Our Project

[kylelefevre]

Hey everyone,

I'd really appreciate some feedback from the community here. I really trust your thoughts and opinions. So, we had our project declined by kickstarter.

"Thanks for sharing your idea with us! With Kickstarter, it's important to be able to communicate past experience, have a working prototype, visual examples of your work, and a comprehensive plan to complete your project within a reasonably certain time-frame -- projects at the very beginning stages are less successful because they are not able to do this."

You can only appeal with 500 characters, and ultimately we were kept declined.

What are your thoughts on our project though. We did launch it on Indiegogo, but you can see everything on our site. (not trying to shamelessly plug our project).

We felt we communicated past experience, working prototype, visual examples (the plan is only in the text of the project). How do you feel? It is tough now, because our project will not get the same kind of exposure, but we will keep trying.

www.experienceve.com - if you click the indiegogo tab on the menu you can watch the video on our page.

I just would really like some feedback from you all.

Thanks,

Kyle

[cybereality]

Looks cool. I want to support this, will probably give some money later today.

If you guys make it, I would come to Chicago to try it out, sounds cool.

[cybereality]

Ok. I'm in for $60.

[kylelefevre]

Thanks so much cyber! It means alot for you to support us.

Any feedback/thoughts/etc? The ultimate goal is really to make this project something everyone can enjoy. We're going to make this happen.

[Callezetter]

My first thought was that its a really big project. Or/and seem to have alot of parts to it.
Under tecnology you show a large map of a VR center. It looks massive and quite advanced.

My amateur guess is that its not defined enough for KS, or try to cover to much at the same time?

For a newcomer to your site and idea it takes time to understand what it really is you want to sell.

It is a product? A service? Maybe kickstarter thought that was to vague.

For us VR geeks it sounds great ofcourse, but maybe is it too hard to understand/comprehend for outsiders?

It would be interesting to read what you wrote in those 500 words.

Thats my novice view of it. Still it sounds great once you understand what it is.

[brantlew]

I certainly support the concept, but my thoughts on the project were that it was not clear that the basic R&D had been completed yet. The concept art is nice but this is a significant technical project and the explanation and video shown did not convince me that the product could be delivered. The prototype showed a living room VR system that is achievable by a lot of people and did not hint at how it was going to be scaled to the size and performance suggested by the project goals. My expectations of these investment projects are that the research and prototypes have been mostly completed and proven and that an injection of funding is needed to simply "turn the crank" on purchasing, implementation, and finishing. But this feels more like a "grant" for basic research and a significant investment gamble. Maybe if you were able to film a sizeable room with full player tracking that would demonstrate the results of your prototyping better.

[kylelefevre]

Thanks for the feedback!

Callezetter - you are likely right on some of those points. This is not the easiest thing to demonstrate even to individuals who understand this type of technology. I am possibly off base even thinking that a large number of gamer's would want to see this technology. Haha, I wish I had my response, but it was a form I had to fill out. I was good though and bit my tongue.

Brantlew - I certainly support your thoughts on backing it. My main goal at this site isn't to get backers though, it is for your exact kind of feedback. The biggest factor in how it was filmed is quite honestly a lack of a larger space to film. I don't have the luxury of being a student to have a place to film in, and our funds have gone into purchasing and developing this tech. That said I assure you it is scalable. I know you have concerns with wireless hdmi (I don't think I can ease those concerns for you) and the skeletal tracking is entirely scalable as well (just more equipment purchased and put together). As I mentioned before everything we use is off the shelf hardward, modified to our needs.

[Chriky]

That said I assure you it is scalable.

This is basically the problem; you need more than this to get capital. You really need to demonstrate your core product actually working. The main thing for me is the line "our advanced optical tracking will track your skeleton one-for-one anywhere that you're at in our entire facility".

This is a pretty big claim. I am not that in the know about VR tech, but I am a reasonably interested amateur, and that is AFAIK totally unprecedented without motion capture markers. In the demo video the guy isn't wearing any markers on his arms so if I was forced to guess, I'd say that was using a Kinect.

Basically, what you are proposing is my dream; I would love it to exist, I would pay a lot of money for it to exist, but you haven't convinced me you can deliver it.

[bobv5]

For me, using flexible instead of fixed funding was a bad choice. I don't want to give money to a project that has nowhere near enough money to be successful. With a fixed goal I would only be charged if you got enough offers to make the venue. With flexible I could end up being charged even if you fall very far short of the goal, and have no chance of making the real thing.

[brantlew]

My main goal at this site isn't to get backers though, it is for your exact kind of feedback. The biggest factor in how it was filmed is quite honestly a lack of a larger space to film.

ok, well what about even a garage with full character tracking. That's a really, really important piece of this puzzle that's missing. If you plan on using a preexisting professional mo-cap system and don't have the funds to purchase it then you could mention that in your plans. If you are developing a custom solution, then you're in a bit of a fix. Normally when you seek investment your potential investors would be privy to all of the details. But with crowd funding it's tricky. I don't really know how you can protect IP and also request public investment. You would have to do a really good job of demonstrating that you have solved the problems.

[kylelefevre]

Ok guys, so going through your feedback - I'm going to pull this project and reassess it. I've made quite a few errors on this, but I'm going to use them as a learning experience. I will still make this happen and hope to get support here in the future.

First and foremost - cyber, I will refund your money ASAP. The same as others who have contributed thus far. I certainly made a critical mistake by not doing the all or nothing. I was caught up on the thought of being a couple thousand short. I do not want to end up weeks down the road with only a few thousand raised and have to figure out how to pay people back now that fees are taken out. It isn't right to those people.

I really did not do a good enough job selling how we do this and frankly it is a difficult thing to do. We're going back to the drawing board with our plans.

Right now our plans are to create a solid Project HeLa demo and create a simplified at home version. This will include our gun setup and we'll work out HMD plans. We hope to drive this project to create a user base and fans. This will help to give a greater foundation for our facility.

Thanks for your feedback, I greatly value it and it has helped in making this decision.

[cybereality]

Well I thought you guys had a good idea, but I could understand wanting to get things sorted out better.

One thing I will say is that I think the goal was very high and not realistic. I know the Rift did an amazing number, but that was also because the lowest tier (that got the Rift) was like $300 and up. So it was much easier to get the high numbers. I feel with this project there is not the same need for contributors to give that kind of money. Meaning you will need a lot more people donating. This is hurt even more by the fact that the project is location specific, so you automatically lose a great deal of people internationally, or even within the US that can't (or don't want to) travel to experience this event. So there is a lot running against you. Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I wish you guys the best of luck.

[kylelefevre]

We still believe very strongly in the idea. Honestly, I've wanted this personally forever! We haven't done a good job communicating this though nor in getting the word out. The sum of money needed, while large, is really what is needed. There is no fluff in that number, which is why likely nobody has done it yet. Alas, we feel if we promote ourselves better in the area and online we can launch the project at a better point. Thanks for your continued support though!

[Fredz]

Looking at your video I also think there are several problems with your approach. The most important ones have already been pointed out, but anyway I'll go on with my (long) opinion in case it could help in the future.

Disclaimer : I know I can sound harsh, so feel free to ignore me completely.

The start of your presentation looks a lot like the one from Palmer, by saying that nothing existed for what you wanted for a long time and that you'll create it. That's not a bad idea per se, but that's unfortunate when most of your potential bakers have probably seen that video already, since it touches the same field.

Some originality could have helped there, like having a rapid tour in a rendering of what you want to build (which you've done, but is shown only for 2s far in the video and without details), with some catchy words (but not false claims) to make people want to go there and help you in creating this.

Example : 5000 sqft gaming field (shown later in the video), 32 simulateneous player (I don't know the exact number), immersive stereoscopic rendering, full body tracking, etc. For each sentence an illustration of what it would look in reality (or even as a mockup) would be needed.

Basically from what I understand you want to create the equivalent of a lasertag game in a realistic environment, I think that's how you should sell it and it should be evident right from the start of your video. Then you can present how it will be done and what you need to create it.

Your logo (mutilated skull) is not a great selling point, it looks a lot like the signature of some Amiga demo coders in the old times, the music and the head mosaicing and turning into red didn't help in this regard either. Not really professional looking, even a bit creepy, and it doesn't really represent the main idea of your project.

You oversell your project with catchy sentences that are quite dubious and that nothing proves in your video.

Examples :
- the most realistic virtual simulation to date ;
- we can take you anywhere ;
- you will use all of your senses (really ?) ;
- extremely low latency head and aim tracking (if that was really possible in a gigantic open environment many people would be interested I think) ;
- high resolution models (when you don't show any, just one would have helped) ;
- the most intense survival horror game you will ever play (seriously ? better than Doom 3, Left4Dead, Resident Evil, without having programmed any game before that ?) ;
- complete freedom to move as you want (but you only show someone in a small room walking in place) ;
- AAA game engine (doesn't mean AAA game...).

Palmer had a good approach with this, he never oversold his project and people like John Carmack were even prompt to point out its shortcomings. It's good to make people dream, but you don't have to make unverifiable claims. If the project is interesting enough for people, overselling is not needed.

You don't show anything to prove the feasibility of your project, except some drawings and some renderings which don't look really attractive. The same sequence is show several times (with the statues) although it doesn't look like it's part of a game (no interactivity). It's a scene that doesn't seem to have any connexion with your game project and that could have been grabed from the Web.

Filming a yound adult (no problem with that in itself) with a backtop that looks like a schoolbag in what looks like its parent living room with the familial TV doesn't help in gaining credibility. Even if it's not really the case, that was the first image that came to my mind when seeing this part of the video. It looks like some student project, not like a start-up trying to mount an ambitious project to create something revolutionary.

Using a garage-like big room full of wires with a projector showing a stereoscopic image on a big screen to give an idea of the immersion would have been more effective IMHO. It would have showed that you're technical people, that you take this project seriously by having a big dedicated room and material for it and that you're able to give at least a small impression of what the end result could look like.

Having a guy moving his hands in front of a TV at home looks too much like someone playing with a PS Move, a Wiimote or a Kinect, ie. not very different from what people already do themselves.

The metaphor of switching from the drawing board to reality is interesting, but it makes your project look like a dream that even you are not sure it will come to reality. You should only show what it will look like, not where you started from (it reenforced that when you said that now you're doing what you want). I think people are not interested in that, they want to see something that is as closest as possible to what the end result will look like.

The long blurb about the historical events that took place before the game in itself doesn't serve any purposen, except hidding the fact that you don't have have anything looking like a game just now. When people play FPS or survival horror games they don't care about the story, they only want to shoot zombies or monsters in realistic environments.

Writing a game is already an enormous task in itself, and you don't show anything that proves that you're able to handle that, let alone deploy it in a gigantic real-life environment. You try to grasp too much things at the same time, you should have show prooves of concept for each module to convince you're able to do all this on a much greater scale.

[brantlew]

We all want this too. Best of luck.

[Zaptruder]

Really, either the project needs to progress much further before asking for public funding, or you guys need to be more prepared to show the guts of your technology and how well its currently working.

As I said before in the other thread, the main problem for most people is that it's location is limited to Chicago. For me, in Perth Australia, as interested as I am in the concept, it's just a no go as far as donating atm.

If the rewards included some way of sending out useful products for backers (be it software or the skeleton capture system), then I think you'd do much better.

Hell, it might even be worthwile breaking the project funding into stages - first stage is; here's our game - it works with these controllers on the market - these are the features that make it stand out (i.e. gun/body independent tracking, tight locational damage).

Then later, here's our skeletal control system - here are the bits needed for it - and it can be used to enhance VR (and our game) in this way.


I've always kind of assumed that a VR activity centre would kind of emerge naturally once the technology to do it for consumers became mainstream... otherwise the tech investment seems really high for what is essentially an alternative to things like paint balling and laser tag.

[kylelefevre]

Ok, so I appreciate the feedback. Let me hit on some of these those.



The start of your presentation looks a lot like the one from Palmer -Really not intentional...Kickstarter/Indiegogo really focus on selling who you are and why you are doing what you are doing.

with some catchy words (but not false claims) - no false claims were made.

You oversell your project with catchy sentences that are quite dubious and that nothing proves in your video.
Examples :
- the most realistic virtual simulation to date ; - the point of the end result
- we can take you anywhere ; - shown through three drastically different levels? An island, a skyscraper, a desert?
- you will use all of your senses (really ?) ; - I didn't prove this, but yes
- extremely low latency head and aim tracking (if that was really possible in a gigantic open environment many people would be interested I think) ; - yes the IMU we have has a solid 260 hz update rate (with kalman filter on, 1000 hz with no filter) that is good for 200 ft.
- high resolution models (when you don't show any, just one would have helped) ; - Maybe high poly model would have worked better...that is an image of one
- the most intense survival horror game you will ever play (seriously ? better than Doom 3, Left4Dead, Resident Evil, without having programmed any game before that ?) ; - none of those games are virtual reality
- complete freedom to move as you want (but you only show someone in a small room walking in place) ; - cant argue that point
- AAA game engine (doesn't mean AAA game...). - low blow, but the point is that it isn't like every other hacker project out there done on unity or some other low rent game engine. This matters...despite what anyone says. That isn't a negative comment towards others projects, but more a requirement in our eyes for a commercially viable system. Getting what we have working in unreal engine was no small feat on its own.

The same sequence is show several times (with the statues) although it doesn't look like it's part of a game (no interactivity). It's a scene that doesn't seem to have any connexion with your game project and that could have been grabed from the Web. - I'm sorry I just take offense to this part. Everything, literally everything, was created by our team. We also worked very hard creating each piece .. software, levels, textures, music, graphics, website, etc. This was a huge undertaking. Obviously one mistake we made was not hiring a designer and having all tech guys.


The long blurb about the historical events that took place before the game in itself doesn't serve any purposen, except hidding the fact that you don't have have anything looking like a game just now. When people play FPS or survival horror games they don't care about the story, they only want to shoot zombies or monsters in realistic environments. - So you are correct in that we haven't spent the time on the game portion yet (we have focused on the technology), I do disagree with your thoughts on story. I think people care greatly about the story they are playing, especially if you are dealing with a single player game. The primary way to hold someone's attention in a single player game is through the storyline.

Writing a game is already an enormous task in itself, and you don't show anything that proves that you're able to handle that, let alone deploy it in a gigantic real-life environment. You try to grasp too much things at the same time, you should have show prooves of concept for each module to convince you're able to do all this on a much greater scale. - I agree we really did not do a good job of doing this. So, I do thank you for all your feedback. I strongly disagree with some things you said, but there are many valid points in your post. Thanks again.

[cybereality]

- you will use all of your senses (really ?) ; - I didn't prove this, but yes

So you are saying that you will have smell, touch and taste? Honestly the technology to emulate just one of those senses could be a Kickstarter all in itself (or a college thesis project). I'd have to say its a little suspect if you are just throwing that in as a footnote. I think this gets back to the point of the project being way too ambitious, just too many moving parts. Maybe it needs to be something more concrete, for example just the game. Made so people can play it at home on their own setups (ie Oculus Rift, Razer Hydra, etc.). I think this would broaden the appeal massively.

[Fredz]

Thanks for the answer, shows how much you're comitted to your project.

- the most realistic virtual simulation to date ; - the point of the end result

Yes, but a bit too much when you don't show much of your content. I've seen many indie game projects over the time overselling their ideas without showing much (and dying long before completion) to believe the first person who announces something revolutionary. Using only some straight facts (size of the area, # of players, technology used, etc.) and some appealing open sentences helps to tease, and show that you're not overconfident and that you grasp the difficulty of the task.

- we can take you anywhere ; - shown through three drastically different levels? An island, a skyscraper, a desert?

Anywhere means infinite number of places, and you can only have a finite one even if there are many. That may sound like nitpicking, but selling something as unlimited when you don't show much of what is possible is a bad tactic. See the backfire on the "unlimited detail" technology on any website, they're seen by a lot of people as a scam. Simply listing all of your environment instead of saying "anywhere" would also have made the thing more concrete. In your video it's not clear what theses places are for too, are they part of the whole game or different environments people can experience ?

- you will use all of your senses (really ?) ; - I didn't prove this, but yes

Really ? Tactile feedback, smelling (odorama) and tasting too ? If you've got tactile feedback, you should show a demo of it and how it integrates in the game. Smelling is more difficult to sell in a video, but you could explain how it's done with the technology used. As for tasting, I'm not sure you're serious about it, are you ?

extremely low latency head and aim tracking (if that was really possible in a gigantic open environment many people would be interested I think) ; - yes the IMU we have has a solid 260 hz update rate (with kalman filter on, 1000 hz with no filter) that is good for 200 ft.

Then why didn't you simply show a demo of that in a 4,000 sqft room or on a basketball or football field ? Even some glimpses of it would have helped.

the most intense survival horror game you will ever play (seriously ? better than Doom 3, Left4Dead, Resident Evil, without having programmed any game before that ?) ; - none of those games are virtual reality

Sure, but in this sentence virtual reality is not mentionned, and several AAA games have already been adapted for virtual reality (CAVE, Ultimate Battlefield 3). Not the same environment, but you can't say that yours will be better without showing it, when people could already have tested those.

- AAA game engine (doesn't mean AAA game...). - low blow, but the point is that it isn't like every other hacker project out there done on unity or some other low rent game engine. This matters...despite what anyone says.

Sure, but it's equally possible to make an awful game with an AAA engine that it is to make a good game with an Indie one (Among the sleep looks quite good to me).

I'm sorry I just take offense to this part. Everything, literally everything, was created by our team.

I'm not implying that you didn't model this scene, I'm just saying that potential bakers could think it's the case in order to sell your project, because it doesn't show any connection to your actual game. It's also a bit unfortunate to present something not really related to your project because it could like you don't have a well defined goal and are just exploring concepts. If you had talked about several games available for your project, including this scene into one of them, it wouldn't have been a problem.

We also worked very hard creating each piece .. software, levels, textures, music, graphics, website, etc. This was a huge undertaking. Obviously one mistake we made was not hiring a designer and having all tech guys.

Yes, showing all the people involved would have helped I think, because in this video we see only one or maybe too persons. You don't necessarily need a designer I guess, but you should have shown more of the 3D work you've done.

So you are correct in that we haven't spent the time on the game portion yet (we have focused on the technology), I do disagree with your thoughts on story. I think people care greatly about the story they are playing, especially if you are dealing with a single player game. The primary way to hold someone's attention in a single player game is through the storyline.

Yes the storyline is very important for certain types of games, but in your case it looks like you want to do a multiplayer FPS to shoot zombies, so I think it's more in the league of Doom 3 or Left4Dead than Deus Ex or Heavy Rain. I may be wrong, but you didn't really give enough information about the mechanics of the game to be sure the story is an important part.

I agree we really did not do a good job of doing this. So, I do thank you for all your feedback. I strongly disagree with some things you said, but there are many valid points in your post. Thanks again.

If it can help, all good. Good luck with your project.

[kylelefevre]

@cyber - So touch is probably the easiest of the group. You see in a small at home setting, obviously this is exceptionally challenging. But the concept here is putting the same physical elements in place. As an example, if you see glass table in the game you have glass there physically. Or if someone is walking on gravel, you have gravel physically there. We are also toying with other sensations, wind (obvious easy one), sun (hotter/bright lights), working on a prototype of essentially mini bloodpressure cuff to give a sensation of being grabbed.

Smell would be used in a more minor sense, but there are simple things that can be accomplished. IE scented oils, candle warmers, grass clippings, etc put in a non play area to help stimulate the sense of smell.

Taste - is honestly more of a gimmick than anything. This is not something that has a great practical application outside of being fun for the player to do something new. The ultimate goal was to at the end of the simulation allow the player to pick up a piece of bubble gum, take a water bottle, etc and actually eat/drink it if they chose to.

You see the problem here is that these are all well defined concepts in our minds and discussed/hashed out and honestly not even very difficult. But this is too much to throw at people all at once without having ever seen this or us.

As Zaptruder aluded to and I think I mentioned last night, we are going to change our approach to a smaller scale to start. We'll get some of this technology into people's hands at home so we can get an actual user base first. I always shoot for my end goal without fear of not hitting it, and it is what has helped me to be successful to this day. I overshot on this one, but I can learn from it.

Seriously, everyone the feedback is appreciated. This is exactly what I hoped for and it shows me the care and dedication this community has.

[Chriky]

How are you tracking things like bubblegum sticks and glasses of water? This is the most important part of the facility and you are either going to have to give a very robust demo of it or explain exactly how it works.

[BOLL]

Ok, my comments. Me? Previously an IT professional (technician, manager) for 5 years, have been studying game development on university level but not ventured into that career. Highly technical person, has spent lots of time producing media. Half-expert (technically) photoshopper, half-assed video producer, illusionary illustrator, web-code-script-chop-fixer. Right now studying app development as IT was killing my creativity. This is me.

Who are you? The video only stated you did middle-management... which involves which tech skills? What background do you have? What previous projects give you credibility? I'd like to see more of that.

So, getting right to it, what really sticks out for me with this project is the overly ambitious use of photoshop. The concept art looks just like screengrabs with filters applied, lots of the art is seemingly reused with different filters (as you can see on the Facebook page), simulated screenshots look just like photos that have been transmogrified with destructive filters to make them seem painted or computer-generated. If you are trying to look serious, this is not it. Clean drawn concepts, pixel-sharp screenshots, polished promotion art... where is it?

I did not perform too much reverse image search, but at least one of your assets seems hacked together from Internet media, so your claim for 100% team created assets seems a bit dubious, no?

Also, this team you have assembled, where is it? Why no clip of the team working together? Profiles of their individual roles/skills/creds? Just because you say you have a team, not bringing the members into the scene makes it suspicious. Are they all online friends that help out? Onilne relationships are awesome, but you could then have stated "A global team with international members cooperating seamlessly online have joined forces to bring this concept to life!" or something like that. If some aspect of your project is not good enough to show, perhaps rethink what you are doing and make it something you are proud of.

Oh, about assets. Sure team-created, but how come the terrain is very low quality while you have a very nicely modelled statue, tree and plant in a pot? You do realize it looks like you have just grabbed the assets from an online repository and dropped them into the UDK right? Even if that might not be the case, it is what it looks like to me.

So yeah, my honest feedback, and I'm not holding back. This looks like a project by someone very enthusiastic, but with very unproved skills and abilities. There is very little proof of concept, or even concept descriptions. The supplied media is dubious, oddly distorted and seems assembled by someone still experimenting. Very lofty claims have been made while the provided tech demo seems very limited in comparison, it makes for very large leaps of faith for people to get involved.

I assume you will hate me a bit for this :) but I would have to. Sorry for trampling on your dreams, but this is what I see, and you are free to make me think differently! Just realize, if I think this, more people might. You might want to reconsider how you present things and your openness, or even, reconsider the limits of your own abilities or that of your team.

If I have been too harsh? Very sorry, I'm a cynical old man, hahaha.

[PalmerTech]

I am going to try and mostly address things that other people have not. EDIT: Some people have pointed some of these things out before I could post, but I left them in.

1) Kickstarter rejected you because you failed to "communicate past experience". We know nothing about your team, and little about yourself. Note that I don't have a college degree myself, but when the only experience you have listed online is a high school diploma and a management position at a supermarket, people are going to be skeptical. It would be different if you were just a project leader who was starting the company with the help of a lot of other people, but it appears that you are the only member in the LLC, which has an office address of an apartment in a residential neighborhood. Protip: Having a third party receiving address helps to make you look legitimate. That is what I have done when I ran business out of my house.

2) They also rejected you because you lacked "a comprehensive plan to complete your project within a reasonably certain time-frame". Most Kickstarters, especially ones with such huge targets, specifically list exactly what the money is going to be used for, and when. People want to know that their money can make the tech actually happen, and if you already have the tech working, then they want to know you are not spending half your budget on hookers and blow.

3) I have done a lot of what you are doing, on both the hobbyist and military simulation level, so I know a lot of the challenges you face. Problem is... It seems that you/your engineers do not.

Wireless HDMI is not very hard to do these days, these are multiple chipsets that can provide great quality with minimal latency. Your 75' figure sounds about in line with what you could get with a WHDI chipset and an omnidirectional antenna, but why move the entire base station? You could use a directional antenna and just rotate the base to roughly face the player, that would get you a 150' diameter area no problem!

On top of that, your tracking specs seem, well, impossible.

Our biggest overall challenge in general is latency, but I'm confident we have that all set. We will have sub 10 ms latency from skeletal tracking, sub 10 ms from wireless hdmi, and sub 10 ms from the IMU. The IMU's that are being used are also solid for up to 200 ft. We have spent a lot of time finding the best hardware out there to make this project stable.

10ms of skeletal tracking is crazy. The Kinect has many times more than that, and I am not aware of any markerless systems that come even close to 10ms of latency, that figure is about on par with what you get from marker based professional MoCap systems from NaturalPoint or PhaseSpace. If you have really solved that problem, then you should be making a tracker system to sell to people, not an installation; I know of 5 or 6 places off the top of my head that would pay several hundred thousand dollars each for a system like that.

Sub 10ms from the IMU is also far fetched. The sensor we are developing for the Rift is not even that low, and we have the help of some of the best sensor and software experts in the world. The asynchronous nature of of USB packets means you are realistically adding between 4ms to 8ms for USB alone, and I am not aware of any wireless IMU technologies that are fast. Even if you somehow pull out tracking data in less than 10ms, you still have a lot of work on the PC side to get that into the engine, especially since you are using UDK. The only way to get decent latency in Unreal is to integrate on a deeper level than you can do without a full Unreal license with source access.

Speaking of UDK... The UDK license states that if you plan on using it commercially, you have to pay them 25% of all revenue past $50,000. That means if you hit your minimum target, you would be paying more than $87,000, and would also owe them $5 per player for as long as you run the installation. Have you budgeted for that? I assume so, but without a cost breakdown, it is hard to be sure.

I love VR, I think this project would be amazing if brought to fruition, but the honest summary is that from our end, all we see is a single guy with no demonstrable tech experience claiming that he can build an incredible VR system if he has a large sum of money, but can't release any plans, specifications, or explanations beyond a demo that is identical in appearance to what a lot of people have done using a Kinect and PS Move. I would love to see further demonstrations that prove me wrong!

[kylelefevre]

Well this thread has certainly devolved into a strong dislike for me.

I don't know what else to add to this right now as everyone has their minds made up about us. I will come back on here when we have more to share.

Overly ambitious...yes. Lying to anyone...no. You can say whatever you want of our skills/thoughts/plans, but I have not lied to anyone on here.

[PalmerTech]

Well this thread has certainly devolved into a strong dislike for me.

I don't know what else to add to this right now as everyone has their minds made up about us. I will come back on here when we have more to share.

Overly ambitious...yes. Lying to anyone...no. You can say whatever you want of our skills/thoughts/plans, but I have not lied to anyone on here.

I don't dislike you, we just know next to nothing about you. I don't think you are lying, I think you are overly confident about being able to reduce your latency as much as you think you can.

If you don't know what else to add, maybe you could touch on why you believe you can do so much better on latency than anyone else.

[cybereality]

I hope you don't think we are just busting your chops. You asked for advice and people have given it. And since you've already pulled the project from IndieGoGo, clearing you think some of the criticism is valid. Personally I don't doubt anyone's skills. We can all accomplish amazing things with time and effort. However its one thing to shoot ideas around in a forum, and its another thing to be soliciting donations from the public. When you are in the position of pitching a project, especially when the goal it over half a million dollars, you have to expect people are going to scrutinize your credentials. This goes for whether its on a crowd-sourced site, a bank, to venture capitalists, or otherwise. And if you can't take the heat, then maybe its not a good idea in the first place.

[kylelefevre]

Well quite honestly I am going along with stated information from the company I am sourcing the IMU's through. They have developed dll binds for UDK, and say latency with the 260 hz kalman filter is sub 4 ms latency.

I understand how these things can be percieved to potential backers. I am proud of my professional background as it has given me the knowledge and skills to run a multimillion dollar business as well as a retail facility (ie gaming center).

Either way, I did ask for feedback and I got all sorts. I'm ok with what I have at this point, as I said I will come back when I have more to share.

And cyber you are right, I did take heed of quite a few items of advice here. Regardless of how anyone feels, I know that I could have made it happen. However, I didn't think I would realistically hit 400,000 and made an error in how I set up funding. I think that the fact alone I pulled it shows my personal integrity. Many people have collected funds crowdfunding and not used them for legitimate purposes.

I don't want to seem ungrateful for any feedback, I just felt it left from the path of being constructive when we start talking about my personal background. If a lack of specific background stopped many great individuals we would have many amazing inventions missing throughout history.

[Zaptruder]

Well this thread has certainly devolved into a strong dislike for me.

I don't know what else to add to this right now as everyone has their minds made up about us. I will come back on here when we have more to share.

Overly ambitious...yes. Lying to anyone...no. You can say whatever you want of our skills/thoughts/plans, but I have not lied to anyone on here.

If you haven't lied, that's great - because you're working on technology that is potentially much more lucrative (although much lower level) than a VR center. It's certainly the way to explore before the VR centre (even if that is your ultimate destination... and really it's kind of the ultimate destination for a lot of VR enthusiasts as well).

[BOLL]

I responded with my spontaneous reaction :) sorry if it makes you feel bad, but I figured being honest could be of interest. If you are looking for investors, presentation would be a factor, no?

Still, I'd love to see more of this project, if there is more. From what I can read and see it does not convince me much, so yeah, pix or it never happened! ;P

Oh, and if we're continuing. Why the large backpack if the HDMI transmitter is so small? Even a battery-pack could be worn in a belt. To hide the tech you've put together? A black box could have worked.

And, simulating gravel under ones feet by adding real gravel, is that really simulation? Sure, a simulation of where that gravel is, but the experience of touch and sound? So far I see this project more like one of those 4D-5D-6D-whatever experiences where you sit in a moving chair with 3D-glasses and get shot with air bursts, sprayed with water and sometimes an actor would be present in the room, etc. With virtual events being manifested with the same events in the real world... I guess that could be called simulation, haha, but perhaps in a different sense. Now I have confused myself, awesome!

Also, why not just find a big space to show the tracking working? See if you can use a sports center hall when the hall is empty or anything similar.

I'd say most of my skepticism is rooted in that from what I have seen so far, I can imagine myself capable of producing similar material by messing around in photoshop and doodling around with the UDK for a while, certainly after four months, this while I certainly do not have the technical know-how to do a project like this :) I am my own reference point, but I'd love for you to prove you are smarter and better than me though. It would give me a good personal lesson to get my perceived seriousness of this project proven wrong!

The most impressive part for me would be the head-tracking section, but again, it doesn't seem to go beyond the realm of hobbyism compared to what I have seen elsewhere... ? This might just be because of my own ignorance, but then shouldn't a promotion video try to help ignorant people to understand? Hehe.

[android78]

Don't think that the people posting here are disliking you. Myself, I am often criticized for sounding like I am being overly critical when I really am just trying to offer some assistance. When there is something I can improve, I prefer people to tell me so I know.

so will try not to be too negative.

First off, I think this is an amazing idea for a project and really exciting to see someone try to get this up and running. There are others on this forum working on the idea of real space with VR rendering overlay on this forum and I think it could be a fantastic experience if done well.
If you are trying to get crowd funding, then you need to be able to offer something that very many people can use. The location problem is a very limiting factor in this case, and particularly when you are talking about unproven technology, it's hard for people to justify spending thousands on a plane ticket to experience something that may at some time in the future be able to deliver an amazing experience. It is a huge risk when you haven't yet got some well respected third party with whom you have demonstrated the technology willing to put their name behind is and say that it works. I know we can't all have John Carmack saying that they have tried this and it works, but if you could get someone who is known, then that would really help.
The alternative to a spokesperson really is to say how it works and why it works so that people have more to decide if they think it really can work or not. If you do this, it'll be hard to protect any ideas that you haven't patented though, so I understand your reluctance. You have to remember that this forum has a lot of people who have experimented with, developed (or developing) their own ways of solving the issues you claim you have overcome and run into many, many issues. I'm not saying that you aren't able to deliver, or that the issues aren't solvable, but you must understand that it's easy to be skeptical... If you've managed to solve the issues (particularly with regards to tracking) first try (or even 100th try), then you are an amazing engineer and really should be head engineer at a company and be paid a fortune!

Zaptruder made an interesting suggestion with regards to breaking up the project into parts and possibly offer an actual product at each step until you have enough proven tech out that people just trust you. I would prefer the steps be:
1. Tracking/motion capture system. Maybe a demonstration environment to play in... nothing complex, just a small room wit a couple of objects to interreact maybe.
2. Game with modified control scheme, but still using the motion capture that can be played in small area.
3. You create the physical play area with all the additional tech, including smell, heat, physical objects, etc. I would assume that by this stage, you will have developed wuite a following and it would be likely that private funding would be fairly easy to come by (if they weren't chasing you).

This would add some complexity with regards to getting to final product since it involves high volume manufacturing, but may end up being more feasible.

Lastly; I really wish you all the best with this. Even if I am unlikely to be able to experience your creating, I would love to read about it coming to fruitin and succeeding where others have failed. This is the kind of thing that many of us have been dreaming of since we were kids! Please keep us updated with any progress you make through the forum. I'd love to know where this project goes.

[BOLL]

(I am sorry if I have been overly skeptical, I'm new to these forums, and have probably been too exposed to sketchy projects in my corporate career. Again, I might be too cynical in this situation :x I'll shut up for now haha)

[PalmerTech]

I just felt it left from the path of being constructive when we start talking about my personal background. If a lack of specific background stopped many great individuals we would have many amazing inventions missing throughout history.

I only went into it because Kickstarter listed it as one of the reasons they rejected your project, and it is a valid concern. There is nothing wrong with your background (Truth be told, it is more impressive than mine until extremely recently), but because there is nothing about your team or technical skills, Kickstarter is going to be skeptical that you can actually pull it off. I mean, suppose you were trying to launch a Kickstarter for an organic food co-op: They would see your credentials and say "Looks like this guy has the skills and the means to pull off what he is doing!" If I tried that, on the other hand, they would want to see some proof that I/my team had any experience doing sales and foodstuff management, and because I have none and do not have a compelling case to the contrary, they would probably reject me. Make sense?

There are still two things to consider, though: The UDK licensing issue, and the skeletal tracking. I can't imagine it making sense to hand over 25% of your revenue (not profit) just to use UDK. Maybe you could work out a special licensing deal with Epic, it would be good to know if you are pursuing that option, or just planning on eating it. I still think that sub-10ms markerless skeletal tracking is unrealistic, because like I said, good marker based tracking systems are barely managing 9ms tracking, and that is for the fastest raw feed possible. Your supplier for the IMU might claim 4ms latency, but I would be willing to bet that the actual latency is much higher than. The person most likely to be lying is your supplier.

I think most of us on the forum would love to help, but we cannot do so without any details. Without any details, a markerless sub-10ms tracking system seems very improbable. This is not a personal attack, it is an observation based on working with $600k+ military tracking systems that don't come even close to that.

[Krenzo]

Well quite honestly I am going along with stated information from the company I am sourcing the IMU's through. They have developed dll binds for UDK, and say latency with the 260 hz kalman filter is sub 4 ms latency.

Would it be possible to get the name of this company? I'm curious about their technology as I think many others here are.

[kylelefevre]

Palmer, I suppose looking at it from that angle I can understand what you meant from your comments. There are always downsides to communication via text.

For now I'm going to avoid speaking on the tracking tech.

As for UDK, the licensing fee is 100% included in the financial calculations. It is a massive expense (25% after 50k), but they give out one time purchase licenses. This also includes if you earn enough to hit this number (which is shrouded in mystery). So there is not detriment to starting with the 25% license. It is a massive expense, but the engine offers way more than anything worth using out there (minus cryengine - rumored to be 1.2 million to license). Of course there is unity, and the project Fredz pointed out earlier was actually really impressive. I feel most comfortable with UDK, as I have been learning with it in small doses since Unreal Editor was released to make mods.

I will continue to visit here, and I'll give updates as progression is made. Zaptruder's suggestion is by far the best and the intended path. It honestly is just purely logical that people would struggle to trust such a big project from an unknown entity.

[kylelefevre]

Krenzo - Sure, they really are an awesome small company. As I said, they even developed DLL binds for UDK that made life easier for our project so far. I've tried many IMU's and these are by far the best I have tested.

http://tech.yostengineering.com/

[PalmerTech]

Thanks for sharing! I have a nice latency measurement system here at Oculus, I think I will pick up a few of these units to add to our sensor collection. Let me know which one in particular you are using if you want me to do some testing for you.

[kylelefevre]

Great, I appreciate the offer! We are using the wireless 2.4ghz DSSS.

[Fredz]

Krenzo - Sure, they really are an awesome small company. As I said, they even developed DLL binds for UDK that made life easier for our project so far. I've tried many IMU's and these are by far the best I have tested.
http://tech.yostengineering.com/

Their 3-Space Sensor looks pretty good, up to 260Hz with accel/gyro/magneto for only $99, it seems a lot better than the other offerings like the Hillcrest FSRK-USB-2 (no magneto), the Sparkfun Razor IMU (50Hz) or the Mongoose 9DOF IMU (50Hz also it seems).

Thanks for the link.

[Krenzo]

Thanks for the link. I'm confused though. That sensor says it only outputs orientation information. How would you be doing position tracking of such a large space with it? If you watch their Mocap Studio video, you will see that their software does not do position tracking and only constructs the position of each sensor based on its orientation relative to the other receivers in conjunction with the calibration data.

I have seen systems that do position tracking using IMUs. They require you to have one foot on the ground at all times, and then they use the grounded foot as a pivot to move the origin by comparing it to the position of the other foot when it is placed back on the ground. It works ok, but it's not very accurate as you not only have sensor drift but you have a fuzzy calculation of foot placement as your world origin. In the YEI 3 Mocap Studio video, they use the torso as the origin and don't try to determine world movement.

[kylelefevre]

Krenzo - The IMU is not for position, it is only for orientation. While it can be done through dead reckoning(my understanding of this is somewhat limited after stopping research due to the difficulty) it is horribly inaccurate as the sensor drifts over time. This drift leads to significant error in a short period of time if you can't recalibrate.