We, especially as kids dreamt of exploring so many strange places. The scene from those video games, space movies and especially the animated world in kid’s television shows fascinated us. Back then, we did know very little about animation and boons of technology. But, eventually we grew up and so did science. Have you ever thought, if a Virtual Reality world can be formed in a desktop screen then why not around us? Because every video games, animated movies are based on the manipulation of visual and auditory sensors.
This gave rise to the term ‘Virtual Reality’ where one can be virtually present in a different world and interact. The work on the acreage of virtual reality started a long time ago. The concept of virtual or artificial reality was introduced in the early 1900s. But, everything was proposed in the form of theory or an artistic form. It was all a perspective back then. The real man who is behind converting this literature to true visual illustrations is Jaron Lanier. He is a world-famous computer scientist along with being a man who admires art in the form of music.
What is Virtual Reality?
Virtual Reality can be solely described as visual illustrations along with the auditory system. The main feature of virtual reality is audio and video feedback systems. Today, it can be best described using virtual reality headsets along with a head-mounted display. Once you put it on, it gives an experience of a real-world with 3-D animations where you can walk and interact with other creatures. A virtual reality environment can also be made using large screens. It is often shown in movies that an entire room is converted to a different environment where the illustrations are reflected on those screens.
Virtual Reality has hugely developed in all these years. It has mainly contributed to the gaming industry, education and also in military training. Before Lanier stepped into this domain of technology, some theory and primitive research works were carried out by Morton Heilig (1950), Ivan Sutherland and Bob Sproull (1968) and David Em (1977).
Researches on how to navigate the virtual world were carried out in NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the early 1980s. It was in 1985 that Lanier founded a company for virtual reality products and pioneered it.
Jaron Lanier
Born into a Jewish family in 1960, Lanier grew up in New Mexico. He lost his mother in a car accident when he was nine. Lanier didn’t belong to a privileged family and spent his early childhood living in tents. He was a highly brilliant student and hence got enrolled in New Mexico State University at the age of thirteen. Eventually, he started doing a project funded by the National Science Foundation and it introduced him to computer programming.
In 1983, Lanier started working for Atari (an American video game developing company) and later focused more on learning virtual programming language.
In 1985, Lanier finally founded his own company, VPL Research devoted to virtual reality. But, the business failed terribly after a couple of years and he was bankrupted. The company was finally acquired by Sun Microsystems in 1999.
Lanier played his role as chief scientist of Advanced Networks and Services (a non-profit organization), a visiting scientist at Silicon Graphics and a visiting scholar at Columbia University. Lanier, along with carrying out his research, nurtured his artistic part as well. He is a visiting artist at New York University.
Virtual Reality in the 21st century
A lot of development took place after Lanier introduced to the world of virtual reality. Many video game companies like Sega introduced VR headsets for their game series. In 2007, Google added a new feature, Street View in their maps which gave a panoramic visual effect. In 2010, the prototype of Oculus Rift was created which came with a new feature of rotational tracking. It was the first of its kind in the market which was later acquired by Facebook for $3 billion.
In 2013, Valve Corporation introduced new VR products in the market that provided a smear-free and lag-free display. In the next year, Sony launched VR headsets for Play Station 4. Within the next couple of years, companies like Microsoft, Samsung, Apple, Google, Sony etc grabbed the VR market. Research is still ongoing on how to make a better user interface, more viable, 360-degree interactive photography, better motion controllers etc.
Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more