The ABCs of VR

Virtual reality. Now, we've talked about it a lot lately, and we'll continue to. It is topic number one of 2016. But, when I say the word, you probably imagine head-mounted display. The goggles, if you will, that you wear. That's almost a detail in VR. Where VR hits the road is in how you craft the media. And that's also where it gets messy. Now, at a minimum, virtual reality is surround video, a whole bowl, if you will, of video around you on that head mounted display. Not just laying on a flat webpage like on YouTube. The next step many insist on for the VR label is you be able to move within the scene. Now, movement comes in two different flavors. You can move smoothly wherever you like, in some cases, that's more of a video game motif. Other times a video production may only allow you to choose a few different points of view you can jump around to or it takes you to. The next layer that some believe is essential to VR is movement of your limbs. Times. Can your arms and hands be registered by the VR hardware so that you can interact with and manipulate objects in the virtual environment. That of course is much more like reality. Now those who are developing VR hardware, VR content, and VR messaging for brands and media companies have Somewhat different agendas as a result, the definitions are not that clean right now and there in lies job one. Creating within the industry a rock solid definition of what VR is kinda like HD TV then, communicating that to consumers Consumers who really don't know what this term means. And thirdly, keeping it all distinct from augmented reality which unfortunately is bubbling up at about the same time. It's gonna be a busy couple years in visual tech. [MUSIC]