Slightly off topic,have you looked at Morph3D lately??

wolf359 · June 2017

https://www.morph3d.com/

Virtual Avatars for AR& VR???

perhaps they know something the rest of the industry does not

https://www.pcgamesn.com/how-why-and-when-vr-will-fail

outrider42 · June 2017

How many people have built theater rooms in their homes? Do we knock home theaters like we do VR? The issue with VR is that people need to really experience it properly first to understand it.

VR absolutely is great. But it needs time. It needs the new tech, and it needs to get cheaper. OK, some people can't handle it, some people can't handle roller coasters either, yet I don't see amusement parks going away anytime soon. That's a non issue. Floor space is a minor issue, again for the same reason people create dedicated home theater space. If they want it enough, they'll do it. Not an issue.

The biggest problem VR has right now is that instead of working together, everybody is trying to fight each other, which is ludicrous. We are still in a VHS vs Beta phase right now, and that is killing VR. IMO, a VR headset is just like TV screen, and it should be treated as such. Instead, you have companies fighting to make games and things exclusive to their respective VR screen...just imagine if a TV station only worked on a Samsung TV. That would not fly with consumers, and it shouldn't fly with VR.

Sony has sold over a million of their PS VR sets. That's a start. But they need content. Most PS VR games are just "experiences", not full fledged games. They need more real games. If Sony actually puts the effort in it, they alone can make VR succeed regardless of what happens to Vive and Oculus.

One more thing, many people don't see the benefits VR can give you. VR can give you a home theater screen right in front of your face. You'll feel like you are looking at a 80 foot screen. You should watch a 3d movie in VR, its works so much better than it does in the theater or on a 3d TV. Hell, I didn't even like 3d until I saw a 3d movie in VR. Now...I like 3d! But even just a regular 2d movie looks impressive in VR simply because of how large it is presented.

VR is coming...if the industry will just give it a chance. Did anyone seriously expect $800 Vives to fly off the shelf? That's pretty unreasonable. The price will come down, and things will start happening. VR will probably always be niche, just like a fancy home theater. But the people who invest in it can be big spenders, too. And for that reason, I don't think VR will die.

And this is coming from somebody who is naturally pessimistic. VR is real. Now can Morph3D do something with it? I don't know, I honestly thought Morph3D was dead until you remended me it existed. That is the bigger problem for Morph3D. Personally, I feel (and have posted this several times) that Daz should just kill Morph3D and integrate it into the Daz store where somebody might actually discover it exists. Remember the forum posts a while back when people got emails from Morph3D? People thought it was a scam! They didn't even know it was real! And some of these people were long time Daz users. That is very telling of Morph3D's problem. That is a much bigger issue than betting on VR.

Daywalker Designs · June 2017

I think the problem is that they (VR equipment vendors) are keeping the prices artificially high; I finally have a VR Ready computer, but have not invested in the rest of the gear for that reason, and I'm as much of a pessimist regarding VR as you probably were before you tried it. I'd also like to see some of the aopplicatons I use (yes, including DAZ Studio, even though I have in the past said otherwise) enable the functionality if applicable to their software. I'd love to be able to see the model I'm sculpting in zBrush in 3D as I work on it, and I'd also like to see them support another item I'm considering getting for use in DA Studio.

wolf359 · June 2017

"How many people have built theater rooms in their homes?
Do we knock home theaters like we do VR?"

No because the theater rooms in homes will be watching
the same episodes of "Game Of Thrones" that everyone else
is watching, only with an enviously huge screens with superior
sound.
VR suffers from the problem of trying sell the fancy ,expensive hardware
before the Content market is properly developed

Understand this; without the appstore in place on day one
the original IPhone would have failed as an overpriced Ipod with phone calling ability

Content is KING!!

Let's say, for a moment, that
people are happy let the VR tech grow naturally
and upgrade every year or two. Where's the killer app?.

Purely on spec, the original Nintendo Gameboy was a
piece of garbage. The battery life was great, but the rest
of it was terrible. Slow. No backlight. Low res visuals.
Tinny sound. Limited controls.
In spite of that, the machine sold nearly 120M units.
That was due in no small part to
Tetris, also known as "digital crack."

Where's VR's Tetris? There might be some
potentially good titles, but there's no one title
that will single-handedly sell millions of units.
People will buy anything as long as you
give them a convincing reason to do so.

The same is true for those"3D TV"s
if content producers are not providing enough
Stereographic content the result is inevitable
https://www.cnet.com/news/3d-tv-is-now-more-dead-than-ever/

" I honestly thought Morph3D was dead
until you remended me it existed.
That is the bigger problem for Morph3D.
Personally, I feel
(and have posted this several times)
that Daz should just kill Morph3D
and integrate it into the Daz store
where somebody might actually
discover it exists."

Well according to the site, Morph3D is the "top one percent
of unity content providers with over 100 thousand content downloads"
of course that could all be based on the free MCS sample package available there
and not neccessarily actual sales.

outrider42 · June 2017

wolf359 said:

"How many people have built theater rooms in their homes?
Do we knock home theaters like we do VR?"

No because the theater rooms in homes will be watching
the same episodes of "Game Of Thrones" that everyone else
is watching, only with an enviously huge screens with superior
sound.
VR suffers from the problem of trying sell the fancy ,expensive hardware
before the Content market is properly developed

Understand this; without the appstore in place on day one
the original IPhone would have failed as an overpriced Ipod with phone calling ability

Content is KING!!

Let's say, for a moment, that
people are happy let the VR tech grow naturally
and upgrade every year or two. Where's the killer app?.

Purely on spec, the original Nintendo Gameboy was a
piece of garbage. The battery life was great, but the rest
of it was terrible. Slow. No backlight. Low res visuals.
Tinny sound. Limited controls.
In spite of that, the machine sold nearly 120M units.
That was due in no small part to
Tetris, also known as "digital crack."

Where's VR's Tetris? There might be some
potentially good titles, but there's no one title
that will single-handedly sell millions of units.
People will buy anything as long as you
give them a convincing reason to do so.

The same is true for those"3D TV"s
if content producers are not providing enough
Stereographic content the result is inevitable
https://www.cnet.com/news/3d-tv-is-now-more-dead-than-ever/

" I honestly thought Morph3D was dead
until you remended me it existed.
That is the bigger problem for Morph3D.
Personally, I feel
(and have posted this several times)
that Daz should just kill Morph3D
and integrate it into the Daz store
where somebody might actually
discover it exists."

Well according to the site, Morph3D is the "top one percent
of unity content providers with over 100 thousand content downloads"
of course that could all be based on the free MCS sample package available there
and not neccessarily actual sales.

VR targets mostly gamers. In your Gameboy example, the Gameboy launched with just 5, count them, FIVE launch titles:

U.S. launch: July 31, 1989

But...like you say, it was bundled with Tetris, which became a phenomenon. Without Tetris, that thing would have flopped hard. But still...the Gameboy only had FIVE games at launch! Selling hardware before the content has developed is basically EVERY single gaming hardware generation ever created. This is not a new thing, and I'm surprised you even counter with this argument. I already stated that VR needs content, I never denied that. But it is not comparable to the Crapple launch, which is not a gaming system, but a portable computer. It was hyped well before launch. I remember that time, none of my friends were talking about the App Store apps, lol, they just wanted an iphone because of what it was. That was probably the single most hyped product launch of all time right there. Any comparison to that or 3D TV is pointless.

And when you speak about people watching Game of Thrones, again, its not like you cannot watch GoT on a VR screen. You can. This is what I am talking about when I say people don't know everything VR can do. You can watch EVERYTHING you already have in VR, and it will feel like a theater experience. This is a big advantage over 3D TV, which needed dedicated content, you don't need dedicated content to enjoy it in VR. So yeah, I can watch the same episodes of GoT as anybody else in the comfort of VR.

So for the theater crowd, the content is ALREADY there. You can use the content you have! This is something people need to understand.

For the gamer, that's still in progress. But it suffers a chicken and egg problem. Video games cost a lot more than a 99¢ app to create, and studios don't want to drop a lot of money on something with a small install base. That's why it takes time. It is happening though, like I said, PSVR passed a million units sold. As that catches on, PC will begin to fall in line.

CypherFOX · June 2017

Greetings,

wolf359 said:

"How many people have built theater rooms in their homes?
Do we knock home theaters like we do VR?"

...

Understand this; without the appstore in place on day one
the original IPhone would have failed as an overpriced Ipod with phone calling ability

I...wait...what?

The original iPhone did not have an app store. It wasn't until the iPhone 3G (second generation) that it gained built-in support for the app store. And it was pretty darn successful as a powerful phone, before the app store. It became more so, of course, but...yeah, that statement is...let's go with 'alternate facts'.

wolf359 said:

Well according to the site, Morph3D is the "top one percent
of unity content providers with over 100 thousand content downloads"
of course that could all be based on the free MCS sample package available there
and not neccessarily actual sales.

There's a vastly larger universe of people who want to make a game than who will make a game, and those who want to will still buy items.

Anyway, VR is going to be a significant piece of our entertainment menu. It's just a matter of time. And VR DOES have a lot to do with DAZ's bread-and-butter: characters. What makes technology click with us? When we feel using it brings us closer to others. Telephones, radio, TVs, email, IM, chat. Facebook, Twitter, and Friendster/MySpace before them. Making people feel like they are closer connected with others touches something ingrained in us as humans. Putting on a headset and sitting around a virtual Algonquin Round Table with your friends all across the country would be awesome. It's going to be cheesy, and awkward, and face-palm inducing at first, and there's many folks who are never going to be comfortable with it, or who will sneer at it as 'phony' the way they sneer at Facebook now, but bringing folks together, even 'virtually' is going to be a huge need-filler. I dispute the concept of 'killer app', but I'd argue that our need to be connected with others is always a driving force.

And every person sitting around that virtual Algonquin Round Table? They need an avatar. They need to feel that it's a projection of themself. And who can provide that? Who has the experience building a morphable, tweakable, skinnable, top-notch human figure for decades?

Yeah...DAZ 3D is well positioned for VR. I hope they keep on top of it, because it could be a rocket ship for them.

-- Morgan

wolf359 · June 2017

"And every person sitting around that virtual
Algonquin Round Table?
They need an avatar.
They need to feel that it's a projection of themself.
And who can provide that?
Who has the experience building
a morphable, tweakable, skinnable,
top-notch human figure for decades?
Yeah...DAZ 3D is well positioned for VR"

I Dissagree respectfully that people in 2017 will chose to hide behind virtual avatars
Remember GoFigure?? the makers of our animate2 plugin for Daz studio.

Well, their primary business model was to provide
online avatars for people to useto represent themselves
in online environments.
and before that it was metacreations Avatar lab
where are they now??

Now that the numerical majority of westerners own a smart phone,
I have a hard time seeing "virtual avatars"
competing in the narcissitic, self branded ,instant publising
world of instagram,facebook and other social media platforms.
certainly no one would be taken seriously on dating apps like
Tender,hiding behind a cg character.

I dont see who would actually use such tech in a way that the
providers could monetize it.

Daywalker Designs · June 2017

CypherFOX said:

Greetings,

wolf359 said:

"How many people have built theater rooms in their homes?
Do we knock home theaters like we do VR?"

...

Understand this; without the appstore in place on day one
the original IPhone would have failed as an overpriced Ipod with phone calling ability

I...wait...what?

The original iPhone did not have an app store. It wasn't until the iPhone 3G (second generation) that it gained built-in support for the app store. And it was pretty darn successful as a powerful phone, before the app store. It became more so, of course, but...yeah, that statement is...let's go with 'alternate facts'.

Itunes was usable on the early iPhones, if I'm not mistaken, and I think there were apps on there for the iPod too.

wolf359 said:

"And every person sitting around that virtual
Algonquin Round Table?
They need an avatar.
They need to feel that it's a projection of themself.
And who can provide that?
Who has the experience building
a morphable, tweakable, skinnable,
top-notch human figure for decades?
Yeah...DAZ 3D is well positioned for VR"

I Dissagree respectfully that people in 2017 will chose to hide behind virtual avatars
Remember GoFigure?? the makers of our animate2 plugin for Daz studio.

Well, their primary business model was to provide
online avatars for people to useto represent themselves
in online environments.
and before that it was metacreations Avatar lab
where are they now??

Now that the numerical majority of westerners own a smart phone,
I have a hard time seeing "virtual avatars"
competing in the narcissitic, self branded ,instant publising
world of instagram,facebook and other social media platforms.
certainly no one would be taken seriously on dating apps like
Tender,hiding behind a cg character.

I dont see who would actually use such tech in a way that the
providers could monetize it.

Not everyone is comfortable with sharing their real likeness with people they don't know personally; how many people on Facebook or Google+ actually know more than a small fraction of their online 'Friends" personally? I can see the possiblities of Avatars for those folks, and people that want to project a much different image of themselves than what folks would actually see if they allowed their real likeness to be depicted.

wolf359 · June 2017

"Not everyone is comfortable with sharing their real l
ikeness with people they don't know personally;
how many people on Facebook or Google+ actually
know more than a small fraction of their online 'Friends" personally? I can see the possiblities of Avatars for those folks, and people that want to project a much different image of themselves than what folks would actually
see if they allowed their real likeness to be depicted."

This is correct
It is just that I am not sure how a company
builds a profitable business model selling these
in competition with the many free resouces.
https://laughingsquid.com/faceyourmanga-create-your-own-custom-avatar/

BTW I downloaded the "ReadyRoom" app
https://morphid.com/

Its kind of cool!!
if we could get the bandwidth and other standards
unified for live, realtime digital replacement with one of these characters
it might gain some traction with millenials but then there is already
"The Sims"

bluejaunte · June 2017

CypherFOX said:

And every person sitting around that virtual Algonquin Round Table? They need an avatar. They need to feel that it's a projection of themself. And who can provide that? Who has the experience building a morphable, tweakable, skinnable, top-notch human figure for decades?

Yeah...DAZ 3D is well positioned for VR. I hope they keep on top of it, because it could be a rocket ship for them.

-- Morgan

I think I would have to disagree with that a lttle bit as well. An avatar alone won't do anything, you need an environment where these avatars can even exist and that's way more challenging. Frankly the kings there would probably be Linden Labs who had a full blown virtual world going with Second Life and they are also working on a successor. I don't see Daz positoned particularly well at all when it comes to VR which needs realtime rendering typically using game engines. Morph3D tries to tap into that market but really hasn't got by itself an awful lot to do with VR at all. I don't think it's much more than a pipe dream to hope any big time commercial project that would have people be represented by an avatar would use Morph3D to do so. They will develop their own thing that they can tailor to the experience and also monetize without any strings attached.

Obviously the big player as far as a possible chat app or social media VR experience would be Facebook who bought Oculus and they are sure as hell not going to use anything close to realistic characters. Such things I think will look more like this for a good long while:

RorrKonn · June 2017

Morph3D characters are in Unity store.So if VR takes off great ,if not Unitys not going any where.

drzap · June 2017

First of all, when VR takes off (and I say when, not if), everyone will need an avatar, is that not so? I mean, its not like you can project a webcam video into VR space so everyone will be represented by some sort of avatar even if it's just a static gif. Most people will select an avatar from what's available on their favorite social app. As mentioned before, I espect Facebook to be a major portal as well as Microsoft, Sony, and new social apps to spring from this. But Morph3D is claiming to be able to provide a persistent avatar across all VR realms? There is no standard VR realm yet. Remember when there was ICQ and Yahoo IM? Yahoo would constantly try to match it's protocol with ICQ so IM chat users could interact with ICQ users? Every few weeks or months, ICQ would change so as to break the connection. ICQ was the father of modern instant chat messaging and didn't want to share. Even now, Wechat, MSN or Facebook can't intermingle on the same network. I see that happening in the VR realm for the time being. I hope a standard will develop and a common portal can be established, but it just looks as if Morph3d is offering a portal into their network and hoping others will follow.

linvanchene · June 2017

What we can observe is that some "clusters" of companies are trying to come up with common standards for Virtual Reality VR and Augmented Reality AR technology.

Morph3D - Unity - Otoy - ORBX - Light field rendering - 360 Video - Facebook - Oculus - Samsung TV

-> It may take 2-3 years until all the technology is ready to connect all the pieces. Other sources talk about six years or longer.

Several clusters of companies with different VR technology will compete and then longer down the road we may see one or two common VR standards that are ready for main stream users.

- - -

If you are interested in more information about VR and AR check out some videos of Vision 2017.

Those videos are about 30 minutes long each and provide a good overview of the current challenges in each field.

Vision 2017 - Lessons from Oculus: Overcoming VR Roadblocks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swA8cm8r4iw

- - -

Vision 2017 - Beyond the Screen: Using the Real World as Your AR Canvas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkCJLq_Za0Q

- - -

Vision 2017 - Unity + Octane: The Path to Holographic Cinematic Rendering

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9oILsWlW1U

- - -

-> there are a lot more videos of Vision 2017 on youtube.

- - -

diogenese19348 · June 2017

We have a member over at Daggerbay that uses VR to create content. His handle is P3nT4gR4m. He sculpts in Oculus Medium and the results are really impressive.

nonesuch00 · June 2017

There are already successful avatar supply businesses in the Unity world so that Morph 3D would try it's hand at it is no suprise at all and theirs are already better quality and have morphing capabilities the other's doesn't. I don't think none of those non-Morph3D avatar businesses are as successful of Morph3D though and Morph3D hasn't even started selling Avatar services yet.

Personally, I think that owing to the announcement that Amazon made to integrating a virtual changing room (initially via expensive Alexa add-on HW though with will cause the concept to flop I think) into their internet store via personally fitted and customized avatars for their customers; it is a natural that Amazon would eventually make such avatars freely usable via some avatar transport protocol for use freely in other 3rd party games and apps as a persistant reminder to shop Amazon.

So that of course is really likely to be very good and competent competition that maybe places like Wal-Mart and others will also seek to develop and deploy before Amazon is able too. And talk about your advertising coups! Free advertising presence for Amazon and whoever else makes the most useful virtual assistants that can help get clothing that fits and looks good with the added bonus of fewer returns. Know how much businesses spend on advertising? Consider for a minute how much advertising revenue pays for with regards to the entertainment content you see. That is huge cost of business savings!

Really it's not a bad ideal for DAZ / Morph 3D / Singular Inversions to look at and develop too as maybe they are already better positioned to create such a protocol and the associated technology and license it to businesses like WalMart.

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Slightly off topic,have you looked at Morph3D lately??

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