The original text of the blogger: "Looking at the test report on the impact of long-term use of VR head-mounted display devices on the vision of low-age users for the long-term innovation center of the future." The purpose of this experiment is very good. Games and education are all important application areas for VR/AR, yet there is currently a lack of clinical research on children using these technologies. However, there are still many areas for improvement in this experiment.
VR/AR technology, especially VR/AR display technology, is closely related to ophthalmology. In addition to exploring the impact on children’s vision, at the ARVO conference in 2017, Professor Sun Xinghuai also reported the use of video see-through technology for amblyopia training ([^ARVO hotspots, amblyopia treatment new progress: augmented reality binocular split training]). Future VR/AR has more potential applications in ophthalmology, and more VR/AR companies will need medical-related research and experimentation.
Another article wrote that "Ophthalmology expert Wang Kai proposed to use VR to create an immersive learning environment, which will improve the efficiency of students’ learning. I was shocked to see this news. First of all, as someone constantly involved in eyesight research, with doctors working in clinical practice, I firmly oppose and resist!"
Today, ARinChina had the opportunity to interview Dr. Weng Dongdong from Beijing Institute of Technology. Dr. Weng has been focusing on virtual reality, augmented reality, and new human-computer interaction technology. He is committed to developing a new generation of high-immersion virtual reality systems and applying them to themed entertainment and psychotherapy, among many other fields.
ARC: At present, how many R&D companies can really do the labs described in the blog? What is the status of our domestic R&D enterprises? After reading the blog, I suddenly realized that this is indeed a very serious problem, especially the scene that may involve children.
Dr. Weng: The study on the impact of long-term use of VR on users, discussed in this article, was conducted by our team in 2017 with support from the Beijing Future Image Innovation Center. Regarding this research, many people challenged it, saying there was a blue cursor sponsorship, which was actually a PR project given to HTC, so it was considered a company behavior. In fact, this research lab was a pre-research project of Beijing Institute of Technology and Beijing Future Image Innovation Center, and it did not receive any financial support from any enterprise.
There are very few people in this field in China. Although our team led the research, we mainly focus on engineering and VR/AR application research, not particularly familiar with the ophthalmology field. At the time, we consulted ophthalmology experts and discussed the program before the experiment, but since this field is so new and interdisciplinary, the first version had many deficiencies. After publishing the results, many professionals pointed out the shortcomings. In the “-- Bowen--â€, I think it's actually very good. The question is comprehensive and helpful for follow-up studies. Our goal at the time was to throw a brick to get a jade—raising the issue for further discussion.
In the field of VR, there are several different situations in domestic enterprises. The first category includes companies like HTC, Xiaomi, and Huawei. They are independent HMD helmet manufacturers and industry leaders. They are very concerned about research in this field. However, due to intense market competition, their research departments may not have enough power to support many research topics, especially basic ones. While they are actively involved in related research teams and have discussed VR health issues, they are now more focused on polishing technology and products.
The second type of enterprises, such as many domestic head-mounted display brand companies, actually want to pay attention to this aspect, but most are start-up teams. It is difficult to ask them to consider social responsibilities during the early stages. The market is very competitive, and early revenues are not good; they rely more on investment. Everyone is rushing to improve products quickly. It is estimated that those who are currently paying attention to this matter are people outside the industry. People within the real industry may not be concerned about this issue.
The third category includes industry-related foundry and processing companies, as well as content-oriented enterprises. Their focus on VR health issues is more “standardâ€-oriented. For them, determining and implementing standards is more important. As for companies doing VR education and children's entertainment applications, they may or may not care. Currently, they tend to ignore this issue or prioritize products and market over research. After all, basic research takes a long time, and companies can’t wait.
At present, it seems that everyone discussing this matter is the best outcome. We did this research because, since 2017, VR has been used in many aspects of children's education and entertainment. Many developers are eager to enter this industry. But in reality, including me, no one knows how VR affects children's vision. Most things are theoretical with no experimental data. So, instead of waiting for something to happen, we decided to conduct experiments and collect some basic data through a controlled process. At least we could gain a general understanding of the issue.
At the same time, I hope that after raising this issue, it can attract the attention of relevant researchers. Honestly, this research is very cross-cutting. For example, ophthalmologists themselves didn't pay much attention to VR last year, because it was too new for them. Similarly, for us as VR researchers, ophthalmology is relatively new. So, very few people are actually doing this work. Therefore, we took the initiative to raise the issue first, hoping to bring attention to this topic.
ARC: Ophthalmologist Wang Kai’s article “VR technology is not suitable for the vast majority of young people†– can this article be an academic point of view? Or does the author’s conclusion strictly base on clinical trial design considerations?
Dr. Weng: Wang Kai’s article mentioned that he thinks VR is totally unsuitable for children. I don’t totally oppose this point of view. Academics themselves need different opinions. Although they may not agree with the truth, I strongly support his attitude. This kind of open and direct discussion is very valuable in academia. Some of his arguments are based on limitations of current display devices, such as the edge field of view, which we might have considered before.
His point of view, in turn, is also a guide. This is the same as the purpose of doing this experiment. It is to tell practitioners and manufacturers what you want to do in order to make everyone feel comfortable using it. From another perspective, these are still only discussions. Everyone is stating their own truths, common sense, and experience. It is still not academic. The academic level must use data to speak. The experiment we did was trying to explain the problem with some data, although there are still many weaknesses in our data that need to be addressed.
Therefore, I especially hope that relevant practitioners can also start to study this as an academic issue, using rigorous data to prove their views. Many things, through experimentation, you will find your common sense. There may be problems, such as the discovery of Poisson's bright spots.
ARC: Weng teacher, many reports now say that VR+ education, VR+ theme entertainment, etc., are not bad. Then, these directions are ultimately thought to be the money to make children. The above-mentioned article is the main market target for VR. A great challenge, how do you see this problem?
Dr. Weng: Although these articles have some controversy about children's use, from my personal point of view, nowadays, for children, the use of VR equipment has not reached a particularly long period of time. Children use VR helmets for short periods. So there are a few suggestions. First of all, before a large amount of data comes out, the time for application design should be as short as possible for children. Be cautious about children's problems. From my personal experimental data, this problem seems to be more optimistic, at least in the one-hour experiment, we saw no negative effects compared to the pad.
When it comes to the impact on the market, in fact, people may easily ignore this effect, which is not immediately effective. After all, after wearing it, you may not immediately feel eye pain. If this is the case, I feel that no matter how noisy in our academic circles, the people should still use it, because there are manufacturers who will continue to push. But at the same time, before there is no corresponding standard, we have no way to blame the manufacturer for doing something wrong, because it is originally without standards.
So from this perspective, we also hope to promote the formation of standards as soon as possible. We are doing it ourselves, but the formation of standards is a very cumbersome and painful process. Moreover, if you really want to form a standard, you must first have enough industry data to support some of your points. But to be honest, we have already done an experiment and have already been speculating. There is still not a lot of experimental data about children. Therefore, to go to the standard now can only be the brains of everyone, not very scientific. So the two are an iterative process, and there must be such a chaotic process before the real correct standard emerges. This is also the process that any product will experience.
ARC: I heard that Ge Hangbin also introduced me to some of our labs. I want to know if there are more R&D cooperation in the labs. Now the country looks like a variety of schools and enterprises to encourage cooperation, military and civilian integration.
Dr. Weng: There are many cooperations between our laboratory and the outside. We have built a cooperation platform for standard testing in Nanchang, mainly to support us to make national standards. The Nanchang government has given us considerable support, and we hope to do something for the industry in the future. One of our team's main research directions this year is about long-term immersion and long-term research in VR. We call this kind of livable VR, Livable VR. At present, it is actually more about the basic issues of technology.
In addition to research, in terms of industry, we are more concerned about the application of VR in the theme of entertainment, because we believe that a new technology is rapidly promoted. In addition to military, entertainment is the most accessible area for a new technology. We are now doing some application research on some equipment and technology of VR in large theme parks with the support of Huayi.
ARC: Regarding industry development, I think your point of view is very valuable. Your identity is to look at the industry at the forefront of the academic industry. In particular, listening to Michael tells you that you have also participated in many unofficial meetings in the industry. What is your opinion on technology and market in the next three years?
Dr. Weng: There is now a new force joining the head-mounted display, which is Microsoft. Microsoft has more and more vendors, and he defines the head-end display as a new device for interactive display. It is different from the concept of VR in our previous industry. In the past, we used VR as a brand new platform. This is actually very difficult. Whether it is a startup team or even some multinational companies, we want to completely create a new interactive platform. It is very difficult, not one or two years. What Microsoft is doing now is like an update, and he has already integrated VR into Windows 10.
I think Microsoft will have a huge impact on the next three years, but Microsoft has not yet clearly released some definitions of VR’s future. My judgment is that they will pay attention to some applications of VR in the office field. This is also the most important development direction for VR in addition to entertainment in the next three years. The development of VR industry applications will be a very gradual process before the huge changes in head-mounted devices, and will slowly improve without explosive growth.
I think the most important direction in the future is to take into account the long-term use of the equipment. It also has a very big relationship with the article we discussed today. It is that VR must not be a short-term device, it will be with us. Like a computer screen, like a mobile phone, it is a device that is used for a long time. It will take several hours and weeks to use such equipment. It is possible to make VR truly a basic thing. In order to achieve this goal, there are still a lot of hardware and software work to do. So in the past few years, I think that some giant companies may be more iterating their products to meet these needs. Once the head-mounted display meets the needs of long-term use, its quantity will be explosive. Basically, it is a device that everyone has to use.
Education is also an application direction that I am more optimistic about. The education I am talking about is not the same as the education that I am doing now. The kind of education I am talking about is more radical. It is classroom education. Of course, there is a premise that VR helmets can meet the standards for children. By that time there will be a particularly important concept of subversion, that is, we are now discussing the degree of damage to the child's eyes, but the problem we discussed a few years later is that using a VR helmet is good for the child's glasses, because it is good. The design of the head is very likely to avoid various eye diseases.
Of course, this is not to say that the current head-mounted display can directly solve these problems. I just said that the head-mounted display has the potential to solve various problems that cause eye diseases, such as the distance of viewing, the light environment and including Wang Kai. The edge field of view mentioned in the article and so on. The premise is that the performance of the head-mounted display itself meets these requirements. Designers are also required to develop targeted improvements based on these causes.
We have already started to discuss this issue, and various manufacturers have begun to pay attention. I believe that this will become a problem that everyone has solved in a few years. The problem that may be faced in the future may be that if your child wears a helmet for learning for a long time, it is likely that his child's probability of myopia is much lower, because he is in a good light environment during his study. Good viewing environment inside. There is no eye disease caused by his own posture and various conditions at home. In fact, this is a prerequisite for the large-scale use of VR in the future. We call it healthy VR.
The day when this device can be realized, this is not good, three or five years may be ten years, but it should not be too far, because many basic problems are already being solved, and of course, a new generation of technology is also needed. For example, magic leap, they claim to use the light scanning display technology. Or the next generation of better flexible oled technology is possible. The technology is still developing constantly. I believe that it will soon rise to the high line of health. Once this healthy line is passed, all the problems will be reversed. That is to say, the problem is that wearing a head is troublesome and unhealthy. So I won’t use it, even if he is good. After that, after this line, no matter whether he has any advantage or not, using him is healthier than using the monitor, so the balance will be pressed.
This is my view of the technological development in the next few years. Of course, the development of the industry revolves around the development of these technologies. As long as the head-mounted display meets the health needs, it can be used by everyone, without any psychological burden, and even more tend to use it. All the industries basically can't avoid using it, so they will face a complete upgrade process of the human-machine interface. Of course, Microsoft is already doing this. It is very likely that by that time, everyone is already using Microsoft. The new VR operating system, you may have to do things, just use the new Microsoft SDK to do development, this is not easy to say.
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Clockwise |
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