On 12/06/13 20:42, Craig Funston wrote:
http://www.flyingmag.com/avionics-ge...or-enthusiasts

Hope Condor is next.

A few months ago I went to a talk and demo of a prototype Oculus Rift,
partly because of the possibility of using it with Condor, partly
because I'm a geek, and partly because I've been taking stereoscopic
photos for, gulp, 30 years.

This is my impression of five minutes using it.

When the Oculus headset is on, nothing other than the game scene
can be seen - unlike google glasses where the image is translucent
and you can see round the edge of the glasses.
I was surprised that the headpiece had no adjustments, but
nonetheless the optics gave a good field of view and respectable
stereo effect.

The demo scene was inside a room with internal
upstairs balcony and external garden with tree overlooking a lake.
The resolution was just about adequate for the demo but would,
IMHO, be insufficient for seeing sufficient ground/cloud detail.
Given the choice between stereoscopic vision and increased
resolution, I'd opt for the latter. However, it was a prototype
unit, and I see no reason the resolution could not be significantly
increased.

Rotating my head about all three axes allowed caused the scene
to change in exactly the way I would expect. This effect was
good and compelling.

The stereoscopic effect was not overdone; it looked natural so
that you didn't really notice them. That's the same as in James
Cameron's "Avatar", and unlike the "poke something through the
screen" that you see in most stereo films.

The "avatar" could be translated through the scene using a
standard "top hat" games joystick. Moving forwards rapidly
towards a wall caused me to involuntarily jerk my head back
to avoid hitting the wall - compelling.

Using the joystick to turn the avatar slowly clockwise or
anticlockwise worked as expected. However, doing that rapidly
caused me to feel instantaneously nauseous, to involuntarily
rotate my head up/down and move my shoulders. Most disconcerting.

So, if my head (and therefore my labyrinths) rotated and the
scene moved correspondingly, all was well. If the scene rotated
and my head didn't then I had problems. I conjecture this would
probably be problem when practicing spins, and possibly when
thermalling.

So, overall I really liked the panning effect, but disliked the
resolution and disliked the scene rotating unless caused by my
head's movement.