How I made a more accurate VR map
Virtual Reality is a groundbreaking technology and is by far one of the most mature emerging technologies out there. But there’s been no application of Virtual Reality into a problem that really solves a very important problem in the world.
It took me to storm when seeing companies like Nike investing in VR for trying out shoe sizes but not trying to invest in VR for accessible healthcare. Now my technical knowledge in Virtual Reality is much lower than, I need it to be.
So I tried to build a project that would help me get more technical abilities in VR while building that helps someone in some way, shape or form.
A VR map of Toronto.
Right now, presentations of maps in Virtual Reality are far from being accurate. Instead, they may seem very accurate in the sense of the esthetics of the building and monuments. But are far from accurate in the sense of measurements of distance.
Let’s break up how I might have hacked VR maps to be more accurate?
Using video and the magic of a cloud platform.
How do maps and visualization work in Virtual Reality right now?
At the moment all the maps in virtual reality, don’t have an accurate sense of direction. They’re always off by a certain distance or around 0.01 centimetres to 0.1 centimetres when used in actually real-world applications.
This means that if you were using a VR simulation which was used in simulating downtown Toronto. It could say the CN tower is 0.01 to 0.1 centimetres away. If VR were used on a day to day basis that’s way too much leeway for something which would be used in things such as hospitals.
Imagine if you were doing surgery and your surgeon was 0.01 centimetres to 0.1 centimetres off that could mean life or death.
There’s a cloud platform for everything…..
Right now, the best cloud platforms for the Virtual Reality models are RMS or a Reality Management System. It takes user data from VR apps and takes those 2D representations and interprets it has a 3D model.
Using this model you could make it easier for a VR program to interpret these assets.
You see right we give our VR applications 2-dimensional pictures as data through our videos and pictures. Now imagine if we could take these 2-dimensional pictures and visualize these pictures and videos as 3-dimensional pictures!
This could help make our VR application exponentially more accurate. Cause now instead of making a computer create a 3-dimensional visualization off of 2-dimensional visual data. You could create a 3-dimensional visualization off of 3-dimensional visual data.
This makes VR application even more accurate, but what makes VR applications even more accurate is using a 3-dimensional visualization of a video. FREAKING CRAZY RIGHT.
How’d I get this to work (Technical Juice!)
Most of the people I know in the Virtual Reality space told me, its a lot less theoretical in terms of technology. And I’m more of a developer than research… I hate research.
But I think to develop this technology, I had to get creative using a new tool. Most of the stuff in virtual reality has already been developed such as Unity, and all the other VR and AR kits. But I think that many of the limitations in Virtual Reality, are because it’s very little open-source and we assume the technology is already developing.
I added a 3D sphere object as an element and then added a video I took around downtown Toronto. And added a C# script to make it readable for an Oculus software and a Google Cardboard.
And added new angles and areas of reading the data.
Where do want to take this?
I try my very best to build everything using intention either for a more long term project I want to build or for me to build the skills necessary for a long term project I want to do.
I want to enhance the user interface for a site such as Yelp. Right now if you use the yelp on your phone it shows you the reviews of a website and on a 2-dimensional map. Which might not be the most helpful, if you’re someone like me who’s terrible at using Maps.
Instead what would be even better would be if you could have the ability to walk around a place like downtown Toronto and while you’re walking a VR world you could have a review at the website around you.
Using the virtual map I built of Toronto, I just need to build add the ability to add real-time reviews everywhere in my virtual map of Toronto.
This probably isn’t solving a huge problem, but that’s not my intention when building this. My intention when building this is to gain immense technical knowledge in this aspect of Virtual Reality and to build something myself and maybe a couple of other people would want.
