Coolest Immersive Announcements at CES 2020
Consumer Electronics Show or CES 2020, the world’s largest technology conference took place last week from the 7th to the 10th. We were happy to learn that like last year, there has been an impressive collection of AR, VR and MR technologies on display, among other innovative and bizarre things… from faux pork to Mercedes’ avatar themed car!
Thanks to advances in 5G and AI technologies, Volumetric Videos have immense potential, as demonstrated by tech giants Sony and Intel:
Sony not only unveiled its electric car concept, Vision-S, with its 33 sensors and 360 Reality Audio, which gained everyone’s attention, but they showcased their new Eye-sensing Light Field Display, perfect for showing Volumetric content. The Sony booth also featured a Virtual Production set, captured as photo-realistic Volumetric data. Virtual production allows the viewer to experience the scene as if they are really there, and provides creative flexibility where film production can take place at any time.
Intel demonstrated software that can replace multiple cameras at sporting events, with high-quality, cloud-based, streaming Volumetric Video at 30 frames per second. Intel said it was now working on improving quality and increasing the factor of viewing a single player from 20 yards to six yards. Volumetric video is transforming the sports-viewing experience by enabling viewing without limitations.
Along with the usual MR glasses to LED displays and VR headsets, Mixed reality itself was used to enable people to experience new innovations. Here’s a list of Volograms’ favourite immersive tech announcements at CES 2020:
Through the Looking Glass!
Our friends from Looking Glass Factory stole the show with their immersive 8K display. With this new device, they take their technology to the next level: big format 3D effect without any headsets or glasses, you heard us right! Delivering 33.2 million pixels with over a billion-count color gamut at 60 Hz, it can be viewed by multiple people in the room.
Controlling devices with your minds is no longer science fiction!
Finnish company, NextMind demonstrated a wearable brain-computer interface that lets you control computer commands with your mind. It can fit on the back of a cap, headband or VR headset and decode brain waves in the user’s visual cortex to determine which option on the screen the user is selecting. NextMind CEO Sid Kouider calls it the “next frontier of human-computer interaction, with endless applications”.
VR headsets with crystal clarity for professionals!
Czech company, VRgineers demonstrated it’s latest 8K UltraWide XTAL headset that has dual 4K LCD displays instead of OLED. With its 8K resolution visuals (4K display per eye), the new headset has improved lenses, foveated rendering, and video passthrough, and its two Leap Motion sensors enable eye-tracking and gesture control. Priced at $7890, the XTAL is intended for specialized applications in industries including the air force, defense and automotive. The first receiver of the new XTAL will be the Vance Airforce Base in Oklahoma, which ordered XTAL headsets to upgrade their training center.
Nreal’s unreal AR glasses!
Chinese startup, Nreal’s AR glasses superimpose computer graphics over real-world views, in other words, you can pin your phone’s regular Android apps in your physical environment. Priced at $499, the glasses are portable and affordable, and what’s more- the headsets are set up even for prescription glasses. The glasses require a tethered connection to an Android phone and come with their own touch pad controller. Although the images produced by the device’s two displays, one for each eye do not fully cover the 135 degree horizontal field of view available to humans, they offer a crisp resolution of 1080p.
Speaking of glasses, Panasonic’s Ultra HD VR glasses are also worth mentioning. This Japanese electronics corporation unveiled world’s first ultra HD 3DoF VR glasses that are lightweight and offer truly natural in-headset visuals with minimal hardware. These glasses, used in combination with 5G connectivity use a micro OLED panel and new optical driver, eliminating the ‘screen-door’ effect.
LED displays that are smaller than a penny!
China-based, Jade Bird Display showcased its portfolio of bright, pixel-dense micro LED displays, one such minuscule display had a brightness of 3 million Nits (for reference, the iPhone 11 display is rated at 625 nits). Currently, the displays are monochromatic with 256 color levels, but they could disrupt the design of AR and headsets because of their extreme brightness, which in turn helps reduce transparency greatly, which is an optical design constraint.
We also loved how Hyundai provided its booth visitors a ride experience of its S-A1 Flying Taxi that was suspended in the air, with eight Pimax widescreen VR headsets!
The CES 2020 proved to be a great exhibition of the latest AR and VR technologies, for both consumer and enterprise applications. As a Volumetric Video enabler, we are super excited with all the developments taking place in this field, as this implies abundant opportunities for us to make Volumetric Video mainstream!
If you are interested in bringing volograms to your immersive project, get in touch with us! We will be happy to help!
The Volograms Team
