Oculus Rift and DCS World Discussion

[Enduro14]

Actually Wags has said allot if you put in context to how much communication actually comes from the devs. VR will be a failure in DCS unless they do come out with a perfect seperate menu for VR specific settings in DCS. Hope they time it right as in two weeks it will be on the street.

[SDsc0rch]

That's my thinking, too.

 

What's the point of having hand tracking if there is nothing solid to touch?

 

Now that is an immersion breaker if you ask me. Might as well use a mouse.

 

 

having anything less than a real aircraft to sit in is "an immersion breaker"

 

at some point there will ALWAYS be something to remind you that you are in a simulation

 

the trick is, find what works for you..

[Johnny Dioxin]

Well I was just referring to what had been said ;)

[DerekSpeare]

I'm very much in favor of the split screen setup where all of the menu interfacing takes place on the main screen and the flying take place on the HMD. I currently turn off the oculus and do my planning/setup on the main screen. Then I exit out, turn on the Oculus and fly. VR folks should have this option available to them to use if they wish.

 

This is, in fact, what it was like when ED rolled out VR for DCS very early on. I know things have changed a lot...but...

[cichlidfan]

having anything less than a real aircraft to sit in is "an immersion breaker"

 

at some point there will ALWAYS be something to remind you that you are in a simulation ...

 

Yep. When your significant other taps you on the shoulder and reminds you that it is trash night, it doesn't matter how 'immersive' your setup is. :lol:

[Frusheen]

I'm very much in favor of the split screen setup where all of the menu interfacing takes place on the main screen and the flying take place on the HMD. I currently turn off the oculus and do my planning/setup on the main screen. Then I exit out, turn on the Oculus and fly. VR folks should have this option available to them to use if they wish.

 

This is, in fact, what it was like when ED rolled out VR for DCS very early on. I know things have changed a lot...but...

 

I think the reason that was able to work was due to the game interface and the game itself being two different executables. That has changed since 1.5. It was also before the move to direct mode rendering. I liked it as well. It was very convenient that way.

 

If the game interface as it exists now was made a little bigger and fixed in space with the ability to lean in it may be good enough. We won't know for sure how readable it will be until we experience the increased resolution of the consumer headsets though.

[Johnny Dioxin]

Don't know if this has been posted:

 

https://youtu.be/1b9NSdT8hRU

 

but I just found it and I really enjoyed it! This guy is ace!

 

The longer you watch, the more you chuckle ;)

 

You capitalist hypocrites!

 

Oh - and here's the update:

 

https://youtu.be/UwlAtxWoj-w

Edited March 11, 2016 by Brixmis
update

[Chivas]

Yes, that is all correct.

 

What you said previously, (which is what I quoted), was incorrect. Which is why I quoted it and clarified that it was incorrect.

 

 

 

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chivas

Tracking in the HMD took over when you looked too far behind, and lost camera tracking

 

 

How is that wrong. If the HMD loses Camera tracking, all that's left is the internal headset tracking to determine headset position.

[average_pilot]

having anything less than a real aircraft to sit in is "an immersion breaker"

 

at some point there will ALWAYS be something to remind you that you are in a simulation

 

the trick is, find what works for you..

To me "immersion" is a myth. You can't really fool yourself consciously to that level no matter how good is the software and hardware. It's more about being so focused on a task that you forget about your surroundings. And you don't need much to achieve that. Just my opinion anyhow.

 

Regarding using VR in simulations, what really attracts me that much is that it's a huge step forward to interface the simulation in a natural way. VR HMD's like the rift or the vive are the first step in that direction. No more little window sitting on a desk. No more tricky head tracking to move a camera using the neck. Just your head inside the cockpit. The rest of the body will come. Not sure how, though.

[DerekSpeare]

BoxxMann's thoughts on the Leap

 

Here's my report:

 

The Leap was easy to setup and get going. I installed the Orion package. All was straightforward. Anyone who has basic knowledge of Windows software installation procedures and UI configuration menus will not have any trouble. First was the calibration, and it went easily. Leap has a preview mode where you can see your hands as it sees them. It uses an IR camera to do the magic. After a few minutes of fiddling I went straight away into FlyInside for FSX (the latest version we have)

 

Dan's implementation of Leap is really great. I was wondering what I needed to do once it fired up, but there were my hands. I didn't need to do anything other than have the Leap connected for FI to use the Leap. Dan has already included an IR camera passthrough as well, so mashing a button brings up an IR view of your particular world. That's really cool and was unexpected. And no Vive required!

 

Humans have been relying on texture and relative proximity of objects when interacting with the world around them since we've been humans. The very physical nature of everything is something we never consider but controls every aspect of our existence.

 

We've been interacting with computers no differently, really. Our impulses to create inputs into our computers gives us very real physical feedback. Typing this is one example! When we're driving, flying or anything, we rely on physical cues controlling our behaviour at any point in time.

 

We interact with so many objects in life without seeing them, but touch is what our brains expect to sense when we do. When we go to start our car we put in the key and turn the ignition, know what it feels like to perform the act, and take off for our excursion, never really conscious of of the feel of the many physical things we touched. We rarely - if ever - need to see it to do so.

 

But what if we didn't receive any tactile cues? What if there was "nothing" really there and you went through the motions, trusting that your hand was in the right place and your conditioned car starting muscle memory acted properly? And say the car started. You'd have to take it on faith that all is "normal", in a relative sense at least. We'd have to make conscious decisions to accept matters, and a conscious "awareness" of interaction is something our brains are not often prone to expect to be required to do.

 

This is what it's like using the Leap. You can see your virtual hand and you can see the interaction, but the lack of tactile feedback makes it quite unrealistic to use and believe - FOR ME. That we often don't look at objects with which we interact makes it doubly hard to consider the Leap to be anything more than a novelty at this point in time. Surely I agree that there are relevant uses of it right now with many aspects of computing, but those who are into gaming and want instant tactile feedback when interacting with their virtual world should look at keeping what they have now.

 

My personal example of simply reaching down to throw the landing gear lever was telling enough for me. In a real plane you just do it. I didn't have that success and confidence in my pretend plane when I tried to do the same. While Dan's implementation is fantastic, and the Leap may have other value, for cockpit games it's got a long way to go. Maybe one day an electrical field of some sort will be invented so that it creates a pseudo-real environment of "electrical texture" that gives physical sensations of virtual objects in the open spaces of our physical worlds. Maybe one day!

 

Details to purchase:

 

The Leap Orion Software is here if anyone else has interest: https://developer.leapmotion.com/get-started

The Leap VR Developer Mount is from Leap here: http://store-us.leapmotion.com/products ... oper-mount

I purchased the Leap from a HK seller on ebay here (arrived in just about 14 days): http://www.ebay.com/itm/271221480224?_t ... EBIDX%3AIT

[S3NTRY11]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chivas

Tracking in the HMD took over when you looked too far behind, and lost camera tracking

 

 

How is that wrong. If the HMD loses Camera tracking, all that's left is the internal headset tracking to determine headset position.

It flat-out stops working. The end.

 

There's no hand-off to internal sensors. It just stops.

 

You can be seriously obtuse when you want to be.

[average_pilot]

From Oculus' Documentation ( https://developer.oculus.com/documentation/intro-vr/latest/concepts/bp_app_tracking/ ):

 

First, users can leave the viewing area of the tracking camera and lose position tracking, which can be a very jarring experience. (Orientation tracking operates inside and outside the camera’s tracking range, based on the proprietary IMU technology, which has carried over from DK1 to complement new camera-based orientation and positional tracking.)

[Chivas]

From Oculus' Documentation ( https://developer.oculus.com/documentation/intro-vr/latest/concepts/bp_app_tracking/ ):

 

Thanks pilot, saved me some time looking it up.:) I knew there was internal tracking, and my DK2 didn't stop tracking when I checked my six, I never even noticed any judder when the camera kicked back in.

 

edit...this begs the question if IMU tracking are in hand trackers, or could be put into the hand trackers to alleviate the moments when the hand trackers are occluded. And don't kid ourselves as both tracking systems have occlusion problems. Although size, weight, and data transfer issues could make internal tracking in the hand trackers a non starter.

Edited March 12, 2016 by Chivas

[hansangb]

It flat-out stops working. The end.

 

There's no hand-off to internal sensors. It just stops.

 

You can be seriously obtuse when you want to be.

 

 

S3NTRY11,

It would be easy to say "You're completely wrong. The end." But I won't.

 

Ahh, what the hell, I'll say it! :D

 

methinks, you do owe him an apology.

[Frusheen]

I've used several VR apps such as the cinema player from my seat at my PC while my camera was well out of range at my separate DCS flight seat. Orientation tracking still works fine (like dk1) but obviously positional tracking doesn't.

[S3NTRY11]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chivas

Tracking in the HMD took over when you looked too far behind, and lost camera tracking

 

 

How is that wrong. If the HMD loses Camera tracking, all that's left is the internal headset tracking to determine headset position.

You were right, I was wrong. Tracking is continued outside the frustum in DCS.

 

I apologise for stating something that was not correct, as fact.

[Chivas]

You were right, I was wrong. Tracking is continued outside the frustum in DCS.

 

I apologise for stating something that was not correct, as fact.

 

No problem mate, things are changing so fast its hard to keep up with it. Its not like I've never been wrong. :)

[S3NTRY11]

No problem mate, things are changing so fast its hard to keep up with it. Its not like I've never been wrong. :)

I tested myself because I was that sure it no longer tracked at all.

 

Ouch.

 

It's so jarring that when it's happened in the past, my brain just said "lost tracking", without realising that I'd only lost transpositional movement.

 

And I've just held onto that. To a fault, evidently.

 

Goes to show how important 6DOF really is in VR.

[S3NTRY11]

In case you guys are like me and only look at the VR section Wags just posted a great update below:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=162487

Thanks for the heads-up!

[gtrdrt]

...things are changing so fast its hard to keep up with it.

 

Have things changed to the point where the ability to use the latest Oculus runtime -- in Windows10 -- with any of the the newer DCS versions -- and an nVidia driver that works well -- is possible yet? That's the change I'd sure like to keep up with.:)

[S3NTRY11]

I'd like to know whether the pointer implementation is abstracted to the point you could use something like Leap Motion to interact with the cockpit, or mod the support in somehow for future peripherals, like gloves.

[Elo001]

Anybody have any tips for performance gains? Even on my DK2 I'm already dropping below 75 regularly when flying low, I don't see how anybody will be able to run DCS in the CV1 with an even higher framerate and resolution

[ariyaner]

Anybody have any tips for performance gains? Even on my DK2 I'm already dropping below 75 regularly when flying low, I don't see how anybody will be able to run DCS in the CV1 with an even higher framerate and resolution

 

 

where is the problem with running under 75 frames ?

25 frames are still enough

and i havent seen more then 37 frames in dk2 i mean

[Frusheen]

Anybody have any tips for performance gains? Even on my DK2 I'm already dropping below 75 regularly when flying low, I don't see how anybody will be able to run DCS in the CV1 with an even higher framerate and resolution

 

Wait for the update. Hopefully that will give us a performance boost. For now all settings on low, HDR, blur, etc off and shadows off is the best you can hope for.

[Frusheen]

where is the problem with running under 75 frames ?

25 frames are still enough

and i havent seen more then 37 frames in dk2 i mean

 

Then you haven't really experienced proper VR which requires 75fps constant. You'll know what the problem is with lower frame rates once you've experienced tracking with low persistence.