Disruptive Technologies for Smart Cities – Virtual Reality

DISRUPTIVE TECHNOLOGIES FOR SMART CITIES – Virtual REALITY

3/31/2021

The article is a continuation of the series of articles for disruptive technologies for smart cities we started publishing in April, 2020. The article is based on the outputs produced by partners under the project Smart Technologies by design (Smart by Design) and is the last from these series.

It was found that there are many digital and/or data-based technologies that are to a large extend applicable in the real conditions of the city and contribute to its coping with public problems or challenges. They are used in diverse areas like transport, energy, utility, urban, health, etc.

These technologies are called smart city technologies and the main purpose of the Smart Technologies by Design project has been to map and select eleven technologies that refer (to the greatest extent) to the concept of a smart city and have already been implemented in diverse areas of application of one city. This article presents Virtual reality.

Description

Virtual reality (VR) is a three-dimensional, computer-generated environment that people can explore and interact with. This technology places the user in a new experience; immersing them and making them interact with a new 3D world.

The main purpose of VR resides in simulating as many senses as possible, like vision, hearing, touching, and even smelling. It is very common to mix VR with the Augmented Reality (AR). While AR simulates artificial objects in a real environment, VR creates a fully artificial environment for the interaction of users.

In order to achieve a full VR experience, it has to correspond with the following aspects:

Believable: the user has to believe or feel that is in another world.
Interactive: as the user moves, the VR world needs to move as well.
Computer-generated: only powerful computers with realistic 3D computer graphics are fast enough to make it believable and interactive enough.
Explorable: it has to be big and detailed enough, so that the user is able to explore it and discover the “virtual world”.
Immersive: the VR needs to engage both, mind and body of the user.

As there are some technologies that do not respond in the same way like the previous requirements, there are different types of VR:

Fully Immersive: which contains a detailed virtual world to explore, a powerful computer and hardware which will help to fully immerse in the environment.
Non-Immersive: simulators with big screens or headphones, but without a fully immersive experience can be considered as VR. There are some examples in which full immersion is not needed like: flight simulators, 3D buildings, etc.
Collaborative: it is a non-immersive technology/entertainment which permits sharing the virtual world with other people. Ex: Minecraft.
Web-based: it is basically trying to create a virtual world on the web but without any immersive experience.
Virtual Reality needs some gadgets, which make the experience more realistic: Head-mounted displays (glasses), immersive rooms, data gloves or wands.

Current Status

Platforms

Some of the best-known providers of VR technology providers are:

Moreover, currently, VR needs some special glasses or Head-mounted displays (HMD) in order to create the virtual world. Some of those glasses are:

Existing Standards

There are already some international standards for VR applications:

ISO/IEC 14772-2:2004: Information technology -- Computer graphics and image processing -- The Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) -- Part 2: External authoring interface (EAI)
ISO/IEC 14772-1:1997: Information technology -- Computer graphics and image processing -- The Virtual Reality Modeling Language -- Part 1: Functional specification and UTF-8 encoding
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 24: Computer graphics, image processing, and environmental data representation
ISO/IEC 14496-3:2009: Information technology -- Coding of audio-visual objects -- Part 3: Audio
ISO/IEC TR 15440:2016: Information technology -- Future keyboards and other input devices and entry methods
ISO 9241-940:2017: Ergonomics of human-system interaction -- Part 940: Evaluation of tactile and haptic interactions

Apart from these, there are many standards and projects under development by the IEEE.

Key Applications

VR is a technology that is used in a lot of different types of applications:

Military: flight simulation, medic training, virtual boot camp, battlefield simulation
Healthcare: human simulation, virtual reality, virtual robotic surgery
Fashion: a virtual fashion show, second life fashion
Business: virtual tours of business environments, 360º view of products, training of employees
Sport: VR performance, equipment design and innovation, events closer to the audience
Scientific visualization: showing complex ideas in visual formats for physics, biology, astronomy, chemistry
Construction: virtual exploring design, simulated construction, viability
Education: virtual reality astronomy, technology closer to children
Entertainment: virtual museums, galleries, virtual theme parks, discovery centers
Virtual heritage sites: monuments, sculptures, historical buildings, old towns, caves, archaeological sites
Engineering: design-cycle, rail construction, car design
Film and TV: music, books, art
Training of professionals in different sectors
Support for cognitive diseases and elder people

Expected Evolution

Platforms

It is obvious that Virtual Reality is one of the most promising technologies for the future. Firms will continue trying to send users to new places that have not been before and providing new solutions to multiple sectors.

VR is originally linked to the gaming and entertainment industries but it will also influence other fields. For example, students will be able to explore historical places immersing them in virtual worlds. Even if it seems a very difficult approach in the short term, new platforms and solutions will be developed in order to improve and evolve Virtual Reality towards a more realistic and affordable technology.

The idea is that the future of VR will involve more than headsets and controllers, it is expected to be more physical. It will be more sensory-oriented than nowadays, which is more focused on the visual sense.

Next devices are expected to introduce much better touch controls, temperature change or smells, making them more complete reality simulators.

Standards

There are already some standards established in VR. But, as mentioned above, there are lots of working groups conducting new projects with the objective of placing new standards. Some of the most relevant ones are:

IEEE P2048.1: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Device Taxonomy and Definitions
IEEE P2048.2: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Immersive Video Taxonomy and Quality Metrics
IEEE P2048.3: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Immersive Video File and Stream Formats
IEEE P2048.4: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Person Identity
IEEE P2048.5: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Environment Safety
IEEE P2048.6: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Immersive User Interface
IEEE P2048.7: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Map for Virtual Objects in the Real World
IEEE P2048.8: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Interoperability Between Virtual Objects and the Real World
IEEE P2048.9: Standard for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality: Immersive Audio Taxonomy and Quality Metrics

Potential Applications in the Future

As it is a very cross-sectorial technology that can be applied to most sectors, countless applications will be developed in the future. Some of those can be next ones:

Business : virtual conferences which will save lots of traveling costs
Gaming: the fully immersive experience
Travelling industry: being able to transfer any environment from the world to some local point allowing people with difficulties to travel
Films: in the same way that the 3D films started, a fully immersive watching films experience will be available in the future
Surgery: even if some platforms already appeared, there is still a very long way to go in order to implement it in a more practical and wide way
Space exploration
Quality of life: the life of people with impairment, diseases or physical problems will be able to enjoy a better life, simulating other realities
Training for any industrial or logistic sectors

Author
KISMC

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