Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion • Hacker News Board

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#81

Post by JumpCrisscross » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:03 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #40

kevinburke wrote: post #8

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. Magic Leap was always a much more difficult problem... they have to respond to a user's head movement, parse the scene the user is looking at (which could be anything), fig…

That's not the big unsolved problem with augmented reality. Those are all problems VR systems can already solve with enough money and transistors behind them. The AR big problem is displaying dark. You can put bright things on the display, but not dark ones. Microsoft demos their VR systems only in environments with carefully controlled dim lighting. The same is true of Meta. Laster just puts a dimming filter in fron…

> The AR big problem is displaying dark

What about those windows where, at a press of a button, they turn relatively opaque?

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#82

Post by dang » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:03 AM UTC

pmoriarty wrote: post #11

It's interesting just how many Magic Leap stories get posted to HN. In the last month or so I must have seen at least 3 stories about Magic Leap, but no other VR/AR technologies. I don't even remember the last time I saw a story on HN about Oculus, or Vive, or whatever the Sony Playstation VR product is called, nor about the Hololens. But the Magic Leap stories are popping up like mushrooms.

You'd be fine to post some :)

These things often come in clusters, though we usually penalize posts that are from a string of copycat or follow-up posts that don't add new information. I have the impression that this one does, though, albeit cribbed from a better source.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#83

Post by kirrent » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:05 AM UTC

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #24

kevinburke wrote: post #8

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. Magic Leap was always a much more difficult problem... they have to respond to a user's head movement, parse the scene the user is looking at (which could be anything), fig…

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. A bit of a tangent, but: for some people, it's impossible for VR to avoid making them feel sick. It's fundamental to them wearing a VR headset rather than a technical chall…

I've never met anyone who gets sick based entirely off vergence-accommodation conflict. I've certainly talked to people who claimed it was an issue but would happily go to a 3d film so I assume they were misattributing the cause of their sickness. Maybe having the peripherals line up for 3d films is enough.

I'd be interested to hear some testimonials on how it affects people though. One of the interesting things about VR is finding out the myriad of different ways people are sensitive to small phenomena.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#84

Post by ryanSrich » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:05 AM UTC

Ph0X wrote: post #46

Animats wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the big unsolved problem with augmented reality. Those are all problems VR systems can already solve with enough money and transistors behind them. The AR big problem is displaying dark. You can put bright things on the display, but not dark ones. Microsoft demos their VR systems only in environments with carefully controlled dim lighting. The same is true of Meta. Laster just puts a dimming filter in fron…

The part that's surprising to me is how instantly popular of a startup it became with so little information. Was this "demo" they gave so damn good that all the investors (some really reputable ones such as Google) started throwing money at it, without doing their research to see how real it was? Sounds very suspicious to me.

Especially considering the nightmare of a funding climate we have. Those demos must have been truly life altering to warrant the $500m in investment.

Profitable startups with hockey stick like growth can't even raise a couple million...damn.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#85

Post by foota » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:06 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #40

kevinburke wrote: post #8

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. Magic Leap was always a much more difficult problem... they have to respond to a user's head movement, parse the scene the user is looking at (which could be anything), fig…

That's not the big unsolved problem with augmented reality. Those are all problems VR systems can already solve with enough money and transistors behind them. The AR big problem is displaying dark. You can put bright things on the display, but not dark ones. Microsoft demos their VR systems only in environments with carefully controlled dim lighting. The same is true of Meta. Laster just puts a dimming filter in fron…

Why can't you "just" use a camera and project the light with "standard" vr technology?

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#86

Post by zardo » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:06 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #40

kevinburke wrote: post #8

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. Magic Leap was always a much more difficult problem... they have to respond to a user's head movement, parse the scene the user is looking at (which could be anything), fig…

That's not the big unsolved problem with augmented reality. Those are all problems VR systems can already solve with enough money and transistors behind them. The AR big problem is displaying dark. You can put bright things on the display, but not dark ones. Microsoft demos their VR systems only in environments with carefully controlled dim lighting. The same is true of Meta. Laster just puts a dimming filter in fron…

>Is there any AR headgear which displays the real world optically and can selectively darken the real world?

They've said they have a solution, and it's more optical illusion than optics. They don't darken the real world, but will make you perceive something similar.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#87

Post by partiallypro » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:10 AM UTC

aub3bhat wrote: post #48

Having used Microsoft HoloLens for more than a month. Microsoft is doing a disservice to a great product by dropping the ball on HoloLens compatible games & software. It has potential to greatly transform gaming. It ought to start dropping the price and releasing more titles.

I have also used HoloLens, and Microsoft is not targeting gamers right now. They want engineers etc, corporations and universities with deep pockets. IMO the FoV is too narrow for the consumer market/gamers at this time. It is perfect for what they are aiming at right now though.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#88

Post by flukus » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:11 AM UTC

pj_mukh wrote: post #36

Analemma_ wrote: post #10

Wow. So if Magic Leap is vaporware, does that leave Microsoft as the only ones publicly making progress in AR? Plenty of companies are shipping VR, but AR ends up being the future, HoloLens is building up quite a lead.

"Magic Leap is vaporware" Where are you getting that? The article seems to imply that feature to feature they are matching the Hololens and that is the worst case scenario. Edit: On second thought you maybe meeting the exact definition of Vaporware in that they are not manufacturing it yet[1]. No indication that they won't be able to though. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware

Microsoft has a product on sale, magic leap have a lot of big claims.

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#89

Post by kbenson » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:11 AM UTC

tedsanders wrote: post #65

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AR big problem is displaying dark. You can put bright things on the display, but not dark ones. There is actually a solution (EDIT: nope, see replies), but it's tricky: If you stack two sheets of polarizing filters on top of each other, then rotate them, you can get them to pass all light at 0 degrees rotation and block all light at 90 degrees rotation. It's like special paper that adjusts brightness depending on…

The problem with that solution is optical, I believe. It would work if you were able to put such a filter directly on your retina, but when you put it earlier in the path of the light, before images are focused, you cannot selectively block individual pixels as they appear on your retina. As a result, the dark spots will look blurry. (Also, if the pixels are dense enough I imagine you'll get diffraction.) Here's is M…

What about Near-Eye Light Field Displays[1][2]? From what I've seen those look to have promise in solving some focus problems and some of the problems with how cumbersome most VR/AR displays are. As a bonus, they can correct for prescriptions.

1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwCwtBxZM7g

2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hLzESOf8SE

Re: Magic Leap’s technology may be years away from completion

#90

Post by zardo » Fri, Dec 09, 2016, 3:15 AM UTC

code-monkey wrote: post #44

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So VR is hard enough - to avoid jitter that makes users feel sick you have to respond to a user's head movement, render a new frame with the new information the user should see, respond to any button presses, then draw the frame, in under 14-20ms. A bit of a tangent, but: for some people, it's impossible for VR to avoid making them feel sick. It's fundamental to them wearing a VR headset rather than a technical chall…

Technically this would be possible to overcome with a light field display. Light field displays are currently very far off from becoming commercially viable.

Well, wether to product is viable or not, that's what Magic Leap is trying to deliver.