AR and VR

Introduction:

What is Virtual reality? It is a type of technology that is used to simulate a scenario where anyone can immerse themselves and interact with the artificial scenario as if it were real. We have many types of Virtual Reality. Some of them include Augmented Reality, non immersive VR, immersive VR, 360 degree visions and many more.

Virtual Reality has a long, long history.

• It was introduced in the late 1920s, as a flight simulator. This flight simulator was called the "Link trainer". This simulation even mimicked the turbulance and disturbances with the help of motors and rudders. The "Link trainer" helped the US forces train their pilots during the world war. This was a safer alternative as compared to letting the pilots inside a plane, figure it out for themselves.
• In the 1930s, authors wrote books about goggles that would land you in an imaginary world where you could walk around, smell, taste and feel the parts of this imaginary world. Many others predicted that this would remain feigned for long. Little did they know...
• The first Head-mounted-display(HMD) as we know of it today was made in the 1960s. It was called the Telesphere Mask. Even though it wasn't interactive, it had surround sound and 3D vision.

VR as we know of it today plays an important role in society. It has become an integral part of fields like Education and Training, Healthcare, Entertainment, Remote work and social interaction. VR can also be implemented in many more fields like Real estate, Architecture, Ambience, virtual travelling and many more.

Many people tend to get confused between the terms AR and VR. AR stands for Augmented Reality. Augmented Reality is a part of a larger sphere, Virtual Reality. The main difference between the two is that, AR works on the real world, by overlaying texts, info boxes, images and so on, this makes AR partially immersive. AR makes the real world around us more intuitive.

Google came up with a pair of glasses a few years back that can identify the language spoken by the second person in the conversation and actively give subtitles in any preferred language. After a lot of thought, Google decided to name it the "Google Translate glasses". Though the product was kind of a failure, it was a wonderful example of the potential AR held when paired with other fields. It failed for multiple reasons, some of which include it's obnoxious pricing, privacy concerns and a horrible battery life.

VR is a way bigger sphere. AR, immersive, partially immersive and non immersive VR, 360 vision all come under the VR umbrella. Immersive VR is what the common man usually means when they speak about VR. Immersive VR is when you are completely cut off from the real world and given an artificial world which you can explore. You can explore this artificial world with the help of all of your 5 senses. Immersive VR is expensive and requires a special setup.

Trends in VR

VR made rapid progress in the last decade. VR went from being this superficial mumbo jumbo to multiple apps on everybody's phone. Multiple games were built with AR as the base. Some of them include Pokemon Go, Google Lens and even the goofy filters on your phone's camera.

Modern versions of AR include holographic images projected on thin air. This was first introduced by Microsoft's HoloLens. This works as you might expect Tony Stark's Jarvis would.

Indian Companies in VR:

India has a bunch of really good VR companies. Some of them include: Simbott, Immersafety, Imaginate. Though it seems slow, VR is gaining traction among Indian folk. It is a growing digital ecosystem. India has huge potential in the VR market. The government is also encouraging Indian companies through initiatives like Make in India and Digital India.

Written by : Vrishank Aryan S, Batch 6 - AI/ML