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Microsoft starts shipping Windows 10 mixed reality developer kits this month

109 points by T-A 10y ago

throw20161123 10y ago
Any suggestions on how to best get started in AR? What I have is an XPS 15 with a GTX 1050 with 4GB ram.
- T-A 10y ago
  Get the latest Windows Insider Preview (or wait for the official Creator Update; it's probably very close, the "preview" watermark is gone in Insider, so the current build looks like a release candidate). Once you have it set up, look for "Mixed Reality Portal" in the Start menu. It will guide you through the setup, starting with a check that you have compatible hardware. For a developer kit, I guess you follow the links to sign up at https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/03/01/windows-mixed-reality-dev-kits-shipping-month/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/03/01/windo... and pray...
- josephpmay 10y ago
  Learn Unity (if you don't know it already). Don't spend too much time on Windows holographic, as it won't become the defacto standard in AR Create some pass-through mobile games/experiences with Vuforia or Kudan. Hand-held AR isn't that compelling IMO, but many of the lessons you learn from it will be applicable for headset AR
  - kriro 10y ago
    Agree (handheld AR with Unity, won't need killer hardware either just you cell phone+your PC is fine). But be aware that if you ever want to ship something Vuforia is kind of costly. For quick prototyping Unity+Vuforia is pretty great. ARToolkit is decent but the tracking isn't as good (imo) and there's more hands on with extracting features from the markers yourself etc. Eagerly awaiting v6 which has been "coming soon" for quite some time now. You can also search for OpenCV tutorials, iirc there's a Unity plugin. If anyone has recommendations for a more open stack I'm listening (own a Unity license but think it's meh-ish for AR). Most certainly would like to migrate from Vuforia since I don't want to bet on something that could just go Mataio and be gone (+licensing cost is pretty prohibitive but acceptable for my use case).
    - iamcreasy 10y ago
      In the video of Vuforia, they show a headset, but I don't see anything about it on their website. Could you share more details? Microsoft Hololens is 3,000usd. Is there any cheaper AR headset?
      - josephpmay 10y ago
        The Vuforia video shows a concept headset from ODG and BMW. Right now there aren't any cheaper AR headsets (worth buying), but there will be later this year. (and now a plug for my own startup: https://www.miralabs.io/ https://www.miralabs.io/)
        iamcreasy 10y ago
        Can you share more details about mira AR headset? The website doesn't say much.
        josephpmay 10y ago
        There's a bit more information on our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/MiraLabs.io/ https://www.facebook.com/MiraLabs.io/), but we're purposefully not sharing much at this time. What I can tell you is it's a consumer-targeted mass market augmented reality headset for under $100. Apps for the platform are built using Unity.
        iamcreasy 10y ago
        That's nice. And about roughly when the developers will get one?
marsrover 10y ago
Does anyone else get a Fahrenheit 451 vibe from mixed reality? No doubt it is completely awesome and I'm very excited. I can't help but feel like we'll all end up like Millie Montag.
- Shalhoub 10y ago
  > Does anyone else get a Fahrenheit 451 vibe from mixed reality? No doubt it is completely awesome and I'm very excited. I can't help but feel like we'll all end up like Millie Montag. Most people here won't get the reference.
- slowmotiony 10y ago
  I have no idea what that is
- marsrover 10y ago
  Wow, I didn't expect that comment to go over so terribly.
gallerdude 10y ago
In a mind-blowing revelation, I learned my university had a Hololens to try. Before trying it, I'd always believed that AR would be the future. After trying it, I believe that AR will be the future - the tech isn't quite there yet. The finger clicks work like 60% of the time, and the windows seem to vary in opaqueness which really threw me off. (And yes, the FOV is pretty terrible right now). But for minutes at a time, I'd be fully immersed. Mixed reality will be one of the biggest transformations, I think. The digital world used to be restrained to our desks. Right now, we carry it around with us in our pockets (and maybe even on our wrists). But with augmented reality, it's going to be joined with our real world - the two are finally going to truly merge. It's impossible to know what will develop from this. We live in interesting times.
- dagw 10y ago
  That matches my experience as well. Don't think I've ever been so excited by the potential and at the same time so disappointed by the reality of a technology as I was by the Hololens.
  - prefect42 10y ago
    I'm quite impressed with the Hololens, but keep in mind that it's a totally a first gen developer product, so was better than my expectations. Yes the field of view is a tad narrow, and yes, the gestures still don't pick up at much at they should. But the holograms look stellar, the position tracking is quite stellar, objects that are placed, stay placed very well while you move about, the effect works very well. The floating planets that my kids stuck on the living room ceiling, continue to stay floating there until somebody later comes by and moves or resizes them. I think this device will have a bright future.
    - dagw 10y ago
      I agree about the future, and when I step back and put my engineering hat on I also realize how impressive what they actually have pulled off is. It's just that after hearing about this amazing Hololens for a year and then finally getting to try one my expectations where really high, and I have to admit the reality fell far short of what I was hoping for.
Eridrus 10y ago
The pricing listed on the MSFT website is interesting "the upcoming Windows Mixed Reality headsets starting at $299" - https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/projects/campaigns/windows-mixed-reality https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/projects/campa... Especially compared to the Oculus Rift which still starts at $499.
- TwoBit 10y ago
  Easy: the Rift is the current best VR, while $300 headsets will be of lesser quality. It's like a Mercedes vs. a Ford.
- AnotherHustler 10y ago
  This is very interesting, the current price of VR hardware is too high for the average consumer (based on research from EEDAR). $299 is a move further towards mass adoption for PC based VR - excellent!
roywiggins 10y ago
It's not clear from the article, but this headset does not do AR like the HoloLens does, it's a VR headset with fancy inside-out markerless tracking. I had a chance to try a HoloLens, and the AR was impressive but the head tracking was even more so. Just very, very solid.
hackuser 10y ago
Is there a difference between "mixed reality" and "augmented reality"?
- T-A 10y ago
  The terminology is a mess (cue laughter from the audience as Abrash tries to float "Augmented Virtual Reality" [1]). I would say: - Augmented Reality: you have a see-through display which lets you see the real world with virtual objects added to it. - Mixed Reality: you have an opaque display which shows a model of the real world, updated in real time using cameras, with virtual objects added to it. [1] https://www.wareable.com/vr/michael-abrash-what-vr-will-look-like-in-2021 https://www.wareable.com/vr/michael-abrash-what-vr-will-look...
ChicagoBoy11 10y ago
We seem to have converged on a consensus that people will more quickly gravitate towards AR than VR. I don't understand how that came to pass. All of the AR experiences that I have seen -- including the examples in the article -- are potentially interesting, but far less compelling than what we have seen so far in VR. Yes, the promise of true AR is great. But so far I have seen no example of an AR application that does a wonderful job semantically understanding the world around you and correspondingly attaching things into your view. Every experience I've seen for the Hololens so far does a great job with tracking, but there is no true interaction with the physical world -- the applications are simply aware of some general constraints on what the surfaces of the room look like. In VR, on the other hand, a demo like Zuckerberg's I think convincingly showed just how powerful a VR experience can be and how seamlessly elements from the real world can be integrated into it. I honestly am curious as to why people are so readily seeing much greater potential in AR. Perhaps in the VERY long term, but for a good long while I can only see VR applications dominating the market.
- andybak 10y ago
  I agree. I think it's become a glib bit of wisdom that ignores the many restrictions and challenges that AR faces. Even when we have good subtractive rendering and a decent FOV - there are still massive constraints on the type of environment you need to have. AR reduces to VR with enough restrictions on room geometry. Also - I want to be elsewhere - not in my house or office with extra things added in.
- mycall 10y ago
  AR is a superset of VR. In AR, the background can be transparent, translucent or opaque.
- fsloth 10y ago
  "All of the AR experiences that I have seen ...are ... far less compelling than what we have seen so far in VR." The point of AR is not to offer compelling experiences, it's point is to expedite real world industrial and service processes and planning. Don't think of how cool it's supposed to look. Think how much it saves when the maintenance crew can navigate a new building as easily as in a video game. The selling point is not to have some cool experiences. The selling point is to have for the repair crew a navigation track to the maintenance item, and a red arrow pointing to it.
jordache 10y ago
are there examples of successful industrial application of AR? Out in the field, not just inside a lab?
- kriro 10y ago
  Marketing material and PR stuff...a lot (IKEA catalogue, Lego boxes). I know it's used in warehousing (routes to locations of stuff, basically HUD of sorts) and it's used a lot for product demos/sales (think demoing some machine at a convention). IKEA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC6t2eEPkPc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC6t2eEPkPc Lego (oldish): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uqxsIQNUPU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uqxsIQNUPU
- AnotherHustler 10y ago
  I've seen this company (http://www.specdev.com http://www.specdev.com) demoing AR visualizations for wind farm development here in the Netherlands. I've also seen another company (which I don't recall the name) demonstrating a hololens app for maintaining wind turbines.
- test9753 10y ago
  Saw this video on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0t1wAkjFBo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0t1wAkjFBo <quote> NASA's Use of HoloLens Puts St. Louis Scientist on Mars with Curiosity Rover If anyone sees Raymond E. Arvidson, PhD, walking the halls of Washington University wearing Microsoft HoloLens, then he's not entirely walking on Earth. HoloLens combined with OnSight, a software tool developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in collaboration with Microsoft, allows Arvidson to be absorbed in the Martian landscape conducting 'field' research. Arvidson may actually be walking on university flooring, but the software is allowing him to virtually walk on Mars with NASA's Mars rover Curiosity. In his role as Curiosity Surface Properties Scientist, Arvidson is planning Curiosity's next move. </quote>
ourmandave 10y ago
It’s also going to be stepping up its efforts with mixed reality on Windows 10 on PCs, which is a core feature of the forthcoming Creators Update for Microsoft’s desktop OS. So another update that will fail to install on my force-upgraded laptop from 2009, but will still try every day, no matter what, whenever it feels like it? Anybody in the market for a laptop shaped brick for cheap?
staticelf 10y ago
Recently tried a HoloLens, after reading some articles and seen the marketing videos I thought it was going to be as immersive as Vive or Rift. But that tiny window ruined it completely for me. It just isn't immersive at all. Sure it is functional and cool, but I don't honestly think that it's going to be all that useful until the field of view is much larger. Another thing that annoyed me was that I couldn't get close to the holograms. You had to stand at least 1-2 meters away. Maybe it was incorrect settings or something, but kind of disappointing when MS had led me to believe it would be as immersive as VR.
helb 10y ago
Wow, Microsoft Bob [1] in augmented reality. :) http://imgur.com/a/eWpG0 http://imgur.com/a/eWpG0 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Bob https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Bob
- tribby 10y ago
  ha. nice catch. that's rover the dog alright!

109 points by T-A 10y ago

throw20161123 10y ago

Any suggestions on how to best get started in AR? What I have is an XPS 15 with a GTX 1050 with 4GB ram.

T-A 10y ago
Get the latest Windows Insider Preview (or wait for the official Creator Update; it's probably very close, the "preview" watermark is gone in Insider, so the current build looks like a release candidate). Once you have it set up, look for "Mixed Reality Portal" in the Start menu. It will guide you through the setup, starting with a check that you have compatible hardware. For a developer kit, I guess you follow the links to sign up at https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/03/01/windows-mixed-reality-dev-kits-shipping-month/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/03/01/windo... and pray...
josephpmay 10y ago
Learn Unity (if you don't know it already). Don't spend too much time on Windows holographic, as it won't become the defacto standard in AR Create some pass-through mobile games/experiences with Vuforia or Kudan. Hand-held AR isn't that compelling IMO, but many of the lessons you learn from it will be applicable for headset AR
- kriro 10y ago
  Agree (handheld AR with Unity, won't need killer hardware either just you cell phone+your PC is fine). But be aware that if you ever want to ship something Vuforia is kind of costly. For quick prototyping Unity+Vuforia is pretty great. ARToolkit is decent but the tracking isn't as good (imo) and there's more hands on with extracting features from the markers yourself etc. Eagerly awaiting v6 which has been "coming soon" for quite some time now. You can also search for OpenCV tutorials, iirc there's a Unity plugin. If anyone has recommendations for a more open stack I'm listening (own a Unity license but think it's meh-ish for AR). Most certainly would like to migrate from Vuforia since I don't want to bet on something that could just go Mataio and be gone (+licensing cost is pretty prohibitive but acceptable for my use case).
  - iamcreasy 10y ago
    In the video of Vuforia, they show a headset, but I don't see anything about it on their website. Could you share more details? Microsoft Hololens is 3,000usd. Is there any cheaper AR headset?
    - josephpmay 10y ago
      The Vuforia video shows a concept headset from ODG and BMW. Right now there aren't any cheaper AR headsets (worth buying), but there will be later this year. (and now a plug for my own startup: https://www.miralabs.io/ https://www.miralabs.io/)
      - iamcreasy 10y ago
        Can you share more details about mira AR headset? The website doesn't say much.
        josephpmay 10y ago
        There's a bit more information on our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/MiraLabs.io/ https://www.facebook.com/MiraLabs.io/), but we're purposefully not sharing much at this time. What I can tell you is it's a consumer-targeted mass market augmented reality headset for under $100. Apps for the platform are built using Unity.
        iamcreasy 10y ago
        That's nice. And about roughly when the developers will get one?

marsrover 10y ago

Does anyone else get a Fahrenheit 451 vibe from mixed reality? No doubt it is completely awesome and I'm very excited. I can't help but feel like we'll all end up like Millie Montag.

Shalhoub 10y ago
> Does anyone else get a Fahrenheit 451 vibe from mixed reality? No doubt it is completely awesome and I'm very excited. I can't help but feel like we'll all end up like Millie Montag. Most people here won't get the reference.
slowmotiony 10y ago
I have no idea what that is
marsrover 10y ago
Wow, I didn't expect that comment to go over so terribly.

gallerdude 10y ago

In a mind-blowing revelation, I learned my university had a Hololens to try. Before trying it, I'd always believed that AR would be the future. After trying it, I believe that AR will be the future - the tech isn't quite there yet. The finger clicks work like 60% of the time, and the windows seem to vary in opaqueness which really threw me off. (And yes, the FOV is pretty terrible right now). But for minutes at a time, I'd be fully immersed. Mixed reality will be one of the biggest transformations, I think. The digital world used to be restrained to our desks. Right now, we carry it around with us in our pockets (and maybe even on our wrists). But with augmented reality, it's going to be joined with our real world - the two are finally going to truly merge. It's impossible to know what will develop from this. We live in interesting times.

dagw 10y ago
That matches my experience as well. Don't think I've ever been so excited by the potential and at the same time so disappointed by the reality of a technology as I was by the Hololens.
- prefect42 10y ago
  I'm quite impressed with the Hololens, but keep in mind that it's a totally a first gen developer product, so was better than my expectations. Yes the field of view is a tad narrow, and yes, the gestures still don't pick up at much at they should. But the holograms look stellar, the position tracking is quite stellar, objects that are placed, stay placed very well while you move about, the effect works very well. The floating planets that my kids stuck on the living room ceiling, continue to stay floating there until somebody later comes by and moves or resizes them. I think this device will have a bright future.
  - dagw 10y ago
    I agree about the future, and when I step back and put my engineering hat on I also realize how impressive what they actually have pulled off is. It's just that after hearing about this amazing Hololens for a year and then finally getting to try one my expectations where really high, and I have to admit the reality fell far short of what I was hoping for.

Eridrus 10y ago

The pricing listed on the MSFT website is interesting "the upcoming Windows Mixed Reality headsets starting at $299" - https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/projects/campaigns/windows-mixed-reality https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/projects/campa... Especially compared to the Oculus Rift which still starts at $499.

TwoBit 10y ago
Easy: the Rift is the current best VR, while $300 headsets will be of lesser quality. It's like a Mercedes vs. a Ford.
AnotherHustler 10y ago
This is very interesting, the current price of VR hardware is too high for the average consumer (based on research from EEDAR). $299 is a move further towards mass adoption for PC based VR - excellent!

roywiggins 10y ago

It's not clear from the article, but this headset does not do AR like the HoloLens does, it's a VR headset with fancy inside-out markerless tracking. I had a chance to try a HoloLens, and the AR was impressive but the head tracking was even more so. Just very, very solid.

hackuser 10y ago

Is there a difference between "mixed reality" and "augmented reality"?

T-A 10y ago
The terminology is a mess (cue laughter from the audience as Abrash tries to float "Augmented Virtual Reality" [1]). I would say: - Augmented Reality: you have a see-through display which lets you see the real world with virtual objects added to it. - Mixed Reality: you have an opaque display which shows a model of the real world, updated in real time using cameras, with virtual objects added to it. [1] https://www.wareable.com/vr/michael-abrash-what-vr-will-look-like-in-2021 https://www.wareable.com/vr/michael-abrash-what-vr-will-look...

ChicagoBoy11 10y ago

We seem to have converged on a consensus that people will more quickly gravitate towards AR than VR. I don't understand how that came to pass. All of the AR experiences that I have seen -- including the examples in the article -- are potentially interesting, but far less compelling than what we have seen so far in VR. Yes, the promise of true AR is great. But so far I have seen no example of an AR application that does a wonderful job semantically understanding the world around you and correspondingly attaching things into your view. Every experience I've seen for the Hololens so far does a great job with tracking, but there is no true interaction with the physical world -- the applications are simply aware of some general constraints on what the surfaces of the room look like. In VR, on the other hand, a demo like Zuckerberg's I think convincingly showed just how powerful a VR experience can be and how seamlessly elements from the real world can be integrated into it. I honestly am curious as to why people are so readily seeing much greater potential in AR. Perhaps in the VERY long term, but for a good long while I can only see VR applications dominating the market.

andybak 10y ago
I agree. I think it's become a glib bit of wisdom that ignores the many restrictions and challenges that AR faces. Even when we have good subtractive rendering and a decent FOV - there are still massive constraints on the type of environment you need to have. AR reduces to VR with enough restrictions on room geometry. Also - I want to be elsewhere - not in my house or office with extra things added in.
mycall 10y ago
AR is a superset of VR. In AR, the background can be transparent, translucent or opaque.
fsloth 10y ago
"All of the AR experiences that I have seen ...are ... far less compelling than what we have seen so far in VR." The point of AR is not to offer compelling experiences, it's point is to expedite real world industrial and service processes and planning. Don't think of how cool it's supposed to look. Think how much it saves when the maintenance crew can navigate a new building as easily as in a video game. The selling point is not to have some cool experiences. The selling point is to have for the repair crew a navigation track to the maintenance item, and a red arrow pointing to it.

jordache 10y ago

are there examples of successful industrial application of AR? Out in the field, not just inside a lab?

kriro 10y ago
Marketing material and PR stuff...a lot (IKEA catalogue, Lego boxes). I know it's used in warehousing (routes to locations of stuff, basically HUD of sorts) and it's used a lot for product demos/sales (think demoing some machine at a convention). IKEA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC6t2eEPkPc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC6t2eEPkPc Lego (oldish): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uqxsIQNUPU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uqxsIQNUPU
AnotherHustler 10y ago
I've seen this company (http://www.specdev.com http://www.specdev.com) demoing AR visualizations for wind farm development here in the Netherlands. I've also seen another company (which I don't recall the name) demonstrating a hololens app for maintaining wind turbines.
test9753 10y ago
Saw this video on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0t1wAkjFBo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0t1wAkjFBo <quote> NASA's Use of HoloLens Puts St. Louis Scientist on Mars with Curiosity Rover If anyone sees Raymond E. Arvidson, PhD, walking the halls of Washington University wearing Microsoft HoloLens, then he's not entirely walking on Earth. HoloLens combined with OnSight, a software tool developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in collaboration with Microsoft, allows Arvidson to be absorbed in the Martian landscape conducting 'field' research. Arvidson may actually be walking on university flooring, but the software is allowing him to virtually walk on Mars with NASA's Mars rover Curiosity. In his role as Curiosity Surface Properties Scientist, Arvidson is planning Curiosity's next move. </quote>

ourmandave 10y ago

It’s also going to be stepping up its efforts with mixed reality on Windows 10 on PCs, which is a core feature of the forthcoming Creators Update for Microsoft’s desktop OS. So another update that will fail to install on my force-upgraded laptop from 2009, but will still try every day, no matter what, whenever it feels like it? Anybody in the market for a laptop shaped brick for cheap?

staticelf 10y ago

Recently tried a HoloLens, after reading some articles and seen the marketing videos I thought it was going to be as immersive as Vive or Rift. But that tiny window ruined it completely for me. It just isn't immersive at all. Sure it is functional and cool, but I don't honestly think that it's going to be all that useful until the field of view is much larger. Another thing that annoyed me was that I couldn't get close to the holograms. You had to stand at least 1-2 meters away. Maybe it was incorrect settings or something, but kind of disappointing when MS had led me to believe it would be as immersive as VR.

helb 10y ago

Wow, Microsoft Bob [1] in augmented reality. :) http://imgur.com/a/eWpG0 http://imgur.com/a/eWpG0 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Bob https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Bob

tribby 10y ago
ha. nice catch. that's rover the dog alright!