[x3d-public] X3D and Occuli

[cbullard at hiwaay.net]

A bit of googling returned links that are wildly scattered.  The first  
was a forum where a fresh face asked about X3D and was told that they  
should not bother with it.   Another pointed to the Instant Reality  
site which said it supports it and does go into some detail about the  
Rift (essentially, it is just another display device).  I found the  
Bit Management site statements that it supports Rift with its stereo  
software.  Admittedly I am way behind on this subject but from the  
surface this appears to be the case.  Please correct me if I am wrong:

1.  Once again, anything open or free such as X3D is being beaten down  
by the hardware vendors and new kids on the block in an attempt to  
capture market and make as much money as fast as possible.  So once  
again the Silly Valley diseases are infecting the 3D marketplace and  
anyone who wants a long life cycle solution has to go out of the US to  
get it.  Sad that.

2.  For those of us who are sitting on X3D content we took some effort  
to develop and don't want to see it "abandoned", our reliable way  
forward is to stick with the dates that stuck with us at the party:   
Bit Management and Instant Reality.   If there are others, I simply  
didn't see them in my quick survey.

3.  There is a "No Bad VR!" meme out there.  I don't know what that  
means but I suspect it is part of the market capture strategy (Wait  
for OUR Content! It will be the Real Deal RSN!).  Meh.

4.  This is a market that is pushed by the headset but the real deal  
is the desktop and the applications on it that can use the Rift or  
other headset APIs as display devices.  IOW, we are looking at the  
same problems we have looked at since the 90s"  multiple incompatible  
platforms for which content development is a bet and an expensive one.  
   The camera capture devices seem to be getting the most attention a)  
instant applications b) cheap content.

5.  VR still makes people queasy.

6.  Finally, X3D has more and better functionality for VR creation  
than is actually necessary to get started.  The focus on hardware and  
the usual hype/greed curve drowns out that message.

I'm not convinced this is quite the leap being hyped.   It is progress  
but not a revolution.  It still comes down to the cost of developing  
and maintaining scripted content.

I am afraid as far as jobs are concerned, Cecile is right.  Here in  
the heart of darkness (DoD Big Sticks Land), it is all about sims  
using Unreal and Unity to sell weapons platforms and to train  
soldiers.   That this is very expensive for the taxpayers is of no  
consequence in an industry that invented the idea of market capture  
(you should see the S1000D pubs systems that are all MS Word and  
SharePoint until the ever deferrred final deliverable).  I have to  
wonder how Don justifies his work to his paymasters these days.   A  
topic for another time...

Aside: the node tree in Instant Reality is amazing if half of them  
work.  That's a lot of toys in the toy box for those of us who like to  
play with semi-autonomous VR objects.  Cool!

If any of that is wrong, please say so.   I'd love to put The River Of  
Life up where it can be viewed on these new display devices, but since  
my ISP has given up on it's web hosting for the casual users, I had to  
pull all of my VR and other web content off the original site.  This  
has become an expensive proposition for hobbyists and I get the  
distinct impression from what I am reading in the VR blurbs we aren't  
welcome in the brave new worlds.

The tragedy is there is probably more original thinking, ideas and  
chops in this community for creating VR than in all of Facebook.

len


Quoting Cecile Muller <newsletter at wildpeaks.fr>:

> Hi again,
>
>
> 99% of Oculus apps use either Unity or Unreal, and that's the landscape
> for the forseeable future; the headset doesn't need to care about the
> formats
> used in the apps, it only displays the resulting views rendered by the 3D
> engine.
>
> If you were referencing Carmack's Vrscript, that's a toy language to
> experiment with,
> it's unlikely to go mainstream.
>
>
> See you,
> Cecile
>