Daily Archives: July 7, 2017

Volkswagen is buckling down on virtual reality technology.

The German auto giant said Wednesday that it built a virtual reality app that acts as a sort of digital meeting room where team members can interact with one another and discuss auto designs, among other things.

The new VR app contains all of the companys previous VR apps like its virtual reality car showrooms into one hub. Employees who work across Volkswagons various brands like Audi and Skoda Auto will be able to access the app and work together on different projects.

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Going forward, we can be virtual participants in workshops taking place at other sites or we can access virtual support from experts at another brand if we are working on an optimization, said Volkswagen ( vlkay ) group logistics member Mathias Synowski in a statement. That will make our daily teamwork much easier and save a great deal of time."

Volkswagen said that it would be using a version of the HTC Vive virtual reality headset for businesses as part of its rollout of the new app.

HTC debuted its HTC Vive Business Edition last June. The headset costs $1,200 and comes with a 12-month warranty, customer support, and other features intended to make it more attractive to business clients.

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Volkswagen Debuts Virtual Reality App for Training, Collaboration ... - Fortune

NEWTON, Kan. (AP) - A Newton couple is bringing Silicon Valley to their Kansas-based lab - better known as their basement.

Corey and Michele Janssens, founders of ViewVerge, are enhancing the way people see media through a 2D to 3D converter and a 3D to 3D enhancer for augmented and virtual reality (ARVR), The Wichita Eagle (http://bit.ly/2sNxVyt ) reported.

Our goal was to basically re-create a biological version of 3D - a more natural 3D - because of ARVR, Corey Janssens said. We perceive in 3D, so it just seemed kind of natural: Why have a 3D device and watch 2D content?

The couple has struggled to attract investors who want to invest outside of Silicon Valley, but said they have no plans to leave the state.

What were doing is a Silicon Valley venture in Kansas, Michele Janssens said. I knew that would be a challenge, and it is just as big a challenge as we thought it would be.

But there are good things happening in Kansas. And everyone tells us there is a push right now to venture more into tech and bring jobs and money to the Wichita area.

While the Jansssenses have sought and attracted mentors nationwide in 3D technology, marketing and branding, they said success will occur when they have licensing and investors to help make ViewVerge technology readily available through mobile applications, or for 2D to 3D conversion in the medical and military fields.

Corey Janssens, a former Army unmanned aerial vehicle pilot and self-taught theoretical physicist and engineer, and Michele Janssens, a speech therapist, have what they call a marriage of science and communication.

An interesting fact that is a very integral part of who we are as a couple and hopefully as a vital company: Corey is autistic, I am a speech therapist, and were married, Michele Janssens said. He is passionate about building things and physics and the science, and I am passionate about communication.

Its really kind of a unique marriage.

Corey Janssens said he has had many jobs in his life that led him to developing this software.

It was when he spent five years as part of and then leading a confidential Microsoft think-tank that Bill Gates called him a modern-day Isaac Newton, according to a ViewVerge media release.

That interaction and exposure led him to apply to get one of the first rounds of developer HoloLens they released, Michele Janssens said. We waited about 10 years to do something like this.

The couple received their Microsoft Hololens - the first self-contained holographic computer - in May 2016.

When we got that Hololens, he knew this was it, Michele Janssens said.

It took just three to four months for Corey Janssens to develop the foundation for the software, and after continual improvements they think they have the answer to natural, human-like 3D media.

I dont believe youre going to have much 2D media in the future, he said. It just makes more sense to have graphics that are put in the format of the way we naturally see things.

If you build a system that is converting 2D to 3D, in a sense that is what the human brain does. We dont actually see 3D, you infer distance from having two eyes.

So by mimicking the biological system well enough with some added algorithms, you have an early computer vision system that is much more human.

The 3D software currently available has been gimmicky, Michele Janssens said, and that is not their goal.

When (people) hear 3D, they think stuff popping out in the face, and thats not actually what 3D is, Michelle Janssens said.

Our goals are to make it natural and comfortable, just like when youre looking around.

___

Information from: The Wichita (Kan.) Eagle, http://www.kansas.com

Original post:

Newton couple creating virtual reality software in basement - Washington Times

Kirsty Wigglesworth/Associated Press

From sipping champagne in a virtual luxury box at the Camp Nou to sitting pitchside at Old Trafford from a hotel in Melbourne, Australia, the way we consume football is beingreimagined by broadcasters and technology companies.

As clubs look for new ways to build and engage their audiences, bold technical thinkers are plotting a virtual-reality revolution. Forget 3D television, which failed to take off and was hugely expensive; VR is the next frontier of football entertainment. Some have already arrived.

In August last year, Bayern Munich's opening Bundesliga game of the season against Werder Bremen was shown live in VR, the first time such an experiment had taken place, while Fox Sports used virtual reality images To enhance their broadcast of an Eredivisie match between PSV Eindhoven and Feyenoord in February of this year.

This is next-generation VR we're talking about. From the Oculus Rift to the Google Daydream, Samsung Gear or HTC Vive, new technologies are poised to transform football viewing as you know it.

But will virtual reality live up to its hype, or are those staking millions on it destined for an expensive reality check?

Miheer Walavalkar sits quietly in a Soho coffee shop. He takes hissmartphone and slides it into a basic VR headset. While the rest of the world sips on lattes and flat whites, I am ushered into the world of virtual reality.

Walavalkar, born in India but residing in the U.S., is one of the brains behind LiveLike, whose introduction into the marketplace was one of the stories of sports VR last year. The company has raised $5 million in funding thanks to former NBA commissioner David Stern and a group of venture firms led by Evolution Media Partners and Elysian Park Venturescreated by the owners of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team.

LiveLike are powering a new app for Fox Sports, called Fox Sports VR, which has already been busy impressing customers, notably showing a college football game between Oklahoma and Ohio State in virtual reality. They also have a partnership to create VR content with Manchester Cityand this week the company will team up with Fox to show the CONCACAF Gold Cup in VR. Bruce Arena's United States versus Panama on July 8 in virtual reality in LiveLike's "virtual suite".

The company has tested its VR capabilities with the Premier League and at the biggest club game in the world, El Clasico, which was watched in VR by an estimated 37,000 peopleon less than a week's notice behind a paywall.

Headset on, I'm reclining on a virtual sofa with a Premier League game happening in front of me. Sergio Aguero is nearly on my lap and David Silva is just further afield. Tilting the head one way changes the camera angle and allows the viewer to move behind the goal. Tilting it the other way allows them to watch from the stands.

There's a stats table you can flick through with just the smallest head movement, giving you the latest possession numbers, passing percentages and everything you could want as a football fan.Replays are freely availableyou just need to move your head slightly to initiate them. You can watch the same incident from three or four different angles.

It's intuitive, easy to use and, after the first five minutes, it's easy to forget that you are sat in a busy London coffee shop with a headset on.Occasionally, when the ball is swept away to the far side of the pitch, it is difficult to see the action, but a quick glance up a the large virtual screen keeps you abreast of what is happening.

For Walavalkar, who grew up watching the Premier League from India, the opportunity to share the beautiful game with millions back home remains a huge driving force.

"For us, live sports is the mecca," Walavalkar tells Bleacher Report."We have done a few live events that have gone really well and got good feedback. It's all about the user experience and social featuresthe ability to teleport the user into an experience.

"We've been able to integrate statistics and replays, while making it a much more social experience. We want fans to feel like they're right in the heart of what's happening."

For LiveLike, the U.S. and Asia are two of the biggest target markets. As noted, the app has already won deals with Fox and Manchester City, but competition is fierce. Anyone who stands still for more than a minute faces being left behind.

Let's take a look at the VR sport market as it affects the major players.

The TV Companies

Few know the potential for success in weaving together television and VR like Fox Sports' Mike Davies, senior vice president of field and technical operations.Davies is the go-to man when it comes to combining live broadcast and the virtual-reality aspect of the channel's coverageand it's paying off handsomely.

Showing Bayern Munich's league opener in VR was just the start for football. "We worked really closely with theBundesliga on this, and they were great partners," Davies tells Bleacher Report. "We tried two big different things, as NextVR has a lot of experience with live soccer.

"One of things we took was to add specialty commentators to the VR broadcast so we didn't take commentary from the linear broadcast. That helped the viewer feel like they had someone co-piloting with them in the experience.The other thing we tried was showing replays at half-time in VR. I think that one of the big things we've been looking at with LiveLikeis having the ability to go back and re-experience instances in VR."

Outside of football, Fox has trialled VR at the U.S. Open golf tournament, the French Open tennis tournament, Daytona 500 and a number of other events, including Monster Trucks.

"I've been playing around with VR for the past few years and actively involved in public-facing events," Davies said."It has been a very quick evolution. With the advent of products that make live VR possible, utilising cell phones, Google cardboard, it has been very quickly attainable technology in terms of being something everyone can consume, at least in theory."

The Bayern Munich VR broadcast went down well with fans and organisers alike, but the nature of football and its suitability for such coverage did raise some questions.

The length of the field was a challenge, with NextVR having to employ more cameras to cover the area. There were also resolution problems to consider, particularly when the ball was on the far side of the pitch.

"When the play was happening close to you, it was dynamiteit was like they were on your lap," Davies notes. "But when it was somewhat further away, because of the resolutions of the phone, it was very difficult to see the ball. I think that large playing field will require more resolution for people to see that."

Davies says he's keen on weaving in augmented reality elementshighlighting the ball or tracking player movements: "The way we're working around that is with additional cameras, tracking data and augmented reality to help you feel like you are part of the game.

"We can also integrate the linear broadcast into the VR with a Jumbotron,so if there is something that is particularly hard to see, then you can look at the screenjust as you would in the stadium."

The Clubs

For clubs like Bayern, with one of the largest and most engaged fanbases in football, the move into VR was a no-brainer. Stefan Mennerich, who heads up Bayern's digital media department, has been working on VR and 360-degree coverage with big success.

Mennerich sees VR as another avenue to bring fans together, particularly those who cannot get to matches at the Allianz Arena or live thousands of miles away in the U.S. or China, the two big target markets for the club.

In 2015, Mennerich began to see the benefits of VR after spending time at Facebook HQ and sampling the Oculus Rift, which is one of the market leaders in headsets.

"I thought that we would have to offer something like this because football lives off the possibility of fans taking part, and so I thought we have to do it,"Mennerich tells Bleacher Report. "I think VR is a very good way to let the fans take part in the event and emotions.

"I spoke to [NBA teams] the Orlando Magic and Golden State Warriors, and what they are doing is very forward-thinking, and we want to establish the same experience for our fans. But I can't say what financial effect it will have in the future. It is the same as with social media was in the beginning. You do it because it's fun, it has good content and the aim is to reach the fans."

Mennerich says the Bayern VR broadcast received encouraging feedback, though they may have been aided somewhat by the fact Bayern cantered to a 6-0 victory. While he remains cautious over the long-term viability of VR, he is optimistic for now.

"I think the first thing we have to do before making a decision is to wait until there is a big-enough audience to enjoy the content because not everyone has VR glasses or headsets," he says. "After that, once we bring in good content, we have to think about how we can monetize it."

The Experts

If Bayern need advice on monetizing VR, Brad Allen would be a good man to consult.

Spend five minutes talking to Allen, executive chairman of NextVR, and his passion for VR and sport is obvious. NextVRis one of the major players when it comes to live VR broadcastthere aren'tmany sports it hasn't shown in VR; they produced a highlights package on each game of the recent NBA Finals between Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors, while those without headsets could view highlights via the company's app. For Allen, this is one of the most exciting times in the business.

He believes VR will provide the perfect complementary form of coverage to live television and that the experience can be a highly engaged, social one.

"What you might see in the future is the chance to build your own luxury box outfitted with your team's gear, and you could invite all your friends," he says. "You look over there, and there are all your friends, avatars of them, or maybe they want to look like someone else, but you are all sitting there in the luxury box even though you are all sitting at home in your VR glasses."

Allen sees an e-commerce aspect coming into play, with the virtual suite offering up a chance to buy team merchandise, such as shirts and personalisation options. He accepts the world has changed dramatically in recent years and believes VR is a great way to bring new fans into the game.

"You have an aging population in some places and where maybe the millennials don't care as much because the amount of entertainment on offer is unprecedented, especially with esports and video games," he says."How do you bring those fans along?

"You can do it with new technology that is unique and different and appealing to them. That's why everyone is interested in this and connecting directly with their fans to give them an experience like nothing before."

Allen likens the scene to that of when cell phones first entered the market with the big, brick-like models. The emergence of Google's Daydream, the Samsung Gear and Facebook's constant investment means the importance of VR is not being lost on anybody. The technology is only going to get better.

"Goggles will move to glassesLG has already brought out its first version," Allen says. "I think they weigh 120 grams. They are tethered to your mobile device, but soon that will be Bluetooth, and all the power will be through the mobile device, and eventually the glasses will turn into something like Oakley wrap around glasses.

"They will have little ear buds that will come down so you get your audio, and eventually we'll have contact lenses. That will be bizarre because you are not going to know whether that person is watching something or talking to you.We've got the biggest companies in the world when you consider Google'sDaydream. They're probably going to be the biggest mobile winner in the space."

Allen talks of "a hundred companies in China" that are making headsets and believes it is only a matter of time before Apple enters the VR space.

But for all the technology and millions being spent, can VR ever compete with the real thingbeing at the game? How can it match the noise, the smells, the anticipation, the palpitations and the authentic matchday experience?

Can VR truly generate the stadium buzz so many football fans live for?

Perhaps not. But for those who live thousands of miles away from the stadium, it could be the ticket they have been waiting forbeing able to watch Manchester United from Macau, Bayern from Brisbane or Tottenham from Tahiti.

"I don't think anything can beat being there in person just because of the energy," Allen says."Youre high-fiving somebody next to you whom you didn'teven know because the team you're both fans of scored a goal. It really won't ever replace that.But what do you do about the 300 million fans who will never be able to get to the stadium? This is the closest thing they'll ever get to being there.

"We have a big strategy around Asia and China in particular; they are huge sports fans over there. People wake up at 3 a.m. to watch Premier League games because they are passionate fans like we all are."

Allen says a combination of geography and the difficulty of getting tickets to major games has driven demand for a more immersive TV viewing experience. "This is their answer. It's the virtual ticket to being there."

*All quotes and information obtained firsthand unless otherwise indicated.

Originally posted here:

EPL 2030: Sergio Aguero in Your Lounge - Future of Football and Virtual Reality - Bleacher Report

Imagine living in a city where every inch of public space is a portal into a different world. Instead of a local park, you have a role-playing arena where citizens dress up as survivalists on the hunt for island boar. The town hall doubles as an e-sports gaming arena where people take video-game classes instead of summer school. A gamer would die happy in the real world if they could wake up here in this virtual one.

But you dont have to imagine: Its called Taihu Mermaid Small Town.

Located on the outskirts of Shanghai, local governors in the Jiangsu province of WuXi are planning to build a literal virtual reality Westworld . Taihu will have five live-action role-play zones, a 48,000 square meter (517,000 square foot) stage area, a 71,200 sq m commercial plaza, and a digital-industry park for engineers, scientists, and R&D labs. Two more towns, Dong Hu and Beido Bay VR Village, have started similar projects, offering entrepreneurs incentives like rent-free offices, apartments, and startup capital. Taihu will cost upward of $20 billion yuan (USD$3 billion), and is part of a broader trend to take development outside of the already vibrant economic zones of Shenzhen and Shanghai and spread it further west.

In this way, China is future-proofing the country by dedicating entire towns to different emerging technologiesa move thats part marketing, part politics. New technologies such as artificial intelligence and virtual reality are developing by leaps and bounds said president Xi Jinping his 2016 B20 Summit keynote, and will be key to developing an innovative world society. Keeping to his word, Xi has increased funding opportunities in these areas, even surpassing the United States on funding AI research. If China can successfully corner the market on defining technologies of our time, it can get a leg up on the rest of the world.

That sprint has already begun. Facebooks $3 billion acquisition of Oculus VR in 2014 set off a virtual international space race, with the US and China taking the early lead. Chinas new VR towns signal their commitment to charging ahead, but the question is if they pull it off. For example, the technology needed for the arena-sized location-based gaming they promise at Taihu is not ready yet. And as one major hardware change can lead to an entire shift in the industry, its difficult to commit to multimillion-dollar infrastructure projects.

Its not just money they need to make it work: Its people, too. Large projects like these need storytelling soft skills and a cocktail of interdisciplinary talent to brainstorm what these towns would look like. A fully-functioning city will need an army of artists, researchers, designers, architects, writers, and a host of other specialties that probably havent been invented yet. Disney imagineers alone come from 140 different disciplines. Leading new location-based gaming companies like THE VOID, Spaces, and Nomadic have DreamWorks, Pixar, Google, and Industrial Light & Magic executives helming them.

And then theres the hardware. Although some of these VR towns have already launched, none have officially partnered with any leading headset manufacturers; HTC Vive is focusing on broader national objectives while the Facebook-owned Oculus Rift is banned in China. According to the Chinas president of HTC Vive, Alvin Graylin Wang, HTC has partnered with Chinas National Tourism Board to promote VR in China, but have no connections to these individual city-level projects. Thats because Wang is skeptical they will work: The people who are involved in it are not necessarily VR experts and are using it to sell more real estate or get more business interest, Wang says. But if you havent thought about how it flows into your daily lives, then it is probably not going to solve the issues.

The reality of these towns is currently far removed from what they promise. Right now, most of these towns are just empty rooms with headsets sprinkled around. Its a lot more buzz than it is real right now, he says. Trying to make every part of your life dedicated to VR technology is, again, a little too early. Maybe in 10 years or so it will make a little more sense.

Chinas VR cities arent the first industry-specific towns of their kind. Similar projects have been conducted with drone cities, and they are also shifting further and further into high-tech research and development with Lingang New City, a $5.6 billion, 133 sq km satellite city near Shanghai.

Wade Shepard, author of Ghost Cities of China, has been researching Chinas development models for the past decade. He has noticed a new pattern where the government invests in basic infrastructure then invites in niche markets that specialize in developing one kind of industry. A lot of these are the local governments pet projects, and they want them to get attention, so they build them to be different, to be extreme, Shepard says.

This often means that local governments have to promise a lot up front to get the ball rolling, and then hope they attract the right people along the way. For example, this model was used to develop the Chinese Medical City, 30 sq km north of the Yangtze River between Shanghai and Nanjing. The area was considered a backwater in 2005, but thanks to policies that allow CMC-based pharmaceutical companies to leapfrog multiple bureaucratic levels, they were able to get their drugs directly in front of the CFDA, Chinas drug regulation body.

State-level projects are not really allowed to fail, Shepard says. These new areas kind of become self-fulfilling prophecies. Developers and investors know that the projects will be successful because the central government wont allow them to fail, so they invest and ultimately make them successful. Ten years later, this ghost city is slowly filling up with business.

Its still too early to know if Taihu Mermaid Small Town will gain the traction it needs to survive. But if they can introduce policies that attract and retain technical and creative talent, China can strengthen its foothold over an increasingly virtual world.

They have a master plan, Shepard says. Whether it works or not is kind of a big question.

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Looking for Westworld? Head east - Quartz