CSA Online by Andrew Moore-Crispin Google Cardboard $10-30 USD Google.com/cardboard Google Cardboard is an experiment that sparked a VR renaissance. While the first Google Cardboard headsets were literally made of cardboard, the technology has grown up somewhat. You can get a well-thought-out and well-constructed Google Cardboard viewer made, ironically enough, from plastic for less than $30. Cardboard iterations are available, too, and cost $15 or less. A quick Amazon search will turn up a bunch of options. Download the Google Cardboard app onto your phone, fire it up, snap your smartphone into the back of the viewer, strap the whole deal to your head and be transported. There are games, of course. Some of these will require a Bluetooth gamepad to enjoy properly. There’s also an entire section of YouTube devoted to 360°-view videos to watch. You can even take an immersive tour of global points of interest or drop in on the street where you grew up to get a 360° view of how much things have changed since you last visited. It’s an eye-opener and an inexpensive entry point. A Bold New (Virtual) World Virtual reality. What’s the first thing that springs to mind when those two, seemingly incongruous words are placed together? Maybe it’s a scene from Star Trek: The Next Generation, with the crew taking shore leave, living out a very real-seeming fantasy. Maybe you take a more dystopian view. Something like The Matrix, where humankind has retreated into a manufactured world and nothing is real (or is it?). While we’re not anywhere near the holodeck of Star Trek fame, and if we were living inThe Matrix, we wouldn’t know it, there’s a whole world of VR experiences awaiting intrepid early adopters. These experiences range from interesting to immersive and from super inexpensive to…otherwise. How VR Works The Coles Notes Version VR worlds are necessarily three-dimensional. VR splits your view and presents a slightly different perspective to each eye. This provides depth of field; it’s the same concept that makes 3D movies work. Sound plays an important part in our perception of what’s real. The second part of the VR equation is a pair (at least) of stereo headphones that can deliver the virtual soundscape. Finally, an array of sensors – in some cases, stuff that’s already built into your smartphone and in other, more advanced scenarios, stereo cameras that can tell exactly where you’re positioned – help the VR device translate your real-world movements into whatever virtual world you’re inhabiting. Beyond that, it’s just raw computing power and smart people building virtual realities for us to play around in. 44 | www.snowbirds.org
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