Good honest review of the PR4 system Cyber, this will help Palmer improve his design.

I can see where the comfort of the headset is going to probably be one of the biggest challenges, but there's a lot of solutions that I think Palmer is aware of.

I would like to have a higher resoultion as well, when I play Skyrim and A-10 on a single display monitor I like at least 1600x1200 resolution, but with Anti aliasing and such I think having a display with 1280x960 which is presented to each eye would be nice for gaming for the PR4.

As far as the bleed over of the image, you might be onto something Cyber. Would it be possible to put a little non reflective matt black plastic barrier at the center of the display screen inside the viewer to help keep each eye focused on it's section of the panel? I can see where this might limit apparent FOV though.

You could easily template something out of black matte board or foamcore for the divider.

I gotta agree on the display front though that Palmer should really look into 7" tablets to bump up the resolution or PPI. That and of course figure out a way to make this play nice with the most popular display drivers from Nvidia and ATI. The whole ball-o-wax really lives or dies based on whether or not people can game with it (or at least those of us here who want entertainment based HMD's and not research HMD's).

The comfort/form-factor issues can be mitigated with more versioning. I would love to take a crack at creating a visually pleasing housing for the unit

Is this just for stereoscopic viewing or for 2D mode as well?

It doesn't have a 2d mode. To look at the desktop you would need to close your right eye to look at the left side of the screen and vice versa.

Yep, I forgot to mention THERE IS NO 2D MODE! Its hardware wired for SBS.

Just for some clarification - so the hardware always optically sends the left half of the display to the left eye and the right half to the right eye. And there is no mechanism to automatically duplicate a 2D video feed to left and right sides of the screen - thus no 2D mode right?

Correct. Life aint meant to be easy

Its this kind of issue that always leads me back to the potential wisdom of incorporating active shutter tech pre-lens. Active shutter layer, Leap optics layer, wide format display interleaved. That would make this whole system play nice with 2D and popular 3D formats, it would bump up resolution and it would eliminate the horizontal "squishing".

I mean, I know that goes against a certain VR snobbery but shutter based ghosting is really very minor these days and I think it would be worth it for all of the positives. I think "ghosting" is being overplayed by a lot of manufacturers looking to one-up the competition. Its there but its subtle and by no means a deal killer.

Hell, depending on how the test unit is hardwired Cyber, you could easily experiment with a pair of Nvidia 3D Vision glasses mounted in front of the leap optics (if the display has the right refresh that is). I can't think of a better way to make an affordable HMD truly wide FOV, with an acceptable resolution.

@Bishop51: You have a good point about utilizing the full resolution per eye, but as far as just making it compatible with 2D and 3D formats - it seems like it just needs a custom device driver.

@ Bishop51: Doesn't the Headplay HMD work in this manner? Shutter layer etc?

One problem with this idea is that it would probably require the LCD to run @ 120hz...

Bingo. Good luck finding a small lcd that will work at shutter speeds. I have asked Cyber if he can test his parallax barrier at close ranges with a Fresnel lens. That would be a decent option for a small single lcd.

Yeah, it would be too difficult (or nearly impossible) to source 120Hz panels at that size. You'd more likely be able to do auto-stereo, though it may be difficult at such short distance. My idea for an HMD was to use dual pico-projectors and polarized lenses. That way each eye can get its own screen and you can adjust and overlap the views as much as you want (physically) which would solve a lot of the issues of using either 1 screen or 2 separate LCDs.

Nice idea with the polarized lenses CyberReality. Thats really a good idea...

Man, lots of stuff to reply to here. This is what I get for neglecting the internet for a couple weeks. Here goes, hopefully I do not miss anything:

@Bishop51: Those logos look great! I am especially partial to the two on the right, the clean and simple contrast looks great. Consumers might be more attracted towards the shininess of the one on the left, though. If you have a copy as a vector, that would be great, I could use my laser cutter to burn it right onto the surface of the HMD! The PR4 is only my current prototype, though, I have been giving each significant revision of my HMD designs a new marker, with the next one being the PR5. If I ever get my design to the point where I am selling a consumer product, I will probably not use the PR (ProtoType) designation. Maybe call it the VR1? As far as Kickstarter, yes, I have considered it. In fact, more than that, I already got my project approved! I have not made it public yet, though, since I want to wait till I have something that I am sure will blow the minds of people who are not VR nerds like us. The last thing the VR/HMD market needs right now is another company promising a revolution, and delivering anything less.

@STRZ: Sim racing is actually one of the better uses at the moment. Racing does not require the fine detail that is needed for competitive FPS games, or reading the instruments in many flight simulators. iRacing with head tracking is amazing!

@Aphradonis: I am not sure how much it will cost yet. Depending on the features included, the bill of materials on its own for a run of 20 units would be somewhere between $400 and $800, so that would be the bare minimum. Still have to factor in labor, shipping, advertising, and maybe a little bit of profit on top to compensate for the R&D. All the specs will be freely available, though, so if a hobbyist would rather build it themselves, there is nothing stopping them!

@Johnny-Mnemonic: I do plan on making a few for forum members here, not sure how many yet. Another idea I have considered is making one or two units to put on eBay, to get an idea of what people think they are worth.

@Hornet: You could use an Android tablet to make an HMD, but it is not the best idea right now unless you plan on using content that is rendered right on the tablet. Streaming your display to the tablet has too much delay to use, head tracking will make you sick very quickly.

@InvaderZIM: Thanks for the compliments! And thanks also for the night vision gear you sent me to play with, it is definitely helping me with ideas for mounts. As far as a barrier goes, yes, that is certainly possible. All of my prototypes up to this point have had a barrier, but this particular unit was in the middle of being redone, and I just threw it back together and put it on a mount so I could send it to Cyber before I went on a trip. Missed a few other things, like light blocking foam.

@Brantlew: Yes, it is SBS mode only. I got your PM about possibly fixing that, responding now.

@Bishop51 again: LEEP optics have a very short focal length, so they would not be able to see the entire display anyways. Active shuttering is definitely something I would look into, that is actually how the Headplay does 3D! Like others have brought up, though, there are very few panels that would work well. I have heard rumblings of active glasses that can be used with Sony tablets/game consoles, but who knows if that will pan out.

@Cyber: Thanks for taking the time to take a look at this thing! I will probably send you some more stuff in the future, hopefully on less of a deadline so we can use cheaper shipping options. I have been messing around using software like Nthusim and Warpalizer to fix the aspect ratio issues, and it is working to a certain degree. I am talking to a few people, and I think this problem can be beat in several ways. Ergonomics wise, I already have a much more comfortable design that is based on the Phillips Scuba, which in turn was designed by Virtuality. Good artists copy, and great artists steal! That design is being used in the wireless PR4, and does allow for glasses.

Resolution wise, there are a few things to try. The HMD I sent you did not have any diffusion film, which would make it impossible to see the individual pixels. Hopefully, advances in display technology will make that step unnecessary. Oh, and as far as being able to see the edges of the display: One way to fix that is to add a barrier, the other is to have higher magnification. I actually have a set of lenses I can add that magnify just a tiny bit more, removing the bleeding/edges on the far left and right, but they are 3 lenses per eye instead of just 2. Weighs a lot more, and I don't think it is worth the extra 10 degrees.

If you guys want to continue the projector HMD discussion, I can split it into its own thread. This is the best option for a projection HMD, in my opinion: http://www.amazon.com/iSiVaL-LED-Mini-H ... B002ZW2UN6

I had somehow overlooked Cyberreality's prior comment about using two projectors with polarizers over each eye. This really solves a lot of optical issues with getting a good field of vision for each eye. I suspect that this reduces the optics for the eyes to being a strong pair of reading glasses. Prices should also be dropping on tiny projectors, especially for the low-light output we would want for a HMD.

Do start a separate thread.

Joe Dunfee

New thread started! viewtopic.php?f=120&t=14262

Great work Palmer, I don't know if you remember me but I was talking to you last year about modding MRG HMDs. Anyway I've been a busy boy building the ultimate triple screen motion simulator for racing. You can see its progression here.

http://insidesimracing.tv/forums/viewto ... 97547d11d8

It's got triple 720p 3D pocket projectors, d-Box motion platform, and trackIR. My screens cover about 120 degrees of my view. I've since ordered some new screens to increase vertical fov.

My interest in your HMD is high. I'd love to have it for playing console games on 360 and PS3 with kinect and move.

In the end I want to use six projectors with two triple head to go digital. I'm thinking that when using multiple panels in your HMD you could utilize the triple head to go. Great work and please put me on the review list and list of potential purchasers.

Thanks

Yes, I remember you. That triple screen setup looks amazing! Any chance you could copy-paste start a new thread about it here? I want to ask some questions and discuss your setup more, but it would probably end up monopolizing this thread.

I am looking into the TripleHead2go, but want to avoid it. Extra expense for one, and it would make it impossible to use wireless video transmitters. Not a problem for sim people, I know, but I am one of those wacky guys who wants to walk around in virtual environments with my own two feet.

BIG NEWS! Someone has posted on how to have a correct aspect ratio side by side image in IZ3D, without the squashing that normally goes on: http://crosseyegaming.blogspot.com/2012 ... ew-3d.html

They also started a thread here: viewtopic.php?f=26&t=14313&p=69574#p69574

Very, very exciting! Can't wait to try, but on first impression it seems to be exactly what I need for my HMD. Hopefully I can do it on the Nvidia GTX260M that is in my laptop, otherwise I will have to wait till I hook up my desktop computer again. If anyone else wants to see if it works in the meanwhile...

I was looking at this myself a few weeks ago, the driver says my time limit has expired. Odd, as I have never used it on this machine!

Anyway, I found a post on the iz3d forum saying that they had attempted to implement this, but it caused problems with a lot of games.

I went to find it for you, and seems it has been recently updated by the same guy.

http://forum.iz3d.com/viewtopic.php?p=3 ... 2cd5c8bd9f

Thanks for finding that post, good to know.

Luckily, I know that most Valve games can be set to wacky resolutions just fine. Really popular games like Skyrim and BF3 have a lot of resolution/FOV modding tools released for them, so that is another place to look.

As long as I can get it working in a few good games I like, I will be very happy. The most important at this point is ARMA2, since that seems like it would be the best base for a full head/weapon tracked VR experience.

Is that d-box setup good mayaman? How much immersion does it add?

Your whole setup looks awesome. These triple 3D monitor setups are making me really jealous ;-(

I bought the D-Box on a whim and wasn't expecting anything really. After using it and tuning it to each game it's easily the best video game or entertainment thing I've ever bought. My triple screens are super immersive, when I added the Dbox, it went off the scale. After a minute on the rig and into the game you actually feel like your moving. Your brain does the rest.

What people seem to not realize is how smooth and how convincing the movement is. Also how violent and powerful it is. There are times during Dirt 3 that the Dbox almost, and I'm not kidding, tips my rig over, it's loving awesome.

Another fact people don't know about Dbox is that it's not only movement, it has several powerful transducers. Think of this thing as a Buttkicker on steroids. It replicates the road surface, engine hum, bumps, pebbles, rub strips all at the same time. It's really an amazing device.

I know they're expensive and that's to bad, because more people should be able to enjoy these things. Hopefully in the next couple years the price will come down more as they become more successful.

I'm planing also to use this rig with Palmers HMD.

Thanks

Hi PalmerTech, that looks really amazing! I really think that FOV is the key for believable VR compared to high resolution. I was just wondering what parts are really contributing to the weight? Is it the lens or the screen?

Thanks, and keep up the good work.

Wow, D-Box sounds GREAT. How much was it?

It doesn't seem to move quite as much as i'd like in a flight sim setup, but really its the fact that it moves at all that is the most important for immersion... you don't really need great amounts of roll etc.

Yeah I almost didn't buy it because Internet know it alls kept bagging on it. Let's just say they have no idea what they're talking about, it's fantastic. Paid 1,500 but I got lucky. The unit I bought usually goes for 2800 used, and even at that price it's worth it. Best thing for immersion I've ever bought. The rate of travel is deceiving, and not alot of people know it also does transducer effects better than anything I've ever tried. This coupled with Palmers HMD would be outrageous.

Hi Palmer, long time

Any chance you could post more details on cutting down the 7in1 ?

Ta

Zach

Hi All,

Haha ...

Zach beat me to the post... I was also wondering if PalmerTech could post more details about cutting down that 7-in-1 board?

I would be highly appreciated.

Mine's on the way.. ^_^

--Mike

@ Chricky: Most of the weight is concentrated in the optics and display control board, the LCD itself is very light. Luckily, the control board and optics can be put very close to the head to minimize how heavy it feels.

@Mayaman: Thanks for the input on the Dbox, I will keep my eye out for one. I have also seen people saying it is not that great, but your opinion is more valuable than those other crazy sim racing people.

@Zacherynuk: I have actually encountered some problems cutting it down as far as I did, I found out that the HDMI input is scaled, only the DVI input is mapped pixel-for-pixel. I don't have access to my boards right now, but if you post a good picture of the top of the board, I can map out the lines of where you can easily cut, and where you can cut a bit more extreme.

@mbogucki: Same thing, if you or anyone else posts pics, would be glad to post trimming info.

Here we go, excuse camera phone quality:

ok, I'm asking. Care to offer a guesstimate on if and when there might be a PRx kit/unit available for limited purchase? Also, would you consider it a viable alternative to a consumer HMD for gaming and VR? If not, what are the most important missing features?

Hey All,

Yay.. My LCD/Board arrived the other day. Can't wait to start "cutting" ^_^

Just curious does anyone have a recommendation as to what voltage can be put into this unit? Weill a standard 12VDC wall-wart work?

Thanks.

Hey, never heard anything from this post so just retouching.

Sorry for the long wait on replying, I have been at the IEEE VR 2012 conference. Great place, great ideas, great people, not so great for getting time away. Will try to find time to reply tomorrow, expect a massive infodump at the end of the week.

heya PalmerTech,

IEEE VR 2012 sounds pretty awesome. I've had the pleasure of attending various Siggraph conferences, in the past, but I'm sure something more "VR" specific sounds even better.

Needless to say, take you time with the info dump. ^_^

Cheers.

--Mike

Has this thread died?

I plan on having a kit available by June at the latest, just for the people on this forum. Cost would be between $300 and $500, depending on if I include things like a head mount.

Mbogucki, here is a picture. You can cut along the red lines if you want to keep VGA, and also the yellow lines if you do not need it. You can actually trim more than this, but you risk killing the board, and there is no point trimming it a few extra millimeters, IMO.

Do you know what Resolution and FOV your kit might be...? Just when I thought my HMD choice was down to two (Sony, ST1080)...A Big FOV would put you over the top of the other two I think.

I LOVE the idea of a kit..Feels like when computers and other cool stuff would first get to the diehards/hobbyist in the form of a kit.

Hi PalmerTech,

Very Cool. Thank you very much for the reply. Hopefully within the next few days I'll give it a shot... ^_^

I'm looking into seeing if I can get the actual driver chip, (initially as a sample)... to develop a smaller VGA only type board for this particular display.

Thanks again.

--Mike

Depending on how the next few months go, I might be buying two, or I might be eating from bins.....

What will be in this $300-$500 kit?

At the very least:

1) Cut lenses and assembled optical units, one for each eye

2) Display panel/s

3) VGA display control hardware

4) Easy to assemble display enclosure

5) Any required video/power cables

Depending on how things work out:

6) Adjustable head mount

7) Light blocker for eyes

8) Camera for seeing outside world/AR

9) Motion tracker

10) Integrated headphones

Anything I forgot, or input on what should be included? I think most people will want a head mount, for example, but no reason to include it if enough people plan on making their own stuff (Like has happened with the Sony).