Archives for “Head Mounted Displays”

Jeremy Oliver advises how to purchase LCD displays for your next homebrew VR helmet. (Hint: take all your optics to Montgomery Wards and try every TV and camcorder on the shelf!) Jeremy’s less than successful experience with Radio Shack suggests a big thumbs down, but what did I know; my first DIY leveraged their Pocketvision-27 [...] Related posts:

  1. 1995 Virtual IO I-Glasses
  2. Take Flight in the Virtual World
  3. LEEP On The Cheap


Trust the folks at G4 to bring us the real scoop on state-of-the-art VR from the inventors of the assembly line, Ford Motor Company. G4′s reportage AND Ford’s VR applications are both impressive; both the MSM and GM/Chrysler have something to learn here. G4 traditionally (is that an oxymoron??) sticks with the latest video games [...] Related posts:

  1. Urinated in His Pants?


VR today is like early TV: it suffers from the split personality of most start-up high-tech industries. At the one end is the top of the line research, carried out by institutions with no mandate to sell anything. At the other end, we have new hardware and software products whose developers are only too happy [...] Related posts:

  1. The Games That Would Be King
  2. CAVE® – A Virtual Reality Theater – 1993
  3. VRASP, Pix-Elation, and Phlogiston


Yes, I’ve heard rumors of bugs (lice) inside VR helmets (untrue!), but researchers in Spain are bloody Kafkaesque, putting virtual cockroaches all over the screens. They “got the bright idea to simulate hoards of cockroaches swarming over insect-phobic volunteers…”, showing that “roaches could skitter, wave their antenna, and even change size from small and medium [...] Related posts:

  1. Myron Kruger Takes a Spin in the Flight Helmet
  2. Tearing Out the Guts of a Virtual Research VR-4 Helmet
  3. 10 Reasons Why Virtual Reality Did Not Become a Standard


Chris Hand from Leicester Polytechnic offers a delightful history of W Industries, the company who brought us the various Virtuality VR game systems. His history begins in the early 80′s and takes us only to early October of 1991, not long after the commercial introduction of Virtuality’s Series 1000 Amiga based systems. The excerpts below [...] Related posts:

  1. The Games That Would Be King
  2. Yet Another Fashion Emergency – J D Roth Talks Virtuality on GamePro TV
  3. All Brawn – Virtuality 1000CS HMD


Build your own LEEP style wide field of view head mounted display optics. Check out the instruction video and parts list below. In the late 80′s and early 90′s wide field of view head mounted displays were all the rage; immersion was everything! The dominant HMD vendors, VPL Research and Virtual Research shared the same [...] Related posts:

  1. Take Flight in the Virtual World
  2. Nothing New Under the Sun!
  3. Tearing Out the Guts of a Virtual Research VR-4 Helmet


For 150 years people have been free-viewing stereoscopic photos (and more recently videos) in a side by side cross-eyed format, where the left view is positioned to the right of the right view. You’re force to cross your eyes like an optical contortionist. For eyeballs with less agility, this can become painful. By using prisms [...] Related posts:

  1. Build Your Own 3D Shutter Glasses Controller for Field Interlaced Stereoscopic Viewing
  2. Build a 2 DOF Wireless Head Tracker – Cheap!
  3. Easy Sterilization – VIM


USA and other western world faced consumer-focused Virtual Reality boom in late 80s and early 90s, accurately when USSR is fall apart. VR came to big industrial cities of post USSR later in 1995 – 1998, when VR hype slowly begin to fall down in USA. That was in a few years after IBM-compatible PC’s [...] Related posts:

  1. Build Your Own 3D Shutter Glasses Controller for Field Interlaced Stereoscopic Viewing
  2. Fear of Flying? Try the Forte VFX-1
  3. Liquid Image MRG2.2 Disassembly and Potential Upgrades


Back when VR really had some cred, the Diaspar Virtual Reality Network hopped on the bandwagon. Imagine, if you will, a dial-up service with a feature list, every item containing the phrase “will be”, as in this feature will be available… but when? Yes, its somewhat ironic that the network is named “Diaspar”, as this [...] Related posts:

  1. PT-01 – A Rare Breed Gains Five Stars (If You Keep It On the Shelf!)
  2. Is VR the New Wasteland? (from 1993….)
  3. AT&T Shows Us Somebody Else’s Future


So well you probably know that it is not a standard that new computers get shipped with VR headsets, although you might have believed that during the mid-90s VR craze. In 1995 many analysts – serious people – predicted that in 10 years most computers would be shipped with VR headsets or other VR equipment. [...] Related posts:

  1. The return of Virtual Reality?
  2. So Serious – 1980′s Virtual Reality from NASA
  3. Lawrence Taylor Teams Up With Virtual Reality


I don’t really agree with the Virtual Boy being VR’s “nail in the coffin”. I think it was just one of many crappy products. Maybe it could have saved the VR hype for a while if it was a big success, but as it is it’s just one of the many VR obscurities that simply [...] Related posts:

  1. Number 5 in PC World’s “Ugliest Products in Tech History” – VIRTUAL BOY
  2. 1995 Virtual IO I-Glasses
  3. 10 Reasons Why Virtual Reality Did Not Become a Standard


Ah well, a review of the PT-01 from Optics 1 … Back in the days it was ridiculous expensive, like most of the VR stuff. The pros are that it is very light and optimized for mobile use, i love that it comes with a belt clip and can be driven by a common battery. [...] Related posts:

  1. The City and the Stars – VR a Billion Years From Now!
  2. Virtual Boy – Another Perspective…
  3. How To Buy LCDs (in 1995)


Nintendo’s 1995 Virtual Boy was a whole cartridge based game system inside a desktop-mounted-head stereoscopic immersive display. Designed by Gunpei Yokoi of Gameboy fame, and offered for $180 retail, the market was less than kind. It was withdrawn from the market in less than a year and now can still be found late in the [...] Related posts:

  1. Virtual Boy – Another Perspective…
  2. Take Flight in the Virtual World
  3. 10 Reasons Why Virtual Reality Did Not Become a Standard


This final segment from AT&T’s 1993 Vision of the Future isn’t too far from what’s happenin’ here in 2010, but 17 years later, AT&T is still not a player. Part1 and Part2 are almost as much fun. [Translate] Related posts:

  1. The City and the Stars – VR a Billion Years From Now!
  2. Regis Takes a Spin
  3. Liquid Image MRG2.2 Disassembly and Potential Upgrades


Jaron walks us through all eleven reasons, from Gates Envy to Movie Projectors. Strangely enough I agree! The Top Eleven Reasons VR Has Not Yet Become Commonplace [Translate] Related posts:

  1. What to do with the Cable? – Dynamic Visions
  2. Myron Kruger Takes a Spin in the Flight Helmet
  3. Tearing Out the Guts of a Virtual Research VR-4 Helmet



In 1991, EVL produced its first CAVE® (CAVE Automatic Virtual Environment) prototype, a two screen stereo projection system with single-user tracking and navigation. In late 1991 – early 1992, a 4 screen (3 walls/floor) CAVE® system – now including surround-sound – was completed and premiered at the annual SIGGRAPH Conference. This video provides an overview [...] Related posts:

  1. So Serious – 1980′s Virtual Reality from NASA
  2. 10 Reasons Why Virtual Reality Did Not Become a Standard
  3. Is VR the New Wasteland? (from 1993….)


1995 Video of Virtual io’s I-Glasses. Virtual reality Head Mounted Display with headtracking. This was the first i-glasses version released and had much lower resolution than the i-glasses they sell today. Back in 1995 this was one of the first affordable home VR headsets along with the Victormaxx cybermaxx and the fortevr VFX-1. The small [...] Related posts:

  1. How To Buy LCDs (in 1995)
  2. 10 Reasons Why Virtual Reality Did Not Become a Standard
  3. Virtual Boy – Another Perspective…


Last week I shredded a Liquid Image MRG2.2. This week we go for the classic Virtual Research VR-4 stereoscopic head mounted display. There’s a lot to love about the VR-4: wide field of view optics, adjustable interpupilary distance, coated aspheric lenses, excellent fit to different heads, and provision for eyeglasses. The optics are timeless; used [...] Related posts:

  1. Myron Kruger Takes a Spin in the Flight Helmet
  2. Nothing New Under the Sun!
  3. Take Flight in the Virtual World


I’ve gotten a ton of emails hurled at me about the Liquid Image MRG2.2 VR helmet. The gist of most of them is: “Hey, I love the wide field of view and how rugged the MRG2.2 is, but I wish I could upgrade the LCD resolution, and, is there a way to make this HMD [...] Related posts:

  1. 6 lbs. 12 oz. – It’s a Baby Headmount! – Liquid Image MRG2
  2. Tearing Out the Guts of a Virtual Research VR-4 Helmet
  3. Nothing New Under the Sun!


This looks like the closest thing yet to a real-life holodeck! The Virtusphere is (as the name suggests) a large hollow sphere which sits on a set of computer monitored wheels. This allows the sphere to rotate a complete 360º whilst still allowing the computer to track the movments. For more information please visit www.hack247.co.uk [...] Related posts:

  1. So Serious – 1980′s Virtual Reality from NASA
  2. CAVE® – A Virtual Reality Theater – 1993
  3. 1995 Virtual IO I-Glasses


It’s 1985 and there’s already a nice high resolution, wide field of view VR helmet (from VPL Research), glove system, and 6 DOF tracking of both helmet and glove, thanks to Scott Fisher and NASA Ames.  In particular, check out the LEEP wide FOV optics (from LEEP inventor Eric Howlett’s predecessor company Pop Optix.) These [...] Related posts:

  1. Take Flight in the Virtual World
  2. LEEP On The Cheap
  3. Myron Kruger Takes a Spin in the Flight Helmet


This totally excellent demo of the Victormaxx Stuntmaster helmet speaks for itself. Lyme disease aside, the Stuntmaster’s wretched optical qualities seem overly cruel to this beast. [Translate] Related posts:

  1. The City and the Stars – VR a Billion Years From Now!
  2. Nothing New Under the Sun!
  3. Tearing Out the Guts of a Virtual Research VR-4 Helmet


Simulator Sickness and the lingering effects of Virtual Reality, drunken behavior in particular, are the subject of this Brian Williams NBC special from 1996. Brian’s teaser: “When they were first unveiled, the science of it all was staggering, but now there’s some evidence it’s having a staggering effect… on some who use it…” A typical [...] Related posts:

  1. Urinated in His Pants?
  2. Virtual Boy – Another Perspective…
  3. AT&T Shows Us Somebody Else’s Future


You know the wave has crested when Regis and Kathie Lee make your specialty an early morning featurette. Reeg hams it up beautifully. If it hadn’t been for that 3:30am load in, it might have been perfect. Dave Polinchock provides expert narration. Quick glimpse of an SGI Indigo on the left, and the Virtual Research [...] Related posts:

  1. Myron Kruger Takes a Spin in the Flight Helmet
  2. Warning Will Robinson, Warning!
  3. Nothing New Under the Sun!