First experience with VR

First experience with VR


State it as the first time might not be accurate enough since I had tried or seen others trying VR sets for more than one time. However, last Wednesday was when I actually started to experience it with active thoughts.

Innovations have always been fascinating to me. And when I saw the video of VR roller coaster on YouTube back in 2014, I knew that there would be one day I got involved with VR creation. The fact is, getting the information of the VR storytelling course from professor Schoonmaker and having the very first experiences of VR viewing by taking the advices from  professor Chew and professor Elin, I am here!

Each experience with VR of the three is totally different, and I actually see the rapid development of the VR industry. The first time when we went to the VR lab in mid-October last semester, there were only few head devices, and Google cardboards. And the contents, like the 3D models and special effects, seemed rough and jarring. Yet the second time, one and a half month later, when we went to the lab again, the robots and 360 cameras were displayed and I even had a 3D scan of my head! Beyond, Augmented Reality - one step further to Virtual Reality - was presented in Class.

This time I carefully tried each device, not for fun and experience something new but in order to differentiate immature technique to those already well-developed and get ready to make new content for VR. I realize that there are three tricky questions impede the progress of VR filming. Every time after I use Google cardboard, especially if it extends to 10 mins and if I look up and down, I will feel nausea. I believe it's caused by the spherical imaging and the screen resolutions are usually low, which leads to the second problem, how to film the world by using 360 camera or brand new device that frames just like the real world that our eyes familiar with and present it in cell phone that still keeps high resolution. And also, where should the cinematographer hind himself/herself so that the shadow won't hurt the beauty of the frame. Or do they even have to hide themselves? Would there a way that they could stay at the scene while making the image cool and fancy?

Oculus Rift seems much more appealing to me. I watch the Avengers and feel like I am in the scene as one of the characters fighting with enemies. It's smooth and real, more enjoyable than 3D movies. As far as the reasons to that, I think that content has a quite nimble motion tracker and I can even see the reflection of MYSELF-the Iron Man, which has a high quality in 3D graphics, and the 3D sound that moves with my head helps too. I prefer the portable ones, wireless sets, that are more convenient and no restrict to the location, though it may cause a feeling of insecure especially when we can see something that we can't in fact touch it, which may further made you fall down. I did get a sense of uncannyness at the very beginning, but I don't think it would hurt the experience in general.