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Life inside the Cave

Posted on 9 Apr 2008 at 16:15

Land Rover plans to use a similar cluster PC setup to power its facility at Gaydon, although it will be employing16 PCs instead of five, each one sporting two Nvidia Quadro FX 4600s to produce more detailed simulations. But how detailed? "Being photorealistic takes a lot of processing power - we're looking at one-wall, possibly two-wall, immersive photorealism initially," says Waterfield. "For four-wall, we'll be using CAD data that we hope to get textured. It will be as good as the pictures you see in a magazine."

Other worlds

The CAVE's potential doesn't stop at ground level. Royal Dutch Shell currently employs a CAVE to visualise underground formations based on seismic charts, helping its engineers to locate potential drill sites. Astronomers have begun loading star charts into the system to get a better idea of how the solar system works, while archaeologists around the world are using CAVE technology to reconstruct ancient sites from antique plans and sensor surveys. And architects can take their clients around their dream home long before it's built, giving them the opportunity to show off the flourishes they'd like them to pay extra for, although that, too, has its dangers.

"The problem is that once you've built a 3D model, people tend to believe it," says Steed. "If you build a virtual house and allow people to walk around, the actual building has to be very close or the client will remember the model and complain. It does help in the planning stage, though. Since it's one-to-one scale, if you have to duck to go through a doorway, you know you've made a mistake in your plans."

Yet of all the potential applications for the CAVE, the one area that's enjoyed surprising success at UCL is psychotherapy. "We've used this on people with a fear of heights," explains UCL's Dr David Swapp. "We put them in a virtual Royal Albert Hall and then move them up, balcony-by-balcony, to assess their reaction. The question was would we see the same kind of anxiety, because if the person didn't show it, it would be a non-starter. It was actually surprising how well it worked."

To prove the point, he gives us a quick demonstration of the public-speaking application. In this simulation, the user is confronted by a boardroom filled with bored executives, shuffling around and yawning, even putting their feet on the table. The head tracker on the shutter glasses allows the executives' gaze to follow us as we move around the table and, although they're nowhere near as realistic as the statue, the effect is unnerving. "The response of people was really interesting," says Swapp. "Even with the neutral audience who don't do very much, people would read a lot into their responses.

"They'd say things like, 'That woman sitting at the back is giving me funny looks whenever I talk about a certain subject', when no such thing was happening."

And for our next trick...

The next stage for the CAVE is the ability to fool the other senses. Spatial audio is already being used to realistically simulate voices and sound effects within the virtual environment and, although experiments aimed at adding smells have met with varying degrees of success, they're continuing regardless. Clearly, however, the greatest challenge is allowing people to touch things in the CAVE, which is where haptics - the study of touch - comes in. Computer games already benefit from early haptic devices, such as force-feedback steering wheels, but these simple "rumble" devices are just the tip of the iceberg: scientists are currently working on gloves capable of mimicking weight and resistance.It's a technology Waterfield admits to being excited about.