CompTIA Executive Summary
Understanding Emerging Technology: Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality by Seth Robinson C utting-edge technology is often dismissed as a toy, something that creates novelty for consumers but does not have practical business use. Few new technologies fit this description better than virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). The video game industry has played a major role in embedding these trends into popular culture. VR in particular has been a long-standing goal, with systems such as the Sega VR headset, the Nintendo Virtual Boy and the Oculus Rift driving gamers closer and closer to fully immersive settings. On the AR front, Pokemon Go has become a primary example used when describing how AR allows for interaction with the surrounding environment. So, let’s define both VR and AR.
Defining Virtual Reality Most people have a fairly good
Defining Augmented Reality Rather than providing a completely immersive environment, the goal of augmented reality is to overlay images and information on a user’s physical surroundings. This can be done through wearables, such as Microsoft’s Hololens, or it can be done through the camera and screen of a smartphone or tablet. The type of information that can be displayed varies widely. Virtual furniture can be placed in a room, local retail or restaurant information can be displayed on a street scene,
understanding of what VR looks like. The first ingredient needed to create an immersive experience is a headset that encompasses the field of vision. The simplest VR applications, such as Google Cardboard, stop here but still provide some motion tracking through the sensors in the phone used as the display. More advanced VR systems, such as Oculus Rift or HTC Vive, provide much higher resolution and refresh rate in order to minimize disorientation. They also offer positional tracking beyond head movement to determine the location and movement of the user and to give them the ability to manipulate the environment with their hands. Of course, these improvements come at a cost. High-end VR systems are much more expensive and also require tethering to a PC or game console for heavy-duty processing.
or instructions can be given for a project the user is working on. As both VR and AR mature, the two will likely merge in applications that fall under the label mixed reality. With VR and AR being so closely related, many revenue forecasts present the two in combination. For example, IDC predicts that worldwide revenues for the VR/AR market will rise from $11.4 billion in 2017 to almost $215 billion in
2021. IDC expects the top industry use cases to be retail showcasing, onsite assembly and safety and process manufacturing training. In the short term, VR is expected to dominate the spending activity, but AR will soon take the lead. This revenue projection highlights the broader possibilities that AR brings to the table. Currently, people have an easier time imagining how VR might be used since it has a longer history. But thanks to ubiquitous networking and advances in personal devices, AR is just beginning to be viable. The opportunities to overlay information in a variety of settings will prove valuable to many companies.
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SPRING 2018 | CompTIAWorld
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