It is no exaggeration to say that 2016
is the year of virtual reality and augmented reality.
Not only the government but also major global companies
are thinking VR and AR as major business.
However, VR or AR is not a new word made in 2016.
The beginning of VR goes back to 19th century.
The first VR device is known as Ivan Edward Sutherland’s HMD (Head Mounted Display)
who studied Computer engineering in The University of Utah.
His HMD was hanged in ceiling because of its weight.
The first progress of HMD was Eric Howlett’s 140 degree viewing angle HMD in 1983.
After that NASA invented 120 degree viewing angle HMD in 1985.
However, there were still limits in display technology
< Credit: The Boston Globe>
In
1990, development of LCD technology influenced the development of HMD.
Despite
of HMD’s steady development, it was not a familiar device to the public.
Now,
however, HMD became more portable, simple and various.
We can divide its kind
into three large groups: Mobile HMD, PC HMD and Console HMD.
The most generalized device in each group might be
Samsung Gear VR, Oculus rift
and Sony PlayStation VR.
Leader of Mobile HMD, Samsung Gear
VR
< Credit: Samsung
Electronics Co. Blog>
Samsung Gear VR is a mobile HMD
which is only compatible with Galaxy smartphone.
The first Gear VR was opened
with Galaxy note 4 and
was only compatible with Galaxy note 4.
After that, it
keep expanded its compatible devices and finally
the third model was compatible
with Galaxy note 5,
Galaxy S6 Edge+, Galaxy S6, Galaxy S6 Edge.
Gear VR was not made by
Samsung alone, but with Oculus VR.
Samsung is expected to release its new Gear
VR
which will be only compatible with Galaxy note 7 in September.
Also,
according to SamMobile
which is a specialized site for Samsung,
Samsung is already developing its own
standalone VR HMD.
This will be a high-end HMD.
The basic specification of the
released Gear VR is like below.
Leader
of PC HMD, Oculus Rift
< Credit: Oculus VR>
Oculus is famous for a company
which has been taken over
by Facebook for $2 billion.
That probably means that Mark
Zuckerberg saw
Oculus VR’s possibility.
Oculus which was found by Palmer Luckey in
2012
received huge funding by Kickstarter.
The first Oculus Rift was DK1
which was a SDK (Software Development Kit).
The next device was also a SDK
named DK2 and
finally the Oculus Rift available for consumers was revealed in
January 2016,
4 years after its establishment.
However, South Korea was
excluded from the list of the global markets
because of some policy problems.
When the Korean consumers heard this news
many were very disappointed.
According to the recent news, however, Oculus obtained certification on July
11.
The release price is now $599, about 71 million won
Leader
of Console HMD, Sony PlayStation VR
< Credit: Sony>
The formal title of Sony project
Morpheus is Sony PlayStation VR.
Like many other HMD, Sony also took a long
time until its release in October.
Even though you need PlayStation 4 for a
perfect play,
Sony PlayStation VR was sold out in Japan’s presale
because of
its low price ($299) compared to the others.
Especially, ‘summer lesson’
one of Sony’s games
becomes so popular with males when its demo video was
opened.
As Sony is preparing 50 more high-quality contents including EA,
Starwards many
consumers are looking forward to it.
Besides, various VR, AR devices
will be released
in the second half of this year and next year.
Don’t you think that virtual
reality and augmented reality
which felt so far will slightly melt into our
life soon?
WAVRP is a curation service which introduces a selected VR video everyday!
