From: mbernat@gel.ulaval.ca (Marc Bernatchez)
Subject: Re: TECH: Need ideas for monoscopic HMD project
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 96 02:10:28 GMT
Organization: dep. de Genie electrique


>deadpool@pheonix.net (DeadPool) wrote:
>I am currently working a little project and need a bit of help. I need
>an HMD, but the ones in my proce range aren't up to par. I don't care
>much about stereoscopics or 3d, I just need a really wide display
>which would give decent peripheral vision and little "dead space". A
>display around 6" wide and 4" high would be about right, but how would
>I go about finding and then implementing the thing? I also need at
>least 640x480 resolution at 256+ colors and head tracking would be
>nice. The tracking just has to emulate either a joystick or mouse
>(possibly keyboard, but that's easy enough) and would be better if it
>was sourceless for portability. Anyone have any leads on information?
>

Hi Steve, I don't want to discourage you but HMD design is rather a
complex matter. The kind of specs you're asking for are not yet seen
on most current HMDs. A 640 pixels resolution over let say 120 degree
of FOV (field of view) will give you quite low resolution result. I
mean, if you mean 640x480 like you would see it on your PC screen,
forget it. Designing the high FOV optics required is yet an other
story.

My best advice to you is to buy a HMD and use it for your project. You
may want to look at my HMD analysis at our web VResources (see bellow)
for more tech info. Go for the CyberMaxx if you need wide FOV but
pixels will be big.

Hope it helped, bye.

 Marc Bernatchez             |  E-mail: mbernat@gel.ulaval.ca
 C.O.P.L. (local plt-00307)  |============================================    
 Dep. Genie electrique       |  http://www.gel.ulaval.ca/~mbernat
 Universite LAVAL            |  http://www.imaginative.com/VResources
 Quebec, Canada              |============================================
 G1K 7P4                     | Virtual Reality is the future of computers