If there was one sentence heard over and over at Maker Faire NY, it was “Did you see castAR yet?” The Technical Illusions team was at Maker Faire in full force. [Jeri Ellsworth], [Rick Johnson,] and team brought two demos: the tried and true Jenga simulator, and a newer overhead shooter based on the Unity 3D engine. We didn’t see any earth shattering changes from the previous demos of castAR, as [Jeri] has moved into optimization of the Hardware, and [Rick] toward even more immersive demos of the software. Optimization and preparing for market are considered the “hard yards” of any product design. This is the place where a huge amount of work goes in, but the changes are subtle to the layperson.
In addition to her development of castAR’s ASIC, [Jeri] has been hard at work on the optics. The “old” glasses used a solid plastic optical path. The newer glasses use a hollow path for the twin 720p projectors. This makes them even lighter than the previous generation. Weight on the castAR glasses can’t be overstated. They feel incredibly light. There was no perceptible pressure on the nose or ears when wearing them. Also missing was the motion sickness people often experience with VR. This is because castAR doesn’t replace the user’s vision field, it only augments the vision. Peripheral motion cues are still there, which makes for a much more comfortable experience.
We talked with [Rick] about some of the software challenges he’s faced. One of them was rendering two images for the twin projectors on the glasses. In order to fit everything in the glasses, the right projection path is inverted. [Rick] had to create an inverted optical path to handle this. A PC setup next to the demo showed all the work the software was doing to create what was a seamless experience from the eyes of the user.
One of the most impressive things about castAR is how quickly the image disappears when one moves off axis of the projectors. This is a feature of the retroreflective material Technical Illusions is using. What it means in the real world is that several players can share the same material “playfield”.
Mid October for the Kickstarter. Assuming price isn’t ‘excessive’, this’ll definitely be my first ever backing.
(I’m not typically a fan of making an investment for no positive return and high risk… but I pretty confident Jeri of all people will be able to deliver)
Thank you Hack A Day for covering us. We enjoyed meeting you! Come talk to us on FB https://www.facebook.com/technicalillusions or our forums to find out when we go live on KS. http://technicalillusions.com/forums/
gizmag reckon a pledge level of $200-250
Same here, this will be the first project I’ll be backing
Then it will only be a matter of waiting for castar to be released and somebody coding some kind of pen & paper rpg interface :)
Thanks for that! Look for us October 15th. Also you should read about our RFID grid and the table top abilities it showcases. Use on minis, effects, aoe indicators, health bars, etc.
I saw this at the San Mateo Maker Faire. The head tracking was rock solid and the weight/form factor made it really easy to pass it around.
I really want to use this for tabletop gaming.
Big fan of Jeri. She’s hit some home runs before. I hope this one goes out of the park for her and Technical Illusions. If the Leap Motion wasn’t so blippy with ambient IR, I’d say those two companies should work together.
I definitely can not wait to see this come out. The list for use case scenarios is quite big. So it definitely looks like a winner of a product.
I like Jeri./ She makes me feel all funny inside! Shes’ like a Wonder Woman version of Kari Byron, LOL!
Thanks for all the kind comments. We’re very proud of the performance and excited that the difficult problems have been solved. Next steps are to make it pretty with some industrial design and cutting tools for manufacturing.
Dear Jeri,
I miss your videos on Youtube
Well that’s a different approach. Most kickstarters make it pretty first, then worry about getting it work.