Pygmalion's Spectacles

Hello again, I hope everyone had a great week. This week at TimeFire VR was a week focused on organization. I have begun organizing the interviews I have conducted. On top of that, I have begun outlining my presentation. I am doing this early, in order to help me guide what pieces of my interviews I want to focus on. For example, the developers know a lot about VR and how it could be implemented; therefore, I will be using part of their responses to help when I discuss the future of VR. While the consumer that I interviewed differ in that respect. The consumers were able to pinpoint slight nuances that highlight pros and cons to the virtual reality and the HTC Vive.

I also began doing some research on the history of Virtual Reality. The very first entry of virtual reality in science fiction dates back to a short story called Pygmalion's Spectacles.  I read it and it is basically a man who meets a scientist in New York. The scientist tempts the man with glasses that take you to another world. The man in disbelief agrees to try on the glasses, and he is utterly surprised. He is taken to another world that is quite colorful and shocking. 

In conclusion, the concept of glasses taking you to another world originates from this story. If you are interested here is the link: Pygmalion's Spectacles PDF. I highly recommend you read it, it is fairly short. 

Above is an illustration for Pygmalion's Spectacles 

If I do research on the History, I may as well do some on current events. I started a google drive and I am basically just stockpiling it with articles about virtual reality. Who know's I may have an idea to use some of the information soon. And the applications and stories about virtual reality are entertaining regardless.

For my survey I talked about it with my supervisor today so I should have an answer by next week. Fingers crossed! 

Finally I just worked some more in Unreal Engine. I managed to to incorporate a death animation and a hit/stun animation. 

That sums up this week of work. I hope everyone has a great weekend and that their projects are going well. 

Griffin

Back from Spring Break!

Hello everyone I hope everyone had a nice spring break! Despite last week being spring break I still managed to pop into my office once. An employee and two of her daughters tried out VR. I used this opportunity to provide them with some questions that would help further my research. These questions were not exactly the same as the questions I was planning on asking my participants for my survey; however, hopefully I can find a use for them. Unexpectedly, she had two more of her children come in and try VR this week. But I could not make it.

Thankfully yesterday I communicated with both her sons about their opinion of VR over Skype. They used the same art program as her two daughters that came a week earlier and I asked them the same questions. Today I finished up listening to their recordings and writing up what they told me.

The only difference really between them and what I am planning to do with a survey group is the number of VR headsets they used. Because these 4 people came in at their own leisure they only tried out one headset, the HTC Vive. The only discrepancy between the two groups would be this, these four not having a reference between other VR headsets, because they only used one. That is why I aimed their questions more towards whether or not VR is even worth it. Alternatively, the other group would answer if it is worth it, which tier of headset should I invest in.

I am making decent progress now that I have 4 consumer's opinions and 4 developer's opinions. But I still am looking for a way to get more opinions for VR. I am still heavily considering the survey, and next week is when I will decide what I am going to do next.

Above is some of my own work, just some stuff that I have been working on for the last few weeks. The sprites(artwork) is not mine, but open to the public; however, the animation and coding/blueprinting I did myself. It may not look like much, and there is a little more than you haven't seen, but this took a while to complete.

I know I have been throwing around the term blueprinting often and here is what it actually looks like:


Other than that I hope everyone's abstracts turned out well; and I hope everyone has a great week back from spring break. Until next week!

Griffin 

More Updates!

Hello again, I hope everyone is doing great. Not only did I work on my project this week, I also had the opportunity to shadow some classes at ASU. I shadowed some W.P. Carey and  Thunderbird School of Global Management classes.

First of this week I finished off my interviews. I have about 30 minutes of audio recordings from 4 different developers. I am currently working on processing the audio recording and taking out all the highlights from their responses. I am very pleased with the outcome of my interviews. I plan to use their responses to help give a developer's perspective on virtual reality. I feel like the interviews serve as a very tangible piece of information, and I am excited to see how it contrasts with my survey results.

Also this week I talked more about my upcoming survey with my boss. I am still currently working out if it is possible. But I should know whether or not it will be possible at the end of next week. Fingers crossed that I can make it happen, I feel like it would really benefit what I am trying to accomplish: insight on virtual reality.

Speaking of next week! By far the most difficult part of my survey would of been finding two young children to answer questions about VR. But thankfully, one of my co-workers is bringing in her two young children to try out VR. So despite next week being spring break, I will be going in on Tuesday when my co-worker brings in her children and asking them some questions about what they experienced. I will have to write up a new set of questions specifically tailored for them, considering their experience will be a bit different than what I plan to do for my tests. This is actually a huge relief.

I also spent some more time working on unreal engine 4. Nothing that directly pertains to my project; however, I feel like it is interesting enough, and it helps me better understand why developers may think a certain way.

Anyway I hope that everyone has a great spring week! I am looking forward to how my and my peers projects progress!