I have cracked the screen door effect!

[mayaman]

You don't snap the unit back together, you can obtain test result without doing that. You're not placing it in the optimal spot, like I said it took me a few hours. If you're getting lots of dust then you must move to a cleaner place. I vacuumed and dusted and I can tell you that if you clean correctly you will not get particles. All 3M screens are not the same. Also like I said the screen door is completely replaced with more of a diamond pattern. but the big thing is there is NO BLACK SPACES between the pixels. Of course you're still going to notice pixels. C'mon dude.

[3dvison]

I hear you mayaman" the big thing is there is NO BLACK SPACES between the pixels. Of course you're still going to notice pixels. C'mon dude."

I also think some people don't get what is being fixed here and why.
I can use an old 640*480 monitor still today, and be very happy with it. The reason is because I do not mind low resolution, as long as there is not a huge black border around each pixel (ScreenDoor). It is ScreenDoor we are trying to fix here, we are not trying to turn a low resolution LCD into a high resolution LCD.

[shiva]

Holy sh*t that looks awesome, definitly a vast improvement, thanks mayaman!

I'm sorry I don't but when I get back to work monday I'll ask the secretary where she buys it and what model.

Any chance you got some update on this?

[mayaman]

^^^Sorry still don't have a model. I know it is their latest widescreen privacy screen for 23" monitors. I do know that the 23" is different from the old 19" 4:3 though as I have put them side by side and the old one doesn't have a glossy back, its matte on both sides. Still trying to get the order info from her.

But the poster above you has it 100% right. You're never going to get rid of pixels on this low res screen but I can tell you 100% that I love my rift more now that I have no black spaces between pixels. Yeah, its a different type of SDE but its just better, at least now, after a couple minutes I pretty much forget about quicker than I did before.

I'll try and get back on the model number. Also, I'll be replacing the tape with little rubber feet this weekend.

[Ziggurat]

^^^Sorry still don't have a model. I know it is their latest widescreen privacy screen for 23" monitors. I do know that the 23" is different from the old 19" 4:3 though as I have put them side by side and the old one doesn't have a glossy back, its matte on both sides. Still trying to get the order info from her.

But the poster above you has it 100% right. You're never going to get rid of pixels on this low res screen but I can tell you 100% that I love my rift more now that I have no black spaces between pixels. Yeah, its a different type of SDE but its just better, at least now, after a couple minutes I pretty much forget about quicker than I did before.

I'll try and get back on the model number. Also, I'll be replacing the tape with little rubber feet this weekend.

There are various things you can do. This might not be so simple to implement on a HMD, but anything is possible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYY0Zi6pT8I

[geekmaster]

There are various things you can do. This might not be so simple to implement on a HMD, but anything is possible.
...

Your video shows "wobulation", which is a common resolution enhancement method used to in DLP/DMD projectors.

I simulated that effect (software sub-pixel wobulation) in my Rift software. It works VERY well on a desktop LCD panel (when viewed with a magnifying lens), but in my Rift, that "vibration" makes me dizzy rather quickly. It seems that we do NOT want that getting into our peripheral vision, at least from my experience. But it works great in the central vision area, so I plan to modify my software to only "wobulate" the central "safe" area and see if that helps.

The amazing thing is that this method allowed me to read full-color text as small as two pixels (six sub-pixels) wide, and the wobulation effectively performed temporal color mixing of the RGB sub-pixels for a wider color gamut at sub-pixel resolution. But the "dizzy" thing makes it basically not usable in its current form.

One thing that surprised me is that it did not seem to reduce the screen door effect, so my reason for implementing it proved a failure (without mechanical vibration). However, again much to my surprise, the resolution enhancement from this effect allowed me to shrink text far more than expected while still maintaining full readability. Sometimes failed experiments can still have unexpected beneficial results, as in this case.

Adding mechanical wobulator vibration would make reading the head tracking accelerometers very difficult, I think. And the vibration could make your face numb as well, but then you might not need Botox injections quite as often to maintain your youthful appearance.

[Zoide]

geekmaster: Have you ever thought of working for Oculus? I think you'd help them make some amazing stuff.

[geekmaster]

geekmaster: Have you ever thought of working for Oculus? I think you'd help them make some amazing stuff.

I dream about it, and I would absolutely love it, but I hear that real estate is expensive there, and I would need my own personal warehouse to store all my books and tools and techno-toys (and a fleet of cargo containers to move it all). I literally own many hundreds of computers (depending on how you define a computer). I could downsize my collections, but that would be very painful for me to make each and every decision on whether to keep or let go each item. They all fit into my (six lifetimes worth of) project plans. My geek friends drool over my stuff, but my non-techno wife calls it all "garbage". Different meme sets...

I suppose I could pretend my house was on fire and just grab the most important stuff, if I were to move to Irvine. But then of course, who knows how long Oculus could stand having a "know it all" in their company. I could be like Jeri Ellsworth at Valve, and I would need more long-term security than that to commit to such a move...

They know who I am if they think they can use me and not abuse me.

[Zoide]

They know who I am if they think they can use me and not abuse me.

I hope they make a wise choice!

[mayaman]

Guys, according to the secretary this is the screen she game me

3M • MFR Item # PF23.0W9

I hope this helps.

[mattyeatsmatts]

How do you look at nudie pics and stuff at work now that you've taken your privacy screen off?

[Zoide]

Guys, according to the secretary this is the screen she game me

3M • MFR Item # PF23.0W9

I hope this helps.

Thanks. I see you can get the 18.1" version for ~$30 used: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/ ... dition=all

[Ryuuken24]

I found one type that is made for the galaxytab and ipad2, do you think it might work?

[mayaman]

How do you look at nudie pics and stuff at work now that you've taken your privacy screen off?

Very carefully...

I don't know if the ipad versions will work. Sorry

I need to reiterate that this isn't increasing resolution. It simply removes the black spaces between pixels, but you can still see pixels of some sort. I don't want people spending money only to be disappointed.

[AttackingHobo]

I don't have my Rift yet, but yesterday I bought a 3m privacy screen from good will for $5

[DannyO]

Awesome work Mayaman, I definitely see an improvement in the image, very surprised its so affective at reducing the black grid.

I'm not familiar with privacy screens for monitors, I've seen them, but never gave them much of a look, I assume they work by having there own "controlled grid" inside the panel in order to direct the light coming from the monitor, if this is the case, with what you were saying regarding having to tweak the screen to get it just right, I'm wondering if it is a case of lining up the grid of the privacy screen in a particular way in relation to the SDE on the display. If this is so, then it may be that you got lucky with that particular privacy screen and in order for this to work, me need to be looking at these screens with a certain size grid and pattern in order to line up with the display.

[AttackingHobo]

There are various things you can do. This might not be so simple to implement on a HMD, but anything is possible.
...

Your video shows "wobulation", which is a common resolution enhancement method used to in DLP/DMD projectors.

I simulated that effect (software sub-pixel wobulation) in my Rift software. It works VERY well on a desktop LCD panel (when viewed with a magnifying lens), but in my Rift, that "vibration" makes me dizzy rather quickly. It seems that we do NOT want that getting into our peripheral vision, at least from my experience. But it works great in the central vision area, so I plan to modify my software to only "wobulate" the central "safe" area and see if that helps.

The amazing thing is that this method allowed me to read full-color text as small as two pixels (six sub-pixels) wide, and the wobulation effectively performed temporal color mixing of the RGB sub-pixels for a wider color gamut at sub-pixel resolution. But the "dizzy" thing makes it basically not usable in its current form.

One thing that surprised me is that it did not seem to reduce the screen door effect, so my reason for implementing it proved a failure (without mechanical vibration). However, again much to my surprise, the resolution enhancement from this effect allowed me to shrink text far more than expected while still maintaining full readability. Sometimes failed experiments can still have unexpected beneficial results, as in this case.

Adding mechanical wobulator vibration would make reading the head tracking accelerometers very difficult, I think. And the vibration could make your face numb as well, but then you might not need Botox injections quite as often to maintain your youthful appearance.

Geekmaster, what if the display was insulated from the rest of the head mount and had a secondary vibrational motor to cancel out the vibration of the screen affecting the users face?

Or if fiber optics get cheap and good enough have the physical display not on your face vibrate the motor there so it doesn't bother you.

I have been throwing some of these ideas around in my head for a while, I had no idea that vibrating screen tech has already been implemented.

[Evenios]

no you havent. and you risk damanging the rift if you do this.

The issue is not just the screen door, the issue also is that things are very pixelated more so in the distance so even if you removed the screen door you would stil have loss of detail of things in the distance the solution is a better screen. and these so called "fixes" might somewhat work but you risk damaging the rift by tampering with the screen and it wont get rid of some of the low res issues too.

i woudnt recommend it and i would just wait for a better rift when it comes.

[TheHolyChicken]

no you havent. and you risk damanging the rift if you do this.

The issue is not just the screen door, the issue also is that things are very pixelated more so in the distance so even if you removed the screen door you would stil have loss of detail of things in the distance the solution is a better screen. and these so called "fixes" might somewhat work but you risk damaging the rift by tampering with the screen and it wont get rid of some of the low res issues too.

i woudnt recommend it and i would just wait for a better rift when it comes.

I can't believe how much of a grinch you are. Is there some kind of deterrent spray I can buy?

The point of the exercise was to see if the screen can be improved by getting eliminating the screen door. He succeeded, apparently. Yes, the screen is still lower resolution than we would like, but your response is basically "you made it better, but it's still poop, so it didn't help". Thanks buddy, very constructive. He improved the screen by ways of a straightforward modification. If you deem it too dangerous for your own Rift then don't participate.

[mickman]

Warning: I accidentally snapped off three of the tiny clips that hold the Rift's front plate. So it is a touch and go situation opening the Rift to gain access to the screen... my issue was the fact I thought all the clips had been fully disengaged on the right side (where the screen cable exits the Rift) so I placed it on the desk & noticed something very small and black bounce out of it... Aahhh !

But its no biggie as the front plate still snaps in fairly snug...... but do realize you're taking a risk opening a Rift.

As for the improvement... is it really worth it... we're talking about a 640p rez here.... not much can be done to gain much in the way to rez. but its still fun to tinker .. right Diamond shape pixels vs square pixels... there's an improvement. I wouldn't pay more than a few dollars though. Forget about spending $10-$20 on a 3M screen for this improvement... unless of course manage to track one down on Flea Bay for a couple o bucks.

[Lookforyourhands]

Yeah I have to say this is a cool mod and all, but Evenios has a point. I was playing HL2 last night on the Rift and I literally don't even notice the screen door.
Yeah it's there but it's absolutely tiny and I'm guessing software configuration is going to have everything to do with this.
I'm running my desktop at 1920x18080, and was running HL2@1920x1080 also. Forcing 32xAA and 16xaf in the Nvidia control panel. Even
if your rig can't handle it, just load up your game like this and see if you notice any difference from running it at 1280x800 with minimal AA.
I honestly can't believe the quality level I'm perfectly happy with the Rift as it is and knowing that it's going to get even better blows my mind lol.
For those of you who have the balls to open up your Rift and mod it all the power to you, but this guy won't be !

[mayaman]

The RIFT is so simple, if you break that front shroud you weren't careful enough. You have to push in the pull out.

Anyway, you can do this or not its up to you. I definitely see an improvement and am still getting a consumer RIFT. This is all for fun. We're not talking about a 4,000 dollar piece of equipment here after all. Chill.

[geekmaster]

no you havent. and you risk damanging the rift if you do this. ...

Too much messing with the screen and you would have to rename the thread title to remove "door effect", eh?

[mickman]

like it states in Big white letters " Developer Kit " .. its built for tweaking etc... Rip it apart and hack the crap out of it.

Drill, glue, smash etc.. just cross your fingers it fires up after each tweak... mine still does & that's what matters the most.

I'll keep fiddling away even one the consumer version's released. This black brick is screaming to be hacked.

I'm busy building a Prusa i3 ( 3D Printer) so I hope to conjure up a whole new HMD housing over the next few days.

The 3M screen is definatley an improvement. The more I use my Rift the smoother I realize it is with the screen... I just have to spend some time out & lock myself in a dust free environment to pick out the particles.

[mayaman]

Also, there is no way to damage the screen doing this, pretty much zero, that is of course unless you drop it on the floor.

I set up a humidifier in the room I performed the mod. I used surgeons rubber gloves with no powder, and I used 5 or 6 of the cheap glasses lint free cleaning cloths along with glasses cleaning spritz. Do not use normal cotton cloths as you will leave lint or scratch the screen. Take your time. pretty much zero chance of wrecking this thing unless you do something stupid.

[geekmaster]

Also, there is no way to damage the screen doing this, pretty much zero, that is of course unless you drop it on the floor.

I set up a humidifier in the room I performed the mod. I used surgeons rubber gloves with no powder, and I used 5 or 6 of the cheap glasses lint free cleaning cloths along with glasses cleaning spritz. Do not use normal cotton cloths as you will leave lint or scratch the screen. Take your time. pretty much zero chance of wrecking this thing unless you do something stupid.

I PMed with a forum member who cracked his screen. Rest assured, they are very delicate when handled (such as taping stuff to them). He bought his Rift on eBay though, while waiting for his kickstarter Rift to arrive, so he is using a replacement screen he also got on eBay. Sadly, it worked while testing but then cracked while reassembling his Rift. Now he ordered another replacement screen.

So "pretty much zero" may be a subject of opinion, even when the Rift was not dropped. There are plenty of ways to damage the screen without dropping it.

[mayaman]

OK be careful LOL

But I've seen many videos of the RIFT getting handled around pretty robustly, just be careful. This isn't really a thread about that though.

Open at your own risk I guess.

[ULTRA_LASER]

I just did this mod the other day. Works amazingly well. Thanks mayaman.

http://imgur.com/a/Yw5x5

[mayaman]

No problem man, can I ask a couple of questions? What is the hydra for? And the sock?

thanks

[ULTRA_LASER]

the hydra is for use with minecrift. you can take one of the hydras and put above your head, and it does position tracking. works extremely well.

the sock is to block the light that comes through the mesh if you're playing in a lighted room without completely taking away ventilation. there's probably a better material for this, but the sock was for a dollar at the corner store.

[shiva]

Just ordered the privacy screen, thanks for finding the reference Mayaman, can't wait to get rid of that damn black grid!! Never experienced with hardware modding before, but the pictures from inside the lens clearly show it's worth it

no you havent. and you risk damanging the rift if you do this.
i woudnt recommend it

I don't think anyone asked for your advice. Try actually contributing to something before spitting on other people's valuable work.

[Lookforyourhands]

Ahhhh I still maintain if you set up your rig correctly, and actually have a good graphics card forcing 32xAA and 16Xaf, running everything on max at at least 1080p really reduces the size of the screen door by maybe half, I don't even notice it ! I have to go looking for it.. Personally I don't think it's worth it to risk
destroying my Rift to try this mod. No one asked for my opinion either but there it is.

[TheHolyChicken]

Ahhhh I still maintain if you set up your rig correctly, and actually have a good graphics card forcing 32xAA and 16Xaf, running everything on max at at least 1080p really reduces the size of the screen door by maybe half, I don't even notice it ! I have to go looking for it.. Personally I don't think it's worth it to risk
destroying my Rift to try this mod. No one asked for my opinion either but there it is.

Your understanding of screen door is completely wrong. It's a physical artifact of the screen itself, and has nothing to do with software.

[Whiskey]

Ahhhh I still maintain if you set up your rig correctly, and actually have a good graphics card forcing 32xAA and 16Xaf, running everything on max at at least 1080p really reduces the size of the screen door by maybe half, I don't even notice it ! I have to go looking for it.. Personally I don't think it's worth it to risk
destroying my Rift to try this mod. No one asked for my opinion either but there it is.

Your understanding of screen door is completely wrong. It's a physical artifact of the screen itself, and has nothing to do with software.

These go to eleven.

[3dvison]

Your understanding of screen door is completely wrong. It's a physical artifact of the screen itself, and has nothing to do with software.

I am with the Chicken. This is the WonderBra Fix, because it puts something (The 3m screen) where there was nothing (The empty area around the pixels).
And If you remove it, you are left with your imagination to fill in the empty spaces.

[mickman]

Avoiding Dust Particles:

I think I might try placing my Rift in a clear plastic bag when putting it back together again to help avoid dust particles.
Simply tape some rubber gloves to the bag opening and tape it off.... we're talking a large bag here. with enough room to easily assemble the rift.

I like the 3M but I don't like dust !! its so darn distracting.

[TheHolyChicken]

Do it in a steamy bathroom; the water will stick to dust particles and make them drop to the floor.

[mayaman]

Ahhhh I still maintain if you set up your rig correctly, and actually have a good graphics card forcing 32xAA and 16Xaf, running everything on max at at least 1080p really reduces the size of the screen door by maybe half, I don't even notice it ! I have to go looking for it.. Personally I don't think it's worth it to risk
destroying my Rift to try this mod. No one asked for my opinion either but there it is.

Your understanding of screen door is completely wrong. It's a physical artifact of the screen itself, and has nothing to do with software.

LOL the 32x AA part was pretty funny.

[lordbinky]

The amazing thing is that this method allowed me to read full-color text as small as two pixels (six sub-pixels) wide, and the wobulation effectively performed temporal color mixing of the RGB sub-pixels for a wider color gamut at sub-pixel resolution. But the "dizzy" thing makes it basically not usable in its current form

What if just the text was wubulated leaving the environmental points your peripheral vision is referencing stationary.

Arg, too many things to play with, such as the possibilty setting 0 wobble of blue intensity on the periphery removing the dizzy effect. (since blue is the primary receptor of peripheral vision)

[KBK]

contrast and sharp edging is required for decent 3d effects.

some people like LCD, some people like DLP, some people like LCOS (DILA). Some don't want any of that and prefer CRT projection.

The same holds here.

The loss of contrast and edging that this would bring about, is unacceptable to me, as a trade off.

You fixed one thing that is personally annoying, and lost something else. Something that many to most might find to be essential to their viewing.

I'm not saying don't do it, but to be aware that there will be tradeoffs.