Virtual Reality Applications

How Is VR Used?

Scientific Visualisation

-- Visualizing the small, the large and the inaccessible: walking around a magnified 3D virus as it grows, or the solar system miniaturized and sped up, and being able to modify the models to alter behavior becomes a new tool of analysis, discovery and experimentation. The raw data used for such visualizations may come from naturally occurring phenomena (deep sea or outer space explorations); from scientific simulations (wind tunnel visualization, stress analysis, the inside of a furnace); or from creative designs (CAD for industrial design, manufacturing and architecture.)

Rapid Prototyping

is one of the greatest successes of VR. With VR, manufacturers can rapidly create and explore multiple virtual prototypes of a product before a single real one is built. The design phase becomes more flexible and more effective. The chance of catching potentially costly errors before manufacturing begins increases. You produce a better product in less time.

Simulation Training

is where VR was born. VR can be used to train personnel in situations that are too dangerous to reproduce in real life or in circumstances where access to the real environment is limited. For example: international nuclear plant inspection (research work at Sandia Labs), flight simulation (Wright Patterson Airforce base) and naval submarine navigation (MIT officer of the deck simulation.)

Communication and Collaboration

: Attached to high-speed networks, VR takes teleconferencing to the next level, tele-collaboration. In VR, participants can be thousands of miles apart and yet feel as if they are all standing in the same virtual office or laboratory, with their product, design, or experiment right in front of them, not only talking about it, but interacting with it, demonstrating it, changing it. For example, CALVIN, is a collaborative VR design environment developed at the Electronic Visualization Laboratory at UIC. This flexible environement allows designers and engineers, who might be on opposite sides of the continent, to work together on the design of products and architectural spaces. Using CALVIN, the users can even invite potential clients to log in from remote locations and join them in a walk-through or test-drive...

Marketing

: Only 7VR gives you access to the other 93you are talking about, making your references clear to others, likewise their references are clear to you. You can see what aspects of the product or project your client is taken by, interested in, confused by, and immediately hone in on those areas. You can instantly illustrate and document any alterations that are discussed. The VR hype can work to your advantage. Everyone wants to see what's new and who is using it. A VR demonstration adds an unstated "state of the art" quality to any product or presentation. "Only 7words..."

Location-based Entertainment

is one of the highest profile uses of VR in the public-sector. VR provides a new sense of realism that was not possible with previous generations of amusement rides or 3-D movies. Coupled with motion-platforms, VR takes passengers where they have never gone before, using less space and giving their operators greater flexibility than their roller coaster predecessors.

VR Entertainment

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Virtual Game Environments

-- Stand-up full immersion 3D interactive VR Pods with the latest in games including Duke Nukem, Descent, Mech Warrior and Quake. Through agreements with other sites, inter-site matches are available world-wide.

VR Simulations

-- Specialized equipment enabling realistic flight simulations, motor sports simulations and sporting experiences such as golf and skiing.

3D Internet

-- Access the internet in full-immersive 3D for interactive gaming, business or general interest. VR HMDs and VRML viewers enable the 3D capabilities of the net to be explored and experienced.

VR for Everyone

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Education and Business

-- Specialized software to enable VR architectural renderings, Virtual tourist (3D geography and history), 3D graphical imaging and rendering services. This software may be run using the VR gaming pods or on a specialized graphics workstation.

Home VR

-- If you own a PC or home game system you owe it to yourself to 'get real'. Boost the power and enjoyment of your home system - go VR.

VR Tomorrow

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In the near future, Virtual Reality will disappear. At least the buzz words Virtual Reality will cease to be used. That's because much of this new technology will be so integrated in what we do and what we see that a term like VR will no longer be required. In our homes and schools, our hospitals and factories, our theatres, clubs and offices, what we call VR today will be the common tools used for communication, education, entertainment and industry.

In the past, the development of the Printing Press sparked an information revolution which changed the way humans think and view the world. Along with the development of computers, telecommunications and television, Virtual Reality marks the culmination of the second great information revolution which will once again open our eyes, ears and senses to new possibilities in personal connectiveness and interpersonal consciousness.