CastAR: The Augmented And Virtual Reality Triple-Threat

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By Alex Davies
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On our last day at CES 2014, we got to go hands-on with an early prototype of a most interesting pair of Augmented and Virtual Reality glasses. Currently in development, CastAR can project holographic-like 3D imagery right in front of you.

Experiencing Projected AR

Again, castAR is one of those products that you really have to experience in-person to fully appreciate. But now that we’ve explained how the glasses work, we’ll try to give you an impression of what it's like to use them. Technical Illusions let us try out the new HD prototype, which projects a 720p image out into the world. Even in this early stage of development, the castAR glasses are very light and comfortable to wear.

Angy Bots screenshot (not running on CastAR)

The first demo we were shown was a third-person shooter called Angry Bots, a sample project made with the Unity Engine, and an example of how easy it is to get Unity games running in castAR. While field of view issues affected the demo's ability to draw us in, it was still a good example of how existing games can be adapted to castAR. Technical Illusions also added that the horizontal field of view will be much better on the final product.

Next, we were shown what Rick called the company's “non-infringing Star Wars-like chess scene”. Although the demo wasn't interactive, it served as a much better indicator of what castAR can do. You see a 3D chess board with animated pieces projected onto it, and when you move around, toward, or away from the board, your view shifts as if the pieces are there in front of you. It’s believable enough that you feel tempted to reach out and pick up one of the characters, which of course you can't. With the integration of gesture recognition through Kinext, though, you will be able to in the future. This is the demo that impressed me most. It was the first time I've used an AR system able to draw my mind in and make the content out in front of me believeable.

The third demo was similarly a non-interactive scene. But instead of a chess board, it was an RPG-style dungeon filled with armored skeletons. Again, it looked impressively real. You could lean in very close to the skeletons to see their detail work. Regardless of angle, they always appeared right where they were expected.

Granted, all of this depends on the retro-reflective surface, so the immersion factor is influenced heavily by the size of the surface available to you. We asked if it's possible to surround yourself with the material, creating a 360-degree experience and were told yes, it should be, so long as you have enough head-tracking markers.

Testing Multi-User CastAR (via Technical Illusions)

The last demo showed how castAR may be used for more than gaming. It was a simple non-interactive virtual desktop that Rick threw together, with different windows appearing in front of you on different planes.

Alex Davies
13 Comments Comment from the forums
  • blackmagnum
    Someone's been trigger happy with the hot-glue gun.
    Reply
  • Quarkzquarkz
    Wait, so will this be better than Oculus Rift? I'm really curious now.
    Reply
  • CaedenV
    This is pretty neat!Back when I was a kid in the '90s my dad use to work for a company that made 3D scanners, and I had the opportunity to follow him one day to go repair a scanner at a college. While there the college students kept me entertained with a system kind of similar to this. It was based on a stereoscopic rear-projection screen, and a set of head tracking polarized glasses. It was pretty cool, and I have been very supprised that we have not seen much like it until now.The other cool thing was that rather than a big funky wand, you basically had 2 handheld devices with buttons under each finger in order to interact with the enviornment. One button would allow you to grab and move an object, another would allow you to rotate, others would bring up context menus, or 'in game' options. It was all really neat.Anywho, the big thing that it was missing (other than good graphics... it was the '90s after all) was the ability to have a multiple users. With multiple users interacting on the same playing field like this new AR can do, it makes for some much more interesting gameplay.I really hope that things like VR and AR are able to take off. When I was a kid I was promised that I could go live in space, and that we would have holodecks available... so far we are 0 for 2, but I would be pretty happy if we could get one or the other off the ground.
    Reply
  • CaedenV
    12771614 said:
    Wait, so will this be better than Oculus Rift? I'm really curious now.

    Certainly not 'better' in the way of quality. The nice thing about Oculus Rift is that you have a much more controlled enviornment, and are able to surround yourself with a virtural world while blocking out reality. This system is meant to open up more social or alternative styles of gameplay. Much more flexible in what it can do... but it will necessarily always have drawbacks because the environment is less controlled. Ambient light can wash out your characters, resolution on projectors vs a screen are always going to suffer more from things like the screen door effect, and it is much more difficult to cram 2 high resolution projectors in the same space as a single high res monitor.

    So it is one of those things where you win some and you loose some. I think the Oculus Rift will have much more of a following for hard core gamers, and even myself as a moderate gamer. But the Rift will always suffer in the popular market because (as is the great secret of Nintendo) people, especially kids (or parents of those kids), enjoy more social games. Things that block reality out have a very difficult time gaining traction. But something like this AR would offer more social interaction. Essentially high tech board and card games, or some sort of choose your own adventure games. I could just imagine something like Warhammer, or D&D being played like this where you can throw down a card or a token and have a 3D character on the field of battle. Or better yet, combine UI hardware like this with a content creator like Project Spark in a school setting to engage students in cooperative programming and game environments!

    At any rate, you loose out on quality, but you have the potential to gain in other ways which could be much more interesting than the Rift. Very different devices aimed at very different uses and markets.
    Reply
  • Omid_m_19
    Beside D&D and board games that have been mentioned in the article,and I add TCG(Trading card games,like Yu-gi oh and infinity wars),I think other things too will be much fun.For example,by adding kinect,you can play a fighting game,seeing your opponent in front of you,and with kinect monitoring your body actions,you hit or block AI fighter,like real fights.I think it would be very useful in learning martial arts.
    Reply
  • Omid_m_19
    Beside D&D and board games that have been mentioned in the article,and I add TCG(Trading card games,like Yu-gi oh and infinity wars),I think other things too will be much fun.For example,by adding kinect,you can play a fighting game,seeing your opponent in front of you,and with kinect monitoring your body actions,you hit or block AI fighter,like real fights.I think it would be very useful in learning martial arts.
    Reply
  • rsktek
    Wondered how long it would take Tom's to mention this tech gear.
    Reply
  • tristangl
    Off topic and no one will care butI find that dev girl very cute hehe
    Reply
  • tristangl
    Off topic and no one will care butI find that dev girl very cute hehe
    Reply
  • tristangl
    darn I forgot that you CANNOT hit refresh on Toms pageGuys at Tom... can you fix that stupid bug where it double post your comment if you ever hit F5 once you post somethingShould be already fixed... I mean you are a a tech website are you not??!!?
    Reply