From: kpc@panix.com (Kevin Centanni)
Subject:  TECH: Report from a V.R. Show in N.Y.C., Feb 1992
Date: Thu, 6 Feb 92 15:55:43 EST



I though some of you might be interested in this:
 
I just came back from a virtual reality convention here in New York City.
It was sponsered by Media Dimensions, publishers of "Speech Technology"
and "International Voice Systems Review" magazines in conjunction with
Speech Tech/Voice Systems Worldwide '92: New York.

The show had about 15 exhibitors dealing with aspects of virtual reality...
some interesting ones:

-Reflection Technologies:  The Private Eye 

 This is an $800 device that consists of a headband with a small plastic
 box suspended about 3 inches in front of one of your eyes... as you look
 ahead, the image inside of the box is 'superimposed' over the real world.
 An interesting note:  Inside of the box is not a video screen.. it's a
 single row of L.E.D.'s and an oscillating mirror.. the display is VERY
 crisp and sharp.  It's available in OEM versions or with a PC-compatible
 card that emulates a CGA screen.  The resolution is 720 x 280.

-ISCAN:  Headhunter Head and Eye Tracking System

 ISCAN makes a series of head and eye tracing devices.  Most of them are
 pretty expensive ( $20,000 - $30,000 ).  At this show, though, the ISCAN
 people were showing off a compact system for detecting eye positioning -
 the interface hardware was contained on a card inside of a PC... the user
 was wearing a helmet and looking through a dichroic mirror... there was
 a video monitor showing his field of view.  On the monitor was a small
 white dot - this was showing WHERE the user was looking.  I'm told that
 this system will sell for approx. $6000.

-Mandala

 This is a compnay from Canada that makes an Amiga-based system.  There are
 no eyephones or helmets - you stand in front of a blue screen and a camera
 is pointed at you... you are then superimposed over Amiga graphics and/or
 video from a laserdisc.  The computer is tracking a silouhette of your
 body as you move around the screen.  The developer, Vincent John Vincent,
 has a couple of cute demos... in one, you can 'play' a set of virtual
 drums; in another, you can play 'catch' with another player.

-BattleTech Center

 There was a booth from Virtual World Entertainments, Inc., creators of
 BattleTech Center in Chicago.  Not much more than a few pictures and
 some brochures and literature.  (Has anyone played BattleTech????)

-Straylight Corp. - PhotoVR

 "PhotoRealism Meets VR On The Desktop" is what the flyer says... this
 company's technology uses Intel DVI boards to display above-average
 quality images.  Eyephones are used, although the tracking and response
 time was exceptionally slow.  It was kinda cute and easy to deal with
 for most of the people I watched...  seems like it might lend itself to
 more of a mass-market type of application.

-Latent Image Development Corp.

 A rather 'strange' guy was at this booth (the pres. of Latent Image),
 showing off some SEGA active LCD shutter glasses and a REAL OLD VHS 
 machine hooked to a color monitor.  His company does 'patented' b/w
 to color and 2D to 3D conversions. Interesting (?)

-Crystal River Engineering:  The Convolvotron

 This PC board set delivers 3D sound over headphones.  Scott Foster and
 Beth Wenzel (from NASA-Ames Research Center) had eyephones set up showing
 a crude virtual world.  This interesting part was the sounds... as you
 navigated through the room, there were objects floating and moving in
 space.  There was a saxaphone, a bi-plane circling the room, a martini
 glass (with the sound of a man reading a novel inside), and a hi-hat
 percussion instrument.  As you approached these objects, the sounds
 of the objects were being manipulated and synthesized by the 
 Convolvotron, creating a 3D audio effect.  Doppler shift was included
 on the plane's sounds.. it was rather impressive.

There were a bunch of other booths there - mostly related to speech
recognition and such...  Raymond Kurzweil was there with one of his
speech companies.  And, tonight at the Limelight (a church-turned-disco
here in Manhattan), is "Beyond 2000" - A look at 21st Century Fashion,
Sytle, and Ideas (!).  There are supposed to be v.r. performances and
stuff. (A good excuse to go out on the company's expense account).

Kevin P. Centanni
Corporate Communication Group
212.268.2100
kpc@panix.com       {cmcl2,apple}!panix!kpc