OMNI May 19, 2020 - VR Edition
Virtual Reality’s impact on the world
VR in Gaming VR in Medicine VR in Museums 1
Implementing VR in Medicine
VIRTUAL VIRTUAL REALITY REALITY 2
Implementing VR in Medicine
TABLE OF C ONTENTS
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Virtual reality in the medicine
Virtual reality in musuems
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March 16, 2020 Originally published at onix-systems.com.
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irtual reality (VR) and its cousin, augmented reality (AR), are emerging in the healthcare field as a high-tech solution for improving medical education. Medical staff are continually learning throughout their lifetime of work. Today, with medical tools undergoing revolutionary upgrades faster than ever before, it is critical for these professionals to stay up to date with innovations. If ignored, that growing gap in knowledge hampers their ability to provide proper services to their patients. This is where AR/VR applications are expected to be most beneficial. Using virtual reality for medical training has great potential. Will it replace traditional training soon, or is this only wishful thinking?
Why Use VR for Medical Training? Modern VR training, although widely regarded as beneficial for education, is still somewhere between excitement and skepticism. It is easy to understand the latter, since many medical professionals were trained using traditional methods and are more comfortable with these methods despite their limitations. Others point at successful implementations of VR in the cultural field. For example, it’s now possible for an entire class 6
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of students to visit the Louvre from any wherein the world or to go on a virtual ‘field trip’ inside the human body. What was once considered impossible has now become possible in our virtual world. The advances of VR in learning and training allow students and specialists to train in a more enjoyable and engaging way. New skills are acquired and honed through practice in interactive and safe virtual environments. Students don’t even require an instructor because instructions and tips are built inside the VR app. However, students’ performance in this virtual world still needs to be analyzed and evaluated by a specialist. Medical schools can benefit from adopting augmented and virtual reality for medical training programs. For example, VR simulations allow for exploring the human body without endangering patients. A scarcity of subjects to practice on can often result in a situation
where students could only practice once or twice before needing to perform a real surgical procedure. Virtual environments provide students with the valuable ability to explore, make mistakes, and learn from them. In addition, students can repeat these procedures multiple times and that’s difficult to accommodate in a traditional school of medicine.
interaction and provide a valuable view of real-world experiences. This makes tasks easier to grasp and creates a level of interest that textbooks or tests struggle to do. VR helps keep medical training formalized, ensuring a stable level of performance quality, while establishing standardized skills set for medical specialists.
VR medical training doesn’t replace traditional training, but it provides an important edge. It can present sophisticated concepts through visualization and
Visualising the brain in VR
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The rise of Covid-19 has forced cultural institutions to explore alternative digital spaces with online exhibitions and a rise in virtual reality
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Laura Feinstein 8 April 2020
There were times when museums were more static and less creative. Now they try to create the most interactive space possible to impress their visitors. Originally published on www.jasoren.com/vr-in-museums/
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t’s a terrible time for going out. Since the emergence of Covid-19 and resulting self-quarantine, thousands of museums, cultural institutions, festivals and global happenings have temporarily shuttered operations, leaving behind empty streets and a restless public. In a sector that thrives on in-person connection, the loss of an audience is disastrous, yet resilient performers, institutions, galleries, even entire art fairs, are moving to the digital arena, using streaming services and virtual reality, manifesting live concerts on the gaming app Twitch, organizing Instagram dance parties and launching online-only spaces.
the “ultimate empathy machine” but despite an initial burst of interest in 2015 during the launch of the Oculus Rift headset, immersive media have primarily remained niche.
During his popular 2015 Ted Talk, the immersive artist, entrepreneur and director Chris Milk suggested that virtual reality could someday become
The last few weeks have seen livestreaming performances of the Metropolitan Opera and the Cleveland Inner City Ballet to an intimate St
“In AR and AV, much of the work is driven by democratizing possibilities, but it is now possible to reach beyond traditional structures and reach different audiences.” -Daniel Birnbaum of AcuteArt Photo originally published on www.factor-tech.com/3d-modelling/8661-virtual-reality-museum-brings-art-and-artefacts-to-the-world/
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Patrick’s Day show from the Boston punk band Dropkick Murphys, with additional groups creating worlds specifically for VR. It is now even possible to take a virtual walk through the New York Botanical Garden’s spring bloom-scape. The pandemic, incredibly, is ushering in a golden age of virtual media, making good on the initial promise of digital, while offering new life and unprecedented access to some of the world’s cultural touchstones, some previously financially or physically inaccessible. While the world has never felt more physically isolated, digital media have offered a bridge, as well as an Now, with social exciting range of distancing, the experiences. technology is When the Google experiencing Arts & Culture something of a initiative first renaissance. launched in 2011, it had modest ambitions. Today, thousands of users each month virtually explore treasures from the Uffizi Galleries to the Guggenheim, leading to a boom in arts-leaning VR projects. This has included the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s award-winning video series, the Met 360 Project, that invites viewers to
explore the Temple of Dendur, among other attractions, using spherical 360° technology created by the celebrated producer Nina Diamond. Recently, the digital team reported a 4,106% growth in streaming viewership, with YouTube video views up 150%, and both socials and the website experiencing significant increases in engagement. The New York Public Library and the 92nd Street Y previously enjoyed modest success with their digital efforts but, since Covid-19, have gained new audiences with dynamic initiatives, shifting discussions with celebrated culture figures to YouTube and introducing free online tutoring for students. In Vienna, an ambitious campaign has put almost “This is just the all of the city’s beginning of a cultural treasures new era of online, from experiencing the Belvedere art through to the State digital realms.” Opera, which currently offers selections from its archive of video performances as well as a VR/360degree experience, recently gaining 130,000 new registrations on the opera’s streaming platform and apps. The past month’s most discussed virtual project has been Art Basel’s Online Viewing Rooms, which proved so popular when it launched that the site crashed. Already scheduled before the outbreak, its debut was fasttracked in response to the Hong Kong fair’s cancellation, explained Marc Spiegler, global director of Art Basel: “It became clear this was something we needed to accelerate and expand.” The virtual fair, which features 234 galleries and a combined 2,100 works, with perks like ZoomRoom, which enables galleries and artists to walk through viewing areas with potential
“I wanted to fuse together and expand the idea of art in the VR space. It’s also a way of future-proofing the museum.” -Peter Martin Originally published on newsroom.cisco.com/feature-content?type=webcontent&articleId=1878909
collectors, appeared to be the most logical response to the unprecedented disruption. David Zwirner Gallery, the first to launch online rooms in 2017, has also seen an uptick in digital interest both on its viewing room platform, David Zwirner Online, and podcast Dialogues. “Online exhibitions can do things that brick-and-mortar exhibitions can’t,” explained Lucas Zwirner, head of content. “They can embed videos, longer excerpts of art-historically relevant material, and artist-created content.” Like any medium, he noted, the online space becomes as meaningful and as fruitful as we are thoughtful in the ways we approach it. “That has been the goal – to come up with something that is effective for reaching collectors and the art world at large, but also appeals
to artists because it is contextual, art historic and elegant.” Taking a similar strategy is Pace Gallery, whose roster includes leading tech-influenced artists like Trevor Paglen and teamLab. The gallery began exploring online viewing room platforms last year as part of a major redesign to their website. “Our hope for these online exhibitions is to use the voices of our dealers and curatorial team to create multi-media environments that really invoke an artist and the context in which they were making their work,” said Marc Glimcher, CEO of Pace Gallery. “Covid-19 has made the push much more urgent,” said Daniel Birnbaum of AcuteArt, which brings together international artists, new media and technology to produce works in VR, augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR), explaining that 11
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5 Key Properties of Good VR Learning Experiences VR Edu Apps Should Have the Following Properties: Immersive. Designers should strive to create the feeling that users are in an experience. For example, if you develop a history app, make history come alive for students. Easy To Use. Eliminate the need to have special skills to interact with a VR app. Meaningful. Meaning is really important for students. You can’t create a good VR learning experience without a good story. That’s why it so important to advance the art of storytelling. Stories quite simply provide the best vehicle for delivering messages that are not only heard and understood, but that also inspire and elicit action. Adaptable. As Albert Einstein once said, “I never teach my pupils, I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” VR experiences should allow students to explore at their own pace. The app should provide complete control over the level of difficulty. Designers should establish how students learn and then use this knowledge to design VR products that allow effective learning. Measurable. Each educational tool should provide measured impact. Teachers should be able to track the metrics of education so they can measure the resulting knowledge of a subject. When designing experiences for VR education, it’s essential to choose appropriate metrics and make it clear what criterium will be used to measure success and failure. 12
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many technologies in prototype have been bumped up to help deal with widespread user demand. Birnbaum, the former director of the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, explained that a move toward digital was inevitable, with or without Covid, but has been surprised at the stunning speed of adaptation. Currently his team has been working with Brian Donnelly, AKA Kaws, on a new type of AR that enables you to place yourself inside immersive environments through the use of an app that has already been downloaded by millions. “It’s an extraordinary thing, that in the middle of a total global crisis, when every museum and every public art institution in the world closes down, and no one can travel, we launched a blockbuster,” he mused, explaining that in his past life it was far more difficult to reach audiences of this size and diversity.
“I’ve found that so many who didn’t have any interest in virtual reality are now keen on understanding its capabilities,” said the CEO and founder of Emblematic Group and “Godmother of virtual reality” Nonny de la Peña. De la Peña, who has worked with global journalistic institutions, includ-ing the Guardian, to bring digital stories to life, demonstrated over Google Hangouts a new project she created for SXSW that permits users to place themselves inside worlds of their creation using Reach, a software program, and a button-based system of De la Peña’s design. “The first initial wave of interest is organizations that are either seeking to create virtual gatherings, because important milestones are suddenly being taken away, and our ability to celebrate together, to organizations that are being asked to do this who desperately need our help to help them get to that point,” she
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explained. “I still think people are just starting to scan the landscape.” “Before Covid-19, the digital space was almost always treated as an afterthought for expanding an audience beyond the reach of physical spaces,” said the digital strategist JiaJia Fei, the consulting director of digital at the Jewish Museum in New York. She explained that cultural programming was usually designed, first and foremost, for an in-person
audience or on-site experience, and later translated online through a video recording or series of images on the web for documentation purposes. “Now that physical spaces are no longer the priority, the cultural sector is rushing to adapt events, exhibitions and experiences for an entirely digitalfirst audience.” She pointed out that achieving this requires an eye toward egalitarianism: almost everyone has a mobile phone and computer at
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home, but very few have traditional VR headsets, which points to a rise in 360 video, Google cardboard, and conferencing tools that can easily be streamed at home. “For digital innovators, this is our moment to push the limit of our creative and technical vision, and a chance to openly experiment,” said Fei. “For everyone else, it’s a crash course in digital marketing triage.” Article originally published on The Guardian
A look inside the new virtual game “Orion13.” (Courtesy of Metro VR Studios)
Put on the Headset: You’re on a dark city street below glittering skyscrapers. Look down and there’s your body, your robotic hands and metallic feet. Look up and there’s a neon pink enemy charging at you. You strike first, your real hands transformed into virtual weapons. The enemy robot goes down in a flare of light. Take off the headset: You’re sitting on the couch in the living room. Sunlight pours in through the window. For decades, this kind of fully immersive experience has been the promise of virtual
reality gaming. Instead of watching stories play out, you can live them. And in the last few years, those visions have started to become reality. But some say VR gaming hasn’t lived up to its potential yet. “2020 is once again being declared to be VR’s make-orbreak year,” says Robert Morgan, who creates VR games and experiences. ““2020 is once again being declared to be VR’s make-or-break year,” says Robert Morgan, who creates VR games and experiences. “ 15
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the beef?” he says. “Where’s the real meat? So I set out to make the kind of games I like to play.” Matalon says he was looking for a game that combines combat with problem solving in a big, open world ripe for virtual exploration. He and his co-founder Michael Clebnik thought they could build that game on an “indie budget,” working out of MatA look inside the new virtual game “Orion13.” (Courtesy of Metro VR alon’s basement and Clebnik’s modern house in the suburbs Studios) of Boston. Both pioneers of the early internet — Matalon deattract people to buy the gear. says Robert Morgan, who creates VR games and expe- All that money has led to a lot of signed websites for bands such as Aerosmith and The Rolling riences. “ “Now, people have content. You can play VR Fruit Stones, and together they startbeen saying that since roughly Ninja, solve puzzles with “Doctor ed an early e-commerce site 2014.” Who” and battle alongside Mar- — they couldn’t resist the pull of Virtual reality has existed in one vel heroes like Spiderman. One VR. popular game is just a simulaform or another for decades. tion of basic office tasks. “I’ve been a gamer Since the term was coined in the 1980s, VR has been used to Still, Nielsen data shows fewmy entire life,” Mattrain pilots, assist doctors and er than 6 million VR headsets alon says. “But this help patients with PTSD, and were shipped last year, barely the number of applications just more than in 2018. That’s just a allows you to be a keeps growing. fraction of the tens of millions character in a game of traditional gaming consoles But the era of modern VR gaminstead of manipuing started just about a decade sold each year. And the total amount of money invested in VR lating a character ago. And in 2014, Facebook has dropped in recent years. made a $3 billion bet on VR on screen.” when it purchased the headset Scott Matalon says that’s beHe says VR gaming is worlds manufacturer Oculus. cause the games just aren’t away from regular gaming — good enough yet. “Oculus has definitely become the difference between watchkind of the Kleenex of virtual ing “Friends” on the television He’s co-founder of Metro VR reality,” Morgan says. and sitting on the couch at Studios, a small, independent studio that just released a game Central Perk between Ross and As investors poured hundreds called “Orion13,” set in the afore- Rachel. of millions of dollars into VR, Facebook put its own cash into mentioned robot world. “When you play a regular PC funding games in the hopes “Especially in the beginning, my game you’re driving [the charthat better experiences might acter] around,” he says. “Even reaction [to VR] was, where’s 16
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when you’re in first person, it’s still on your PC screen. You look around, and there’s your roommate eating crackers. [But] when you put on that headset you’re completely immersed in a world … you can be anywhere.” In “Orion13,” the character whose body you step into is the game’s eponymous combat robot. Her memory implants have malfunctioned, and she’s now self-aware. Your job is to hack and slash through a dystopian city full of unfriendly robots — and solve a few puzzles — to get her “home.” To an observer, “Orion13” looks a little like Wii Tennis on steroids. Swing your arm out farther in
the real world, and Orion13’s sword will deal greater damage. And with enemies coming at you from all directions, a stroll through the virtual world turns into a very real workout. But the intensity of the gameplay brings up one tricky question: What’s the real-life effect of virtual reality violence? Seth Mantie, a Metro VR Studios producer who works with Matalon and Clebnik, points out that research has shown no evidence linking real-life violence to traditional video games. Still, experts have raised concerns about violence in VR.
“Fantasies involving violence are likely to be more damaging in an immersive setting than they are in a video,” Thomas Metzinger, a philosopher at Johannes Gutenberg University in Germany, told New Scientist. “There is a danger of people getting used to not only observing but also carrying out such acts, because they are embodied in an avatar.” “Orion13” is unlikely to draw criticism on that front. The heroine’s primary weapon is a
Michael Clebnik, Scott Matalon and Seth Mantie worked together to make the VR game “Orion13.” (Allison Hagan/Here & Now) 17
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sword, and enemies absorb the cartoonish blows with special effects in a dizzying array of colors until they collapse bloodlessly — they are robots, after all. But Clebnik does think some VR games push the limit of gratuitous gore. He says developers should be conscious of what they’re building, for exactly the same reason that VR is appealing. “It’s spectator sport versus participant sport,” he says. “Participant sport” is an accurate way to describe the game he’s developed. “Orion13” is an experience that makes you forget where you are in the real world. But is that enough? Clebnik and Matalon have high hopes that the game may turn a profit. Still, Metro VR faces the same challenges that have plagued the fledgling industry since its inception — namely, the barriers that keep less-than-hardcore gamers from committing to VR.
“It does change where you are in the room … and it is a little uncomfortable,” he says. “What we’ve seen is the more time people spend in the environment, the more comfortable they become with it.” And there’s the inconvenience. You can’t scroll through Facebook while you’re in the middle of a simulated fantasy world. (Not yet, anyway.) “There’s a friction to stepping into virtual reality,” VR writer Morgan says. “When you’re trying to sell entertainment products for people to use at home, the fact that they go into their space helmet and they can’t see their dog or their beer
or their family, it’s a major factor that reduces the appeal of these types of experiences.” Clebnik agrees. He points to the failure of the Google Daydream, a VR-via-cellphone headset that the company discontinued last year. A Google spokesperson told The Verge the product wasn’t as successful as the company had hoped. “Most notably, asking people to put their phone in a headset and lose access to the apps they use throughout the day causes immense friction,” the spokesperson said. But Matalon says that distance from the real world is the whole point. “I think what we’ve seen is people want more interaction with their content,” he says. “Movies have gotten longer. They include all the extras and the backstory.”
First, there’s cost: Many VR headsets require a gaming laptop in addition to the gear, which can easily add up to more than $1,000. Then there’s the nausea and physical discomfort you might experience when you put the headset on. Clebnik says some people are more tolerant than others.
Here & Now’s Peter O’Dowd taking his first swing at virtual reality with the new “Orion13” game. (Allison Hagan/Here & Now) 18
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A “Lord of the Rings” fan, Matalon says, “The day it comes out on VR, I’m going to buy it because I want to stand on the wall at Helm’s Deep and look out at 10,000 orcs in front of me.” Matalon may be right. There are signs that 2020, if not the makeor-break year for VR, could still move the goalposts. Oculus and Valve, another headset manufacturer, both sold out of some models over the holidays, with shipping delays of more than a month. And the Oculus sales were driven by its newest headset, the Oculus Quest. Unlike other models, the Oculus Quest doesn’t require a gaming laptop or a console. You just slide on a headset and slip into another world. Standalone gear like the Quest made up half of all headset sales last year, compared to just 20% the year before, according to Nielsen data. Bringing down the barrier to entry could mean a lot more people give VR a try, even casual gamers. Clebnik thinks that’s how VR will really take off. “The more people try it,” he says, “the more people put on a headset for the first time, they’ll say, ‘Wow. This is like nothing else. There’s nothing else like this.’
Scott Matalon showing host Peter O’Dowd how to operate handheld VR controllers. (Allison Hagan/Here & Now)
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