#wishing well
14 messages in this thread
ok all get this …. this will blow you away…. i have this cliet that
wants 30 mins of a walk through to video tape but wants to be able to
joystick back and forth between rooms in the house! he is building a 55
million dollor house in beverly hills and is one of the biggest developers
of shopping malls in the U.S. and hid H ouse is going to be just like a
shopping mall… amazing
what i want to know is there any software out there that will allow tou to
do this on a computer(of course not on video) short of virtual reality?
and allow you the 24 bit images and clarity that you can get with 3ds2 or
say alias. i was thinking of the new ibm risc 7000 with there parallel
i860's in real time but still you would have to have a computer to see the
result!
any suggestions would be mucho appreciated… since this guy might be in
the state hospital soon<g> … but his wallet is open … lets see 250 a
sec X 30 X 60 x 30 !
sherwood
Sherwood- The new buzz around here is CDI (Compact Disk Interactive). The
players cost $750 (consumer) to $1500(industrial, both from Phillips) and
you basically put together an entire multimedia presentation on CD. There
would be no moving around in real time (ala Virtual Reality) as far as you
couldn't control where you were walking with the joystick, but you could
interactivly control the rooms that you go to and when you pick a room, you
would see a MM presentation on that room. I understand they now have
fullframe, full motion video on these things, although the best I have seen
is 15 fps, full frame. It's essentially the same as having a MM
presentation on a CD Rom, except no high dollar computer is needed to view
the presentation, just the CDI player and a TV. Don't know if this will
help or not, but if you need more info, you can call Bob Howard at BCD
Associates, (405) 843-4574.
-Mark
Sherwood,
Believe it or not, your client can get what he wants, with 3D Studio models
and OFF THE SHELF HARDWARE, right NOW!
At Siggraph, a VR start-up company called Straylight showed a PC-based
system called PhotoVR that's based on the Intel DVI/i860 boardset. For
about $7000, you can throw the system in any PC, and then load up ANY 3D
Studio model (no matter how complex). It'll process the model overnight,
and then it'll let you run around inside of it at 15 fps with a joystick.
That's with shadows, reflections, and everything. The resolution is
comparable to flic res, and with the displays inside of the helmet, it
looks pretty amazing.
Straylight's number is 908/580/0086. Ask for Tony Ash.
– G
holy bat sh*t Mr. Yost thats great news!!!! thanks for the info. i will
contact tony on monday and see what its going to take to get this neet
little toy.
again thanks alot!
sherwood
And what's truly great about the Straylight stuff is that it really really
works… (amazing, when it comes to VR rigs)
Please keep me informed as to your experiences with it.
Thanks,
– G
talked to scott today over there and boy do i want it now! they quoted 5000
for the board and software, the board is based on the intel 750(dvi) , 2000
for the tracker, 6000 for the headset- although you can use a joy stick
instead. he said that the images are very clear and rendered to 256×240 and
are heavly dithered. it played back at 4 to 8 frames a sec with shadows,
reflections and all. you can also link realities together by fli or flc
files so the transitions are smooth.
all and all i'm very excited to get this stuff in here. it really seems to
open up walkthroughs to a new level of realizim!
thanks for the tip.
sherwood
It sounds like you've got a lot of new stuff to explore. Please keep me
posted, Sherwood.
– G
I can do it.
The question is exactly how much control does he need? If he wants realtime
texture mapped polygons, then contact Sense8 @ (415) 331-9148. If he would
be satisfied with the "railroad" tour of his future home (but still
interactive, aka 7th Guest) go for 3DS and Grasp.
-MM
he wants total control. Gary Yost suggested photoVR. so i will be checking
that route out, but thanks for the suggestions, mucho appreciado
sherwood
Sherwood,
I favour the interactive laser-disk based approach for 30fps 24-bit colour.
But, of course, it would have to be pre-rendered and have a pretty
extensive interface, like a computer game. That's the only way you'll get
that quality, though – anything less is going to be low-quality flic type
stuff.
Martin
do you have any info on software/hardware to put together something like
this on laser disk?
thanks
sherwood
Sherwood
Not yet. I'm looking into it for my client who is interested in doing
hi-quality (24-bit 30fps) interactive walkthroughs of expensive homes. I
also hear a lot of these requests now for virtual reality type
walkthroughs. I thought you were investigating laser disk based systems for
doctors? Sony makes a PC with a laser-disk and touch screen monitor built
in and they also make different level laser disks with RS232c control. Many
programs now seem to allow script control of laser disks, I just don't know
the names of any.
Martin
Yea, but are they really willing to pay what it costs? A decent
walk-through would cost $20-30K to produce professionally, and maybe more.
Most real-estate guys I have talked to figure for a couple of thousand they
should get something neat…
Virtus Walkthrough on the Macintosh (a high-end one) can do what you're
talking about (but not on a tape, obviously). Whether it can do it in
24-bit or not, I'm not sure, but I can find out easily enough, if you'd
like, by asking one of the artists here where I work. He has Virtus and
would know. I guess you'd have to rent the Mac, but it sounds like this guy
eats Third-World countries for breakfast, so just buy one and bill him.
David Taffet