Virtual Reality in woodworking sounds like a recipe for disaster—or at least a few missing fingers. But [The Swedish Maker] decided to put this concept to the test, diving into a full woodworking project while wearing a Meta Quest 3. You can check out the full experiment here, but let’s break down the highs, lows, and slightly terrifying moments of this unconventional build.
The plan: complete a full furniture build while using the VR headset for everything—from sketching ideas to cutting plywood. The Meta Quest 3’s passthrough mode provided a semi-transparent AR view, allowing [The Swedish Maker] to see real-world tools while overlaying digital plans. Sounds futuristic, right? Well, the reality was more like a VR fever dream. Depth perception was off, measuring was a struggle, and working through a screen-delayed headset was nauseating at best. Yet, despite the warped visuals, the experiment uncovered some surprising advantages—like the ability to overlay PDFs in real-time without constantly running back to a computer.
So is VR useful to the future of woodworking? If you’re a woodworking novice, you might steer clear from VR and read up on the basics first. For the more seasoned: maybe, when headsets evolve beyond their current limitations. For now, it’s a hilarious, slightly terrifying experiment that might just inspire the next wave of augmented reality workshops. If you’re more into electronics, we did cover the possibilities with AR some time ago. We’re curious to know your thoughts on this development in the comments!
Much better: the dynamicland folks do projection mapping to project your cuts right on the wood. No goggles.
You can see a brief clip in the first minute of this video. https://dynamicland.org/2024/Intro/
That’s cool and all… But I want one tool to rule them all, I want something similar, but smarter. Something that is the ultimate workshop measure, digital mapping, and laser tracing tool.
As proof of concept – great. The future is here.
But I own a Quest 3 and the pass through is not quite good enough to make it viable.
Furthermore, I took part in an experiment called Experience Lag, while studying in Umeå, Sweden. The effect of lag in real life is quite disastrous.
After that experiment, and while HUD projectors like Google Glass were all the hype at that time, we tried to design a hybrid refractor-reflector HUD device. It was much bulkier than the Google Glass and looked more like a Vive headset with transparent lenses. The system worked well. But there were three main issues with it, that prevented commercialisation:
It was very computationally intensive, we couldn’t even dream about making the device standalone. Maybe today it would be easier to solve this problem.
Lack of an ecosystem. Making apps for the ar hud was tricky and it still is. Our proof of concept was a program that projected trajectory of a pingpong ball. Even this task was extremely hard.
It still lagged like hell. Even when we optimized the program down to machine code.
The gadgets keep getting better, but the furniture keeps getting worse. Really makes you think.
I think the point is that the more gadgets the less people think.
Vivid imagination will remain the best VR for some time.
looks like a good way to lose a finger.
If the lord thought we need 10 finger, he would not gave us computer with binary number system!
yeah no. as a maker i love innovation but for safety and practicality i will never put this in a makerspace. ever.
lets put it this way, osha would never approve it.
With a real direct optical pass through AR headset I’d think this idea is simply good but still not required, as a cork/white board next to work bench etc…
Still you get eye protection and to see the drawing you are working to or the voltage the meter is reading in easy view while you don’t have to turn from the probes, and should the computer be lagging your head movements so the overlay is not keeping up the most important thing the real world isn’t delayed.
VR is a completely wrong (and extremely unsafe!) tool for the job.
Optical pass-through augmented reality headsets in manufacturing are a known quantity and are used here and there already. Mostly for maintenance and quality control (display diagrams, manuals, instructions overlaid on the machine) but also for assembly (e.g. Boeing was trialing this for a while).
Using camera pass-through mixed reality while having camera lag, limited peripheral vision and working with equipment like a circular saw (or basically any other machinery) is a major accident waiting to happen. For factories or professional setting this is a complete safety no-go – imagine wearing a headset like this and you walk straight into the path of an approaching forklift or a robot because you have “blinders” on like a horse. And/or don’t see/hear the warning signal/horn.
It is one of those things where the “just because I can doesn’t mean I should” applies more than ever. I am not sure the Youtube views are worth the potential life-changing injury here.
This has the energy of “I found a good idea for getting views on my video” and not “I found a good idea for my woodworking projects”.
Let’s take the most dangerous tool in the shop, the table saw, and make it even more dangerous. At least partially obstructed vision and encumbered with a gadget hanging on your head. Not even a blade guard. Oh, and please spare me the “I’ve done that for many years and never had an accident because I know what I’m doing” thing.
Not my fingers, not my problem.
I still refuse to consider table saws the most dangerous when I know how people act when they’ve got a circular saw, chainsaw, sawzall, angle grinder, etc in their hands. Not that I like the idea of a VR mentality around one.
Headset-delayed passthrough visuals?! I sure hope he wasn’t running a table saw with this thing on… And people were driving with this?! I thought it was an AR overlay on top of a clear screen, you could see the real world with AR projected on top. That not being the case, this thing sounds ridiculous…
[Just about to start a difficult cut on a power tool that can definitely remove a limb if you aren’t paying attention]
“A new update is available, we need to restart to apply it.”
When I saw the picture I had to laugh. I couldn’t help it. It’s just so silly.
Good on the guy for doing the research on behalf of those of us who evaluate even simple home improvement projects in terms of the bandages required.
Wrong hardware for this, use the xreal. It projects the display like the google glass but with 2 screens in a sunglass format.
Never mind the VR. Maybe the first step bringing tech into the shop should be computer vision that will turn off the tool if the operator is doing something unsafe.
In that title image there is no blade guard on the saw and the operator is crosscutting while holding the material in two places. That’s just asking for kickback.
There’s even a cross cutting sled right there. Hold the material against the sled and leave the other side free. At least it looks like they are on a sawstop.
Stay safe!