Virtual Reality Headsets – A Theoretical and Pragmatic Approach

Publication of a new book:

“Virtual Reality Headsets – A Theoretical and Pragmatic Approach”, 

P. Fuchs and al., February 2017, 200 pages, editor CRC Press,  ISBN 9781138632356

https://www.crcpress.com/Virtual-Reality-Headsets—A-Theoretical-and-Pragmatic-Approach/Fuchs/p/book/9781138632356

Features

·       Offers both a theoretical and pragmatic approach to Virtual reality

·       Provides current state of knowledge on the use of VR headset

·       Discusses the sensorimotor discrepancies and the solutions to avoid nausea and VR sickness

·       Introduces methods for designing VR applications and video games with VR headset

·       Reviews and compares the commercial devices available on the market

 

Summary

The purpose of virtual reality is to make possible a sensorimotor and cognitive activity for a user in a digitally created artificial world. Recent advances in computer technology have led to a new generation of VR devices such as VR headsets. Accordingly, virtual reality poses many new scientific challenges for researchers and professionals.

The aim of this book, a manual meant for both designers and users of virtual reality, is to present the current state of knowledge on the use of VR headsets in the most complete way possible. The book is divided into 13 chapters. The objective of the first chapter is to give an introduction to VR and clarify its scope. The next chapter presents a theoretical approach to virtual reality through our Immersion and Interaction methodology also known as « 3I² model’’. Then, a chapter about human senses is necessary to understand the sensorimotor immersion, especially vision. These chapters are followed by several chapters which present the different visual interfaces and the VR headsets currently available on the market. These devices can impart comfort and health problems due to sensorimotor discrepancies. A chapter is devoted to these problems, followed by a chapter that gives a detailed discussion of methods and 32 solutions to dispel, or at least to decrease, VR sickness. The following three chapters present different VR applications that use VR headsets (behavioural sciences, industrial uses and Digital Art) and the final chapter provides conclusions and discusses future VR challenges

« Prof. Philippe Fuchs is a true world-class expert in VR and its relationship with human perception. The recent resurgence of virtual reality by the massive investment of Facebook and Google has created an unprecedented interest in virtual reality in the public imagination especially for HMD based VR. The problem is that this new generation of VR enthusiast do not have a deep knowledge of the impact of VR on human perception. These include nausea, disorientation, and the simulator syndrome where hand-eye coordination can be altered by long exposure to poorly designed VR experience resulting in potential accidents which could lead to liabilities. This is why this book is important as it will review what is known about VR and its influence on human perception and then describes in practical terms how to minimize those effects. Most likely this book will become the must read in this field for anyone who is serious about designing HMD hardware or VR software that are truly compatible with human perception. »

Dr. Pierre Boulanger, Professor and director of the Advanced Man-Machine Interface Laboratory, University of Alberta, Canada