Hitchhiking the Backroads to Augmented Reality

Posted on by James Ashley

To date, Microsoft has been resistant to sharing information about the HoloLens technology. Instead, they have relied on shock and awe demos to impress people with the overall experience rather than getting mired down in the nitty-gritty of the software and hardware engineering. Even something as simple as the field-of-view is never described in mundane numbers but rather in circumlocutions about tv screens X distance from the viewer. It definitely builds up mystery around the product.

Given the lack of concrete information, lots of people have attempted to fill in the gaps with varying degrees of success which, in their own way, make it difficult to navigate the technological true true. In an effort to simplify the research one typically has to do on one’s own in order to understand HoloLens and AR, I’ve made a sort of map for those interested in making their way. Here are some of the best resources I’ve found.

1. You should start with the Oculus blog, which is obviously about the Oculus and not about HoloLens. Nevertheless, the core technology the makes the Oculus Rift work is also in the HoloLens in some form. Moreover, the Oculus blog is a wonderful example of sharing and successfully explaining complicated concepts to the layman. Master these posts about how the Rift works and you are half way to understanding how HoloLens works:

2. Next, you should really read Oliver Kreylos’s (Doc OK) brilliant posts about the HoloLens field of view and waveguide display technology. Many disagreements around HoloLens would evaporate if people would simply invest half an hour into reading OK’s insights :

3. If you’ve gone through these, then you are ready for Dr. Michael J. Gourlay’s youtube discussion of surface reconstruction, occlusion, tracking and mapping. Sadly the audio drops out at key moments and the video drops out for the entire Q & A, but there’s lots of gold for everyone in this mine. Also check out his audio interview at Georgia Tech:

4. There have been lots of first-impression blog posts concerning the HoloLens, but Jasper Brekelmans provides far-and-away the best of these by following a clear just-the-facts-ma’am approach:

5. HoloLens isn’t only about learning new technology but also discovering a new design language. Mike Alger’s video provides a great introduction into the problems as well as some solutions for AR/VR interface and usability design:

6. Oculus, Leap Motion and others who have been designing VR experiences provide additional useful tips about what they have discovered along the way in articles like the now famous “Swayze Effect” (yes, that Swayze):

7. Finally, here are some video parodies and inspirational videos of VR and AR from the tv show Community and others:

I know I’ve left a lot of good material out, but these have been some of the highlights for me over the past year while hitchhiking on the backroads leading to Augmented Reality. Drop them in your mental knapsack, stick out your thumb and wait for the future to pick you up.