Facebook VR headsets: If its most recent study is any indication, Facebook wants to put an image of your eyes on the outside of VR headsets. Facebook Truth Labs has presented a prototype that would allow users to ‘connect’ with others in the real world using their serious-time gaze.
If that looks weird, it is – but it is a clever reverse of the Oculus Quest 2’s cameras’ “passthrough” technology, which captures the wearer’s environment and displays it on the headset’s display screen, thus allowing you to look through the headgear and see what is truly all around you.
This new passthrough technology would rather make use of an internal digital camera that projects “a 3-dimensional check out of the wearer’s eyes in a viewpoint appropriate way” onto a display located on the outside of the headset, allowing anyone to make eye contact with other people in their vicinity.
The prototype technology, dubbed ‘reverse move-as a result of VR,’ is allegedly designed to help “far more seamless interactions between persons with and without the need for headsets in social or professional contexts” – specifically “natural eye call.” Turtle Beach Stealth 700 Gen 2! Headset
So, whether you’re screaming at a VR arcade or wandering around a digital building at a real estate firm, this type of technology could help reduce the sense of awkwardness and isolation that comes with being siloed in a VR headset – allowing nearby customers to see each other in genuine life, albeit through various levels of the monitor.
The discovery comes only a week after Oculus revealed that its passthrough technology could be used for augmented reality (AR), putting virtual pictures onto internet video feeds of the room around you.
Even though Fb Actuality Labs’ technical invention is still in the prototype stage, there is definitely a case to be made for its professional usage.
The isolating nature of VR can be off-putting for others, and the main challenge for VR gear makers such as Facebook-owned Oculus will be in broadening the audience of VR beyond die-hard technology geeks and gamers such as us.
Facebook VR Headsets: How much eye contact do we need?
Encouraging the ability to perceive socially and to be considerably more grounded in our real surroundings will only help make VR far more accessible to the average customer.
However, if we are talking about a whole next monitor on the outside of a headgear – as well as inside cameras – there will be fees involved.
The wonderful strength of the Quest 2 is that it is a reasonably priced solo headset, and paying a premium for a secondary display that many people would not use does not look to be a wise decision either. We could see a dedicated ‘social’ iteration of the headset, possibly with lower technical specs than flagship Oculus models – for young, more mature, or more relaxed end users.
However, it is also possible that this reverse go-through technology would never reach the market. According to the study, “improved face reconstruction remains a problem,” implying that using this technology too soon might result in some rather weird eye contact, which we believe no one needs.
Given the prototype level that this technical breakthrough appears to be at, we expect it to appear in the Oculus Quest 3, at the very least, and we can see its application remaining considerably more useful when VR headsets finally slim down to something more resembling ‘normal’ glasses.