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What it is: a way of interacting with an artificial environment through extensions of senses.
How it is done: measuring movement in the environment with magnetic tracking
How it will be done in the future: tracking movements and activities in the environment with ultrasonic waves
Current Applications:
Future Applications:
Benefits: saves money in all fields, increases productivity, decreases time-to-market, and increases chance of completed projects being fully functional, helps give companies comparative advantage
Drawbacks: personal isolation, lack of interaction with real world and other people, live in virtual world, increases unemployment
Virtual reality is hitting the world as the next dominant improvement in technology. Like the Internet, virtual reality began with specific uses in mind, but is now becoming more and more versatile. At first seen as a new method of entertainment, virtual reality is now being used in more and more applications, from the business world to the clothing industry. In the years ahead, virtual reality will become cheaper and even more wide-spread. It has even been suggested that in the future, virtual reality can be used to "educate us to become aware of and to control...emotions...and to train our children that violence and dishonesty" are wrong by showing the consequences of such actions (Faggin 41).
Just what is virtual reality? Webster’s Dictionary defines it as "an artificial environment which is experienced through...sights and sounds provided by a computer and in which one’s actions partially determine what happens in the environment" (1320). Put more simply, virtual reality is an extension of one’s senses--a way of interacting with and manipulating a computer-based environment. Jaron Lanier is the most famous of the so-called "pioneers" of virtual reality. He founded the CEO of VPL, a company that was among the first to develop the technology (Brockman 47).
Currently, virtual reality uses magnetic tracking to measure movements within an environment. However, this method has been proven to give users feelings of nausea or drunkenness. Because of its imprecision and disorientation due to hospital medical equipment, this method cannot always be effectively used in the medical field. Future virtual reality will make use of ultrasonic waves to track movements and activities in the artificial environments (The Futurist 13). This will enable hospitals to use virtual reality and decrease ill-effects of users.
Virtual reality is already being used in a wide range of fields: business, various industries, the military, entertainment, education, and medicine. In the future, the Air Force, commercial airlines, and medical schools will use virtual reality more extensively for training purposes and the on-line clothing stores will use virtual reality to facilitate shopping and boost sales.
Businesses use virtual reality to analyze data through the use of 3D charts and graphs. In the design stage, simulations allow programmers to see products without having to build the actual product, saving money and time (Reynolds 121-122). Automotive industries use virtual reality to test designs and safety and check for passenger comfort. Airlines use virtual reality to train pilots and factories use it to train employees working with dangerous equipment. The military similarly uses virtual reality for simulated training (Reynolds 122). NASA used virtual reality to simulate every imaginable situation that might occur in space to familiarize astronauts with the situations and consequently improved their performance and comfort level during unexpected occurrences (Reynolds 208).
Entertainment has long used virtual reality through games such as Atari, Nintendo, and computer games. Now, there is laser tag and games used by restaurants such as Dave and Busters, in Dallas, where customers waiting for food can lead each other through virtual mazes (Restaurant Business 62). Virtual reality education can take the forms of virtual tours and labs. "If you can’t afford the time or the ticket to get to India and see the Taj Mahal, slap on a pair of VR goggles and there you are" (Reynolds 122). Virtual reality allows students and adults to travel abroad, tour famous sites, and learn all about them without leaving a room. Virtual labs allow students to dissect animals without having to kill them and to perform experiments without requiring costly equipment.
In the medical field, psychiatrists are using virtual reality to treat phobias by exposing patients to their fears in risk-free situations (The Futurist 13). Virtual reality advances are already being made in surgery. By making small incisions, watching 3D images taken by a camera inside the patient, and inserting a robotic arm, a surgeon can move tools inside a patient without having to cut them open--reducing pain and recovery time. This technique is still a long way from everyday use, but was first used in 1997 to perform a gallbladder operation (Reynolds 122).
The future of virtual reality is looking very bright. Various fields are continuously looking for new ways to improve and expand their uses of virtual reality. Developments in virtual reality will drastically change the way pilots fly and are trained, medical students are educated, surgeons practice and hone their skills, and people shop. While these changes are developing, it will take time and money to fully implement them.
The Air Force is currently developing "peripheral vision displays" that convey information to pilots without them needing to look around them (Vizard 28). Similarly, military aviators will soon be using head-mounted displays called virtual retinal displays which will "allow pilots to see the surrounding environment while also accessing digital navigation cues and images that appear to float several feet away" (Vizard 28).
An aircraft manufacturer named Embraer has begun employing virtual pilots and passengers, created by a human simulation software from Engineering Animation Inc., called Jack. It is used to improve the ergonomics of the cockpit designs, and evaluate the maintainability of designs, along with telling engineers "what they can see and reach, how comfortable they are, why they’re getting hurt or tired, and other important information" (Computer-Aided Engineering 11). Jack has saved the company money, reduced time to market, and helped to deliver higher-quality airplanes.
The medical field is developing ways to perform virtual surgery to train its surgeons. Through the use of 3D glasses, surgeons will also be able to see and feel the results of each of his or her movements. These techniques will "allow [the surgeons] to train in a safe, predictable, and reproducible setting,...review their work and enhance their skills,...and learn and practice new techniques or procedures" (USA Today 3). Soon, virtual reality will allow physicians and their patients to simulate the surgery experience before actually undergoing it (The Futurist 13). Medical and nursing students will practice their skills on simulated patients before seeing actual patients, reducing mistakes (Vanchieri 207), but some fear that this may threaten the "humanistic elements of the doctor-patient relationship" (Vanchieri 208). Finally, medical schools will replace complex diagrams with virtual skulls to learn more about the brain (Vanchieri 209).
The on-line clothing industry is also making advancements in virtual reality. Philip Treleaven is the leader in what might be called a "virtual changing room" (Goode 4). A scanner measures 300,000 points on the body and then projects an image of what clothes would look like on a person so that shoppers can try on clothes in their own homes. Land’s End has already placed a 3D woman online to allow customers to visualize how clothes would look on their bodies, in the hopes that this would encourage more customers to buy (Reynolds 122).
With all these advancements come numerous benefits. Virtual reality reduces training costs and costs incurred by building actual products in the design phase, reduces time-to-market, and increases competitive advantage, productivity, success rate of completing projects on time, safety--through training of surgeons on virtual bodies, simulations of automobile and airplane designs, etc--, education, knowledge about foreign countries and patient care.
But with new technology also comes disadvantages. These techniques take time, effort, and money to implement. People may experience a feeling of a loss of reality and a feeling of isolation as they interact with an artificial world, instead of a real world with real people. Finally, virtual reality can increase unemployment as fewer people are needed to design projects: products in their design stage no longer need to be built. However, new jobs will open up in the field of designing virtual reality technology.
Despite these disadvantages, the benefits of using virtual reality far outweigh them.
It is a force that everyone needs to know about and be able to use. It will soon become a
dominant force in all industries. In order to fully utilize this technology people will have to
become as familiar with it as they are with the Internet.
Brockman, John. "Jaron Lanier: The prodigy." Upside v.4.9 (Apr. 1997): 1 pp. Online. Internet.(2/25/99)
"Digital People Help Company Lower Airfare." Computer-Aided Engineering (Feb. 1999): 1 pp. Online. Internet. (2/25/99)
"Doctor’s May Feel Their Patients Pain." The Futurist v.33 (Jan 1999): 1 pp. Online. Internet. (2/25/99)
Faggin, Federico. "Practicing Virtual Morality." Forbes Magazine (30 Nov. 1998): 2pp. Online. Internet (2/25/99)
Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. 10th ed. 1996.
"No Contest." Restaurant Business v. 98.2 (15 Jan. 1999) 1 pp. Online. Internet (2/25/99)
Reynolds, Cynthia. "Everything’s Coming Up 3D." Canadian Business v.71 i.21 (24 Dec 1998- 8 Jan. 1999): 2 pp. Online. Internet.(2/25/99)
Root, Barbara and Stephen Goode. "Virtual Reality, Fashion become Tight Fit." Insight on the News v. 15.6 (15 Feb. 1999): 1 pp. Internet. Online. (2/25/99)
Vanchieri, Cori. "Virtual Reality: Will Practice Make Perfect?" Journal of the National Cancer Institute v. 91.3 (3 Feb. 1999) 2 pp. Online. Internet. (2/25/99)
"Virtual Reality Training Tools." USA Today v. 127.2645 (Feb. 1999) 1 pp. Online. Internet. (2/25/99)
Vizard, Frank. "Ready For Takeoff?" Popular Science v.254.2 (Feb. 1999): 1 pp. Online. Internet. (2/25/99)
