4 ms·

The primary use case for passthrough is not AR, it was not intended to be projecting stuff over room interior, and as such, it's crap at a thing that it is expl

by sdrinf 4y ago

The primary use case for passthrough is not AR, it was not intended to be projecting stuff over room interior, and as such, it's crap at a thing that it is explicitely not optimized for. The primary use case for passthrough is bringing stuff into VR, specifically your hands (when used in hand tracking mode), and your keyboard. Your monitor is projected into VR by being hooked to your headset. Any other function's utility has been traded off for these purposes.

SheinhardtWigCo 4y ago
The author's point is that it's crap at a thing it's explicitly marketed as being good at.
- theptip 4y ago
  It's a weird point to spend so much ink on though. The author explicitly raises the possiblity that the marketing fluff could just be marketing fluff, but then seem to go on as if this can't be the explanation. Seems obvious to me that the "Mixed reality" stuff is just marketing fluff, if you pay any attention to the technical evolution of this product line when interpreting these complaints.
adastra22 4y ago
Source? Other “Pro” models like HoloLens are explicitly AR-only. What Pro use cases are there for VR?
- leoqa 4y ago
  I’m interested in it for a hybrid VR-AR for flight sim cockpits. The Varjo Aero is used for this, allowing you to build a cockpit replica and interact with it via pass thru but still using VR for outside the cockpit.
- RandallBrown 4y ago
  I figured the "Pro" in Meta Quest just means it's more powerful than the quest 2...
trzy 4y ago
That's an extremely limited view of passthrough. Passthrough will be most useful for spatial applications like telepresence, in-situ learning, modeling and creation, and visualization, where remaining present and aware of your surroundings is preferable to the undesirable immersion of VR. The bet here is that useful interactions with virtual objects and interfaces don't benefit from disorienting virtual environments. For an example of this on Quest Pro, check out Wooorld. It's a fun hangout app and is arguably a much better experience in passthrough.
- YetAnotherNick 4y ago
  Actually I think opposite is true. The camera is far off from the eye, so in any case you wouldn't feel the immersion, and I think making the camera better would make you more disoriented, rather than less.
  - arjonagelhout 4y ago
    I had the same experience with other headsets such as the Varjo XR-3, which feels like you’re looking at a camera feed. However, the Quest 2 and Pro apply some smart reprojection to correct this, and it feels like everything is almost exactly in the right place. You do notice the artifacts of this reprojection when you’re holding objects close to your face, when you’re moving objects around, or when you’re looking at thin objects such as wires. I also recall John Carmack talking about this topic in one of his unscripted talks at Meta Connect, but I’ll have to dig that up.
  - grumbel 4y ago
    > The camera is far off from the eye That's a non-issue. Lenovo Mirage Solo had a stereo cameras at a proper IPD and the immersion of pass-through on that thing is still by far the best thing I ever experienced in a VR headset. The little offset between the cameras and your eyes is unnoticeable unless you try to touch your nose or do other stuff really close to the headset. And if you really need to, you could get rid of that offset as well (45° mirror and mount the cameras vertical to have them capture the same image as your eye would). The problem with most other VR headsets is that they either have only a single camera for pass-through or use the tracking cameras that are mounted far away from your eyes. Doing the remapping of perspective in software just doesn't give good results.

by sdrinf 4y ago

SheinhardtWigCo 4y ago

The author's point is that it's crap at a thing it's explicitly marketed as being good at.

theptip 4y ago
It's a weird point to spend so much ink on though. The author explicitly raises the possiblity that the marketing fluff could just be marketing fluff, but then seem to go on as if this can't be the explanation. Seems obvious to me that the "Mixed reality" stuff is just marketing fluff, if you pay any attention to the technical evolution of this product line when interpreting these complaints.

adastra22 4y ago

Source? Other “Pro” models like HoloLens are explicitly AR-only. What Pro use cases are there for VR?

leoqa 4y ago
I’m interested in it for a hybrid VR-AR for flight sim cockpits. The Varjo Aero is used for this, allowing you to build a cockpit replica and interact with it via pass thru but still using VR for outside the cockpit.
RandallBrown 4y ago
I figured the "Pro" in Meta Quest just means it's more powerful than the quest 2...

trzy 4y ago

That's an extremely limited view of passthrough. Passthrough will be most useful for spatial applications like telepresence, in-situ learning, modeling and creation, and visualization, where remaining present and aware of your surroundings is preferable to the undesirable immersion of VR. The bet here is that useful interactions with virtual objects and interfaces don't benefit from disorienting virtual environments. For an example of this on Quest Pro, check out Wooorld. It's a fun hangout app and is arguably a much better experience in passthrough.

YetAnotherNick 4y ago
Actually I think opposite is true. The camera is far off from the eye, so in any case you wouldn't feel the immersion, and I think making the camera better would make you more disoriented, rather than less.
- arjonagelhout 4y ago
  I had the same experience with other headsets such as the Varjo XR-3, which feels like you’re looking at a camera feed. However, the Quest 2 and Pro apply some smart reprojection to correct this, and it feels like everything is almost exactly in the right place. You do notice the artifacts of this reprojection when you’re holding objects close to your face, when you’re moving objects around, or when you’re looking at thin objects such as wires. I also recall John Carmack talking about this topic in one of his unscripted talks at Meta Connect, but I’ll have to dig that up.
- grumbel 4y ago
  > The camera is far off from the eye That's a non-issue. Lenovo Mirage Solo had a stereo cameras at a proper IPD and the immersion of pass-through on that thing is still by far the best thing I ever experienced in a VR headset. The little offset between the cameras and your eyes is unnoticeable unless you try to touch your nose or do other stuff really close to the headset. And if you really need to, you could get rid of that offset as well (45° mirror and mount the cameras vertical to have them capture the same image as your eye would). The problem with most other VR headsets is that they either have only a single camera for pass-through or use the tracking cameras that are mounted far away from your eyes. Doing the remapping of perspective in software just doesn't give good results.