a
virtual wind tunnel for exploration of airflow around car bodies.

(a) (b)

Figure 1.3.2.1. VR in architecture: (a) Ephesos ruins (TU Vienna), (b) reconstruction of destroyed
Frauenkirche in Dresden (IBM).

(a) (b)

Figure 1.3.2.2. Exploration of airflow using Virtual Wind Tunnel developed at NASA Ames:
(a) outside view, (b) inside view (from [Brys93f]).

Other disciplines of scientific visualization that have also profited of virtual reality include
visualization of chemical molecules (see fig. 1.3.2.3), the digital terrain data of Mars
surface [Hitc93] etc.

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 Figure 1.3.2.3. VR in chemistry: exploration of molecules.

Augmented reality (see fig. 1.3.2.4) offers the enhancement of human perception and was
applied as a virtual user’s guide to help completing some tasks: from the easy ones like laser
printer maintenance [Brys92c] to really complex ones like a technician guide in building a
wiring harness that forms part of an airplane’s electrical system [Caud92]. An other example
of augmented reality application was developed at the UNC: its goal was to enhance a doctor’s
view with ultrasonic vision to enable him/her to gaze directly into the patient’s body [Baju92].

(a) (b)

Figure 1.3.2.4. Augmented Reality: (a) idea of AR (UNC),

(b) augmented reality ultrasound system (from [Stat95]).
(b) (b)

Figure 1.3.4.1. Advanced flight simulator of Boeing 777: (a) outside view, (b) inside view (from [Atla95]).

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 (a) (b)

Figure 1.3.4.2. VR in medicine: (a) eye surgery (from [Hunt93]), (b) leg surgery (FhG IGD).

One can say that virtual reality established itself in many disciplines of human activities, as a
medium that allows easier perception of data or natural phenomena appearance. Therefore the
education purposes seem to be the most natural ones. The intuitive presentation of construction
rules (virtual Lego-set), visiting a virtual museum, virtual painting studio or virtual music
playing [Loef95, Schr95] are just a few examples of possible applications. And finally thanks
to the enhanced user interface with broader input and output channels, VR allows people with
disabilities to use computers [Trev94, Schr95]

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2 . VR technology
2.1. A first look at VR applications: basic components
VR requires more resources than standard desktop systems do. Additional input and output
hardware devices and special drivers for them are needed for enhanced user interaction. But we
have to keep in mind that extra hardware will not create an immersive VR system. Special
considerations by making a project of such systems and special software [Zyda93b] are also
required. First, let us have a short look at the basic components of VR immersive
applications:

Tracker
HMD

input data stream

3DMouse

output data stream

Figure 2.1.1. Basic components of VR immersive application.

Figure 2.1.1 depicts the most important parts of human-computer-human interaction loop
fundamental to every immersive system. The user is equipped with a head mounted display,
tracker and optionally a manipulation device (e.g., three-dimensional mouse, data glove etc.).
As the human performs actions like walking, head rotating (i.e. changing the point of view),
data describing his/her behavior is fed to the computer from the input devices. The computer
processes the information in real-time and generates appropriate feedback that is passed back to
the user by means of output displays.

In general: input devices are responsible for interaction, output devices for the feeling of
immersion and software for a proper control and synchronization of the whole environment.

2.1.1. Input devices

Input devices determine the way a user communicates with the computer. Ideally all these
devices together, should make user’s environment control as intuitive and natural as possible –
they should be practically invisible [Brys93e]. Unfortunately, the current state of technology

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is not advanced enough to support this, so naturalness may be reached in some very limited
cases.

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In most of cases we still have to introduce some interaction metaphors that may become a
difficulty for an unskilled user.

2.1.2. Output devices

Output devices are responsible for the presentation of the virtual environment and its
phenomena to the user – they contribute to the generation of an immersive feeling at most.
These include visual, auditory or haptic displays. As it is the case with input, the output
devices are also underdeveloped. The current state of technology does not allow to stimulate
human senses in a perfect manner, because VR output devices are far from ideal: they are
heavy, low- quality and low-resolution. In fact most systems support visual feedback, and only
some of them enhance it by audio or haptic information.

2.1.3. Software
Beyond input and output hardware, the underlying software plays a very important role. It is
responsible for the managing of I/O devices, analyzing incoming data and generating proper
feedback. The difference to conventional systems is that VR devices are much more
complicated than these used at the desktop – they require extremely precise handling and send
large quantities of data to the system. Moreover, the whole application is time-critical and
software must manage it: input data must be handled timely and the system response that is sent
to the output displays must be prompt in order not to destroy the feeling of immersion.

2.2. Human factors

As virtual environments are supposed to simulate the real world, by constructing them we
must have knowledge how to “fool the user’s senses” [Holl95]. This problem is not a trivial
task and the sufficiently good solution has not yet been found: on the one hand we must give
the user a good feeling of being immersed, and on the other hand this solution must be
feasible. Which senses are most significant, what are the most important stimuli and of what
quality do they have to be in order to be accepted by the user?

Let us start by examining the contribution of each of the five human senses [Heil92]:
• sight.......................70 %
• hearing...................20 %
• smell........................5 %
• touch........................4 %
• taste.........................1 %

This chart shows clearly that human vision provides the most of information passed to our
brain and captures most of our attention. Therefore the stimulation of the visual system plays a
principal role in “fooling the senses” and has become the focus of research. The second most

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important sense is hearing, which is also quite often taken into consideration (see section
2.5.3 for details). Touch in general, does not play a significant role, except for precise
manipulation tasks, when it becomes really essential (see section 2.3.3 and 2.5.2 for details).
Smell and taste are not yet considered in most VR systems, because of their marginal role and
difficulty in implementation.

The other aspects cannot be forgotten too: system synchronization (i.e. synchronization of
all stimuli with user’s actions), which contributes mainly to simulator sickness (see
section 2.2.2 for details) and finally the design issues (i.e. taking into account psychological
aspects) responsible for the depth of presence in virtual environments [Slat93, Slat94].

2.2.1. Visual perception characterization

As already mentioned before, visual information is the most important aspect in creating the
illusion of immersion in a virtual world. Ideally we should be able to generate feedback equal to
or exceeding the limits of the human visual system [Helm95]. Unfortunately today’s
technology is not capable to do so, hence we will have to consider many compromises and
their implications on the quality of the resulting virtual environments.

Field of view

The human eye has both vertical and horizontal field of view (FOV) of approximately 180˚ by
180˚. The vertical range is limited by cheeks and eyebrows to about 150˚. The horizontal field
of view is also limited, and equals to 150˚: 60˚ towards the nose and 90˚ to the side [Heil92].
This gives 180˚ of total horizontal viewing range with a 120˚ binocular overlap, when focused
at infinity (see fig. 2.2.1.1).

(a) (b)

Figure 2.2.1.1. Human field of view: (a) vertical, (b) horizontal (from [Heil92]).

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2.3.1. 3D input devices
Beside trackers that capture user’s movements, many other input devices were developed to
make human-computer interaction easier and more intuitive. For full freedom of movements

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three-dimensional input devices seem the most natural. Attached to our body or hand-held,
they are generally used to select, move, modify etc. virtual objects. This chapter presents a
broad overview of most important of these devices.

3D Mice and Bats

This basic and simple user interaction tool is in general a joystick-like 6DOF device that can be
moved in space by hand. It is equipped with a tracker sensor to determine its
position/orientation and a few buttons that may trigger some actions [Ware90a]. Some 3D
mice may be equipped with a thumbball for additional movement control.

Gloves

Gloves are 3D input devices that can detect the joint angles of fingers. The measurement of
finger flexion is done with the help of fiber-optic sensors (e.g., VPL DataGlove), foil-strain
technology (e.g., Virtex CyberGlove) or resistive sensors (e.g., Mattel PowerGlove). The use
of gloves allows the user richer interaction than the 3D mouse, because hand gestures may be
recognized and translated into proper actions [Mine95a]. Additionally gloves are equipped
with a tracker that is attached to the user’s wrist to measure its position and orientation.

(a) (b)

Figure 2.3.3.1. Gloves: (a) VPL DataGlove, (b) Virtex CyberGlove (from [Stur94]).

An obvious extension of the data glove is a data suit that covers the whole body of the user.
The first step in this direction is capturing of the whole body movements with minimal number
of sensors [Badl93a]. In last few years more and more attention was paid to such devices, and
there are already commercial data suits on the market like e.g., the VPL DataSuit. An example
of application of the body tracking technology is the real-time animation of virtual actors in film
industry.

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3 . The future of VR
The future of every new technology, including virtual reality, must be considered in two
different aspects: technological and social. Technological aspects include new research
directions and potential use of them for scientific aims. Social aspects include the influence of
new inventions on people: individuals and society as a whole.

3.1. Research directions in VR

The idea of the ultimate virtual environment as stated by Sutherland [Suth65] means that VR
should be indistinguishable from “real” reality (RR). Most of today’s VR applications do not
conform to reality and have poor quality, but are still very useful and persuasive. Without
doubt VR has a big potential, but must be improved a lot to allow more comfortable and
intuitive interaction with virtual worlds. It does not have to simulate reality in every inch of
existence: for training, the simulation should closely match real operating conditions, while e.g.,
in the UNC’s nanomanipulator application we do not even have any reference to reality (since
humans cannot experience the interaction with molecules in real life).

Independently from the application and its purpose, human factors must be considered
(see section 2.2) or the system will fail to be sufficiently comfortable and intuitive. There is
need for mechanisms allowing people to easily adapt themselves and their behavior from VR to
reality and vice versa. To address these requirements better than current systems do, a lot of
research must be carried out and new technologies must be developed [Fuch92, Broo94].
Therefore Andries van Dam called VR a “forcing function” [VanD93].

3.1.1. Ergonomics of visual displays

Up to now, the major interest was paid to visual feedback and visual display technologies.
Nevertheless the quality of nowadays shipped HMDs is far from ideal: resolution is
significantly below eye’s resolving capability, luminance and color ranges do not cover the
whole eye’s perception range (brightness range and gamut respectively), and finally the field
of

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view is relatively narrow. All these disadvantages make virtual worlds appear “artificial” and
unreal, which severely contributes to the simulator sickness.

Despite continuous improvement of operational parameters, LCD- and CRT-based HMDs

(currently at 1280x1024 resolution on 1.2”x1” area [Burd94]) will not offer the ultimate
quality. To overcome these miniaturization problems a competitive solution was presented
recently by HITLab – a virtual retinal display [Koll93, Tidw95]. It uses a laser beam that
projects images directly on the user’s retina. Nowadays this technology offers approximately
the quality of an average LCD screen. Yet, it is very promising: theoretical limits of such
displays are essentially equal to the limits of the human eye.

An alternative approach for presenting images to VR user(s) are large projection screens.
Images can be seen with bare eyes, have better brightness and resolution than typical HMDs.
Stereo viewing is possible with light and comfortable LCD shutter- or polarization-glasses.
For the full immersion (360˚ look around) CAVE-type displays or recently introduced domed
projection screens can be used [Lant95]. Toshiba Corporation has lately developed a “volume-
scanning” display consisting of many slices of semi-transparent LCD screens. This new
technology allows three-dimensional viewing of stereoscopic images without any additional
equipment [Kame92, Kame93].

3.1.2. Tracking technologies

Today’s tracking technologies have many limitations. First and foremost: in many cases the
tracked volume is very restricted. In practice the user is bound very closely to some point in
space (i.e. tracker reference point) and cannot walk around freely. Moreover, the quality of
tracking is often not sufficient – most of currently used technologies are very sensitive to
environmental conditions (the quality of measurement decreases dramatically with the distance)
and introduce considerable latency.

An ideal tracker should be small and lightweight so that it can be comfortably worn by the
user. The working volume for the inside tracking should be big enough to allow free walking
for example in a big room (ten by ten meters?). And at least, the tracker should be immune to
any kind of interferences that would guarantee the equally high measurement precision in the
whole volume.

A partial solution for the inside tracking was developed at the UNC – the “optical ceiling”
that allows tracking of the user inside an area of about three by four meters [Ward92]. This
approach gives the user unbound movement freedom and equal tracking precision in the whole
working volume. The inside-out tracking paradigm used in this system offers good quality of
orientation measurement but position measurements still lack the requested precision. The
whole installation is relatively expensive (needs ceiling LED panels and proper controlling of

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them) and requires heavy optical equipment (cameras) to be attached to the HMD. Nevertheless
it is currently the best alternative for the ultimate inside tracking.

The idea of outside tracking is very promising – it may open new possible applications of
VR, like navigation systems or place-sensitive information services. The currently existing
Global Positioning System (GPS) does not offer quality of position measurement that is
sufficient for virtual reality yet, but further development in this area may bring the required
improvements. Such a high precision GPS in combination with source-independent orientation
tracking devices (as used by the i-glasses! for example) may become then a solution for
medium quality but cheap and wide-spread global VR or AR systems.

3.1.3. Computing power and rendering architectures

Behind all virtual worlds a high computing power is hidden. It is the “engine” for the
generation of all kinds of feedback presented to the user. Though the most powerful
computers are used in VR, there is a continuing hunger for more MIPS and megabytes. More
detailed and impressive scenes require more storage capacity, more CPU performance and
graphical power. Therefore new processors and graphics boards are being developed in order to
fulfill these needs. In practice, however, standard UNIX workstations are utilized for VR
applications that do not guarantee real-time operation (UNIX is not a real time system!) and VR
specific requirements like constant frame-rate rendering (see section 2.4.1) or dynamic image
registration are compromised.

To overcome limitations of standard rendering architectures some novel VR systems correct

already rendered image before displaying it. Just to mention approaches that can be
implemented on conventional workstations like image deflection [So92, Mazu95a], Z-buffer
warping, image generation from the panoramic (360˚) photograph [Chen95] or dynamically
generated impostors [Maci95, Scha95b, Scha96b]. Other more complicated methods require
custom hardware architectures like address recalculation pipeline [Rega94], frameless
rendering [Bish94] or “just in time pixels” [Olan95]. The common aim of these techniques is
to minimize the dynamic viewing error (when the user moves through the scene). Combined
with prediction methods [Liang91, Azum94, Mazu95a], it is possible to achieve an essential
improvement of registration in virtual reality and augmented reality systems.

Finally, widely acknowledged and cross-platform standards – in particular for device

drivers and APIs for these architectures are needed. Only this can assure rapid and (relatively)
easy development of new systems without a need for “hand-crafted” programming.

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3.1.4. User interfaces
“VR means that no interface is needed”: every kind of human-computer-human interaction
should be so natural and intuitive that neither learning nor adaptation should be necessary.
Though, we are far from this: today’s interfaces are clumsy, often require heavy hardware
devices, complicated calibration steps and non-intuitive interaction paradigms. Hence they are
not easy to operate by the unskilled user.

Future interaction with virtual worlds should involve better input and output devices.
Every input device should be at the same time an output device that supports appropriate haptic
feedback. This is essential, because every action performed in the real world on some object
causes a reaction of this object. These cues allow humans to perform manipulation tasks
without seeing what happens – our sense of touch informs us about it! Other senses must be
included into the interaction process like audio output and voice recognition for verbal
communication with computer and finally: taste and smell. Combination of all these sensations
would widen information passing channels between computer and human and make virtual
reality really realistic.

Gloves with feedback, dexterous and exoskeletal manipulators (for the hand and even
whole arm) are the first attempt to improve high quality haptic interfaces [Rohl93b, Stur94].
An extension of them might become a force feedback suit [Burd94] delivering haptic
sensations to the whole body. However, existing prototype devices are very complicated
mechanical constructions, heavy and uncomfortable in use.

Computer generated voice feedback (speech-audio) already does not seem to be a problem.
To fulfill the need of human-computer communication (e.g., with computer generated
autonomous actors or agents), speech recognition is also necessary. There is a couple of
commercial systems [Holl95] claiming good accuracy of recognition, with prices ranging
from 150 to 30,000 US dollars. Very few of them, however, support big dictionaries and
continuous speech processing (whole sentences vs. single words). While it is easy to
recognize and analyze simple orders, the real problem is learning the computer to understand
what the user intents (in fact it is the Artificial Intelligence problem). Moreover, the high
computing power for the recognition and long training of the user are required.

3.1.5. “Seamless” virtual environments

Majority of VR research directions concentrated up to now, generally on the technical aspects.
The improvement of the performance, quality and responsiveness of virtual worlds was the
main problem. However, most of currently existing systems are in fact only test-beds that
cannot be used in any practical application. To construct “seamless” virtual environments proper
high-level software must be developed as the basis for “real” applications [Zyda93d]. To

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achieve this aim, following most important issues must be taken into consideration like
modeling interactive worlds, distributed multi-user architectures, effective user interaction
etc. [Fuch92, Zyda93d, Broo94].

Modeling is a crucial problem of virtual environments. Additionally the user must be able
to interact with the created model as with the real world. Therefore automatic world building
tools that allow easy, intuitive and inside-the-environment modeling are needed. Moreover, the
modeled objects should have natural behavior assigned to them (in some cases also
autonomous behavior), and very often they should obey the rules of physics. Such modeling
tools have a big potential to fuel the development of a broad variety of new VR applications.

Another important aspect are multi-user systems: in real world people share the same space
at the same time with other humans. To meet the same requirements in virtual worlds, the model
must be shared among multiple users (let each of them manipulate the model) and must be
properly updated in order to remain consistent. The today’s networked information spaces are
still largely research prototypes. They are usually limited to a small number of users and run on
local networks for performance reasons. The example of large scale system is
NPSNET [Mace94] that works with a large number of concurrent users, but its underlying
networking protocol severely limits the variety of possible actions. Therefore further
development in this direction is necessary in order to support cooperative work, multi-user
training and collaboration with the help of VR.

3.1.6. Biomedical research

Sophisticated input and output devices are some of the most expensive parts of VR systems.
The development in the area of microelectronics gives a hope that new, high power “silicon
architectures” will be elaborated relatively fast. On the other hand, current “standard” output and
input devices are far below the satisfying quality. The improvement of them (better resolution,
precision etc.) is extremely expensive mainly because it is bound by technological frontiers.

To overcome these problems, biomedical signal processing could be used both for input
and output. Based on biosignals measured by electrodes, muscle activity could be
detected [Lust93]. By processing these signals, the positions of body parts could be tracked.
Moreover, this approach can be used for improvement of existing motion prediction techniques
(e.g., head movement). Knowing neural signal patterns that force muscle actions and knowing
the head “transfer function” (i.e. how the head reacts on muscle input), one could more
precisely predict the future position and orientation of the head.

The output of computers can be directly connected to the human nerves: instead of building
high (but still too low for the human eye) resolution displays, images could be fed directly into
the eye nerves, instead of providing force and tactile feedback, appropriate nerves in different

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parts of the body can be stimulated and so on. Ultimately one can imagine the direct
stimulation of brain cells in order to artificially generate sensations perceived by human senses.
One could just “plug” himself/herself into the computer as envisioned in William Gibson’s
science-fiction novels [Gibs83]. The only question is: Is this what we really want?

3.2. Social aspects

Virtual reality is in its experimental stage today, but without doubt it has a great potential to
alter our life. People expect very much from this technology – much more than it can offer yet.
But there is the other – “dark side”: every new technology and every new invention brings a
fear and feeling of uncertainty with it (e.g., nuclear power). It can be used for good aim, but it
can be misused too. The more potential it has, the bigger the danger can be.

3.2.1. What are the expectations?

VR has found already an enormous number of applications in different areas of science (see
section 1.3). It became a perfect tool for architects, designers, physicists, chemists, doctors,
surgeons etc. All these disciplines, however, are closed for average people and therefore
virtual reality is becoming some kind of myth – something extremely wonderful (a Promised
Land?) and at the same time something inaccessible.

Due to the high cost and fragility of equipment, up to the end of 1980 VR was hidden
behind laboratory walls. But in the beginning of the current decade a great interest of media
dragged it to the wide publicity. Moreover, the development of cheap and powerful hardware
allowed the spread of many installations opened to the public. The first were arcade
games [Atla95] – computer games extended by an immersion feature using a HMD and a
tracking system. The great success of them forced the market appearance of further
entertainment systems: multi user car races, dungeon games, flight simulations and
others [Atla95].

Beside adventure games in cyberspace there are not many other applications that may have
a big influence on people or society yet. Nevertheless, there were already successful attempts
of use of the VR systems in medicine (e.g., curing of mental disorders, phobias [Whal93,
Vinc95], people with disabilities [Trev94]) and in education [Loef95, Schr95]. In the future,
VR technology will have a rapidly growing influence on almost every area of our life:
• education – school, a variety of training systems (e.g., driving license courses, sport
coaching [Ande93], flight simulation, military or astronauts training etc.), programs
explaining laws of nature (e.g., by placing the user between molecules, inside of
hurricane or letting him/her explore the galaxy), and even virtual universities without
lecture rooms will become usual in near future.

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• information retrieval, processing and searching – today’s society is called an
“information society” and the need for new sources of easy accessible data will be
constantly growing. VR will offer the easiest access to information through virtual
libraries (not only books but films, music, stock-exchange data etc.), office electronic
data-files, guided sight-seeing tours (visiting virtual museums, buildings, cities, lands
etc.).
• augmented reality – with the help of see-through HMDs, additional information can be
displayed to the user pointing his/her attention to important objects of the real world,
showing the way to the specified aim (e.g., by highlighting the right way through the
city) or explaining the next step that must be performed to complete some tasks – from the
complex ones like repairing complicated electronic devices or space shuttle elements in
open space to easy ones as operating faxes, laser-printers [Brys92c] or changing a car
tires etc.
• new senses – every information that cannot be acquired by human senses but can be
detected by technical sensors may be potentially seen by the user [Robi92b]. For
example a doctor may have a direct insight into patient’s body [Baju92], an electrician
may see wires in walls while fixing house installation or an engineer may see pipelines
under the ground when performing digging works etc.
• passive entertainment – as new information medium of 21st century, VR will replace
majority of passive entertainment activities like reading books, watching movies, TV,
listening to the music. In fact all of them will be unified in one big virtually multimedial
system.
• active entertainment – thanks to VR technology some computer games become more
realistic, and in consequence more interesting. It is to expect that other free-time activities
like e.g., playing music or sport exercises will be soon altered by VR technology.
• communication and collaboration – at work and at home people constantly
exchange huge amounts of data by communicating with other humans. Physical meetings
that are not always possible due to big distances and other obstacles, are replaced by
talking on the phone, or on-screen teleconferencing sessions. One can easily imagine
meetings in virtual space, virtual phone talking, virtual mailing and many more (in
practice every medium can be replaced by VR). These communication paradigms are not
bound by distance constraints and they are a promising alternative to the existing
collaboration media.
• remote operation – today, a remote operated TV-set is nothing spectacular. VR
technology allows to enhance basic idea of teleoperation. It can include really complex
tasks that require the dexterity of human hands. Teleoperated robots can in near future
replace people at workplaces that might be hazardous to their life of health. This includes

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 for example maintaining of nuclear power stations, works on height, works with
chemicals or viruses etc.
• interactive design – in the future every engineer will be able to design and test his/her
projects (engines, aerodynamics of bodies or even whole mechanical constructions) with
the help of VR. Testing a car, its road behavior, acceleration and other properties is a
fascinating and cheap alternative to today’s design processes that last very often for years!
Eventually, average people will have the possibility to design their houses, hair styles or
clothes interactively and see immediately what the result will look like. Every visit at a
hair-dresser, tailor, or house designer would start with a VR session.

This list of expectations (or rather: wishes) can be extended infinitely and will never be
complete. The fact is that with the development of networks (i.e. data highways), everyone
will be able to rent a network line (like telephone or cable TV nowadays) and connect his/her
personal workstation (computer equipped with a HMD) to it. Then the use of virtual reality in
everyday life will become as common as the use of telephones, hoovers, TV-sets, videos, cars
or airplanes today.

3.2.2. What are the fears?

With the introduction of VR to society there is a need of finding ethical norms for it [Kall93,
Whal93]. People also should know about the potential dangers of the new technology: which
negative or even destructive influence it can bring along [Sher93, Whit93]. One may not
exaggerate because humans have a great ability of adaptation to new conditions: finally they will
always find their place in new (even virtual) realities. Nevertheless it is better to prevent than to
correct [Kall93].

Virtual reality systems of the future can be divided into four groups according to two
criteria: social vs. non-social and creative vs. non-creative [Ston93] (see fig. 3.2.2.1).

Non-social virtual realities allow a single user to interact with the environment. This can be
an interaction either: with a prefabricated (i.e. preprogrammed) environment (they are then
called: non-creative systems) or with an environment that can be modified according to the
user’s needs and wishes (they are then called: creative systems).

Social virtual realities on the other hand allow multiple users to interact with each other and
with the environment itself. Again, as with non-social systems, the environment can be
preprogrammed or it be created and altered by the user or a group of cooperating users.

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non-creative: creative:

single user single user

& &
non-social: preprogrammed modifiable
environment environment

multiple users multiple users

social: & &
preprogrammed modifiable
environment environment

Figure 3.2.2.1. Four types of VR systems (from [Ston93]).

Different types of VR systems can have different influences on people’s mentality. Non-social
virtual realities for example may lead to closing of people in their “own worlds”. This has
already partially happened – some of the most fanatic computer-game players can hardly be
forced to come back to reality! And with more convincing and realistic systems, it can only
become worse... Non-creative applications (like games) may have an additional negative effect:
closing the user in the world that cannot be modified is against human nature and can lead to
degradation of our imagination.

Non-social and creative virtual worlds that potentially can be great tool for designers, are at
the same time even bigger temptation for complete escape from reality. They offer to the user
the possibility of modifying the surrounding according to one’s wishes (which is very often
not possible in real world). Thanks to it, creating an artificial wonderland of dreams will be as
easy as building a house using a Lego-set. With these considerations several existential
questions arise: Is our everyday life so bad that so many people escape from it? Will VR make
people at least more happy? Which influence will it have on the ability of coexistence with other
humans?

This last question, becomes even more important when considering social virtual worlds,
allowing people to communicate and collaborate. They can certainly be a great help in work and
in everyday life, but are they going to replace physical contacts totally? Even today a lot of
people spend hours on the telephone because they are too lazy to pay a visit to their friends. In
virtual reality, the user will be able to create an image of himself/herself – often very idealized
and far from reality. Hidden behind our masks we will meet only equally “perfect” but cold
creatures. How long can one continue living without feelings and how destructive can it be?
How easy will it be to come back to reality and make contacts with real people? How easy will
it be to switch between real and virtual images, and can it eventually cause a virtual
schizophrenia?

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 Beside the dangers of VR discussed previously, there are other more general hazards. TV
has in the 1960s increased the homicide rate in American society [Kall93]. VR can potentially
have the same influence on our society a few years from now. People playing brutal games
may identify themselves with the virtual heroes and adopt their violent behavior. With the
improvement of the simulation and visual quality of virtual worlds the differences between
reality and VR will be constantly disappearing and consequently people may become confused
what is real and what is virtual. In fact this process has already begun: military simulations are
becoming so close to reality that soldiers do not know any more whether they are remotely
steering a real “death-machine” or just making a training. This may eventually lead to the lack
of responsibility for our actions: one can kill cold-blooded thousands of innocent people not
knowing (or rather pretending not to know) if taking part in a simulation or a real
mission [Smit94].

All these questions are intentionally left open. The overwhelming evolution of virtual
reality technology indicates that there may be an all to real danger for society. VR may become
the ultimate drug for the masses. It is our responsibility to choose the right dose.

4. References
[Akam94] M. Akamatsu et al.: Multimodal Mouse: A Mouse-Type Device with Tactile
and Force Display. Presence, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. 73-80 (1994)

[Ande93] R. L. Anderson: A Real Experiment in Virtual Environments: A Virtual

Batting Cage. Presence, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 16-33 (1993)

[Asce95a] Ascension: Ascension trackers technical data.

http://www.world.std.com/~ascen (1995)

[Asce95b] Ascension: Ascension trackers technical data.

ftp://ftp.std.com/ftp/vendors/Ascension/tecpaper.ps (1995)

[Asth95] P. Astheimer: Acoustic Simulation for Visualization and Virtual Reality.

EUROGRAPHICS’95 State Of The Art Reports, pp. 1 - 23 (1995)

[Atla95] Atlantis: Atlantis VR Systems.

http://vr-atlantis.com/vr_systems_guide/vr_systems_list2.html (1995)

[Azum94] R. Azuma, G. Bishop: Improving Static and Dynamic Registration in an Optical

See-through HMD. Proceedings of SIGGRAPH’94, pp. 197-204 (1994)

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