Who to Watch in VR — Idaho Experts Weigh in

We are proud to bring you the Idaho VR Expert Panel! It is our hope that it will be a successful, useful, educational, and ongoing segment of the Idaho Virtual Reality Council (IVRC). The main purpose of the IVRC Expert Panel is to bring useful information and advice to all local industries interested in VR, AR and Mixed Reality.

Who to Watch in VR - Experts Weight In:

 

Dan Thurber, CEO of IonVR:

You definitely want to be following Valve and other leaders like Oculus. It’s such an open world and so many people are coming up with all these great ideas. I think really, if you’re looking to get into VR, follow your heart and your dreams.

 

 

 

Duane Mathes, VP of Game Design, Black Box VR:

For me, that's Alan Yates, hardware engineer at Valve and inventor of the HTC Vive Lighthouse technology. He has been on the forefront of the VR space, and keeping very open with the community about hardware developments. He is also one of the people most responsible for the move to open-source the Lighthouse technology, which will make high resolution indoor positioning technology available to everyone, both in and out of VR.

Just to give you a slightly off-topic idea of what this means for non-VR applications, I have a good friend who has been working on an automated, precisely tracked wheelchair for the severely disabled. The user could activate a control on the wheelchair--which could be anything from a physical button to a tracked eye movement--and the chair could transport them safely to any room in the house. This would be a huge quality of life improvement for them and their caregivers. Other than the Lighthouses, current indoor positioning technology doesn't support anything of this scale, so it's a big breakthrough.

 

Amy Gile, CEO of SilverDraft:

Obviously Autodesk and NVIDIA because they are bringing industrial 3D tools and platforms to design business and entertainment.  Some of the things we are doing with them blow my mind!

Companies that are doing 3D volumetric scanning such as 8i and Lytro because we need to bring more of the real world into VR and make it easier.

Jaunt, WEVR, and Within because they have raised a lot of capital and are investing to create new forms of VR content.

 

 

Brian Cleveley, University of Idaho, Virtual Technology & Design:

The very talented people involved in the development of VR devices including Oculus and Vive – they are breaking barriers that are inspiring a number of industries to incorporate these tools into their businesses.

The very talented people involved in the development of AR/MR software and hardware – they too are breaking barriers that are inspiring a number of industries to incorporate these tools into their businesses.

Philip Rosedale and Ebbe Altberg who are key players in Second Life and Project Sansar respectively. These platforms have made VR creation and use accessible to everyone.

 

Jay Saenz, Founder of Boise VR Project, Oliver Russell

As Amy mentioned above, you’ve got to check out Chris Milk and his company Within. His mission for VR is to eliminate the external frame.

You should also be watching Bricks and Goggles out of the Netherlands because they are simplifying the creation of VR content for the architectural market. They transform your 3D models into virtual experiences and are creating functional applications for VR.  

 

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