Senior Director of Display Systems Research at Meta's Reality Labs Dr. Doug Lanman recently shared an updated VR headset concept that his team are able to actually build right now that can pass the visual turing test.

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The team at Meta’s Reality Labs pulled back the curtain and unveiled some of their research work today in the form of some working prototypes and future designs to explain what they hope to achieve with VR in the next few years.

During the 30 minute conversation between Zuckerberg and Reality labs chief scientist Michael Abrash we learned about the 4 main problems meta is trying to solve to pass what they call the visual turing test or basically making VR look the same as our actual reality.

The first and probably the most important problem of course is resolution. The meta team is looking to reach 60 pixels per degree to try and closely match the human field of view which Mark stated would take more than 8k resolution to reach a retinal resolution in a headset. Meta currently has achieved a 55 pixel per degree display which is 2.5 times higher than on the quest 2. They showed this off in the VR prototype named butterscotch where you would be able to see the fine print on an opthamologists eye chart. To make this work Abrash did say the team created a hybrid lens and had to shrink the fov to about half of the Quest 2. But he said after trying it on it was hard to go back to regular VR because it was so sharp..

Next up is focal length. Because our eyes change shape and flex for focusing and looking around, when this is paired with a solid immovable lens things can become uncomfortable quickly. So on top of needing the retinal display resolution you need a depth of focus that can also hit that 60 pixels per degree number at all distances for near and far rendered images. Since currently this doesn’t exist meta worked to achieve this with varifocal technology that moves the lenses dynamically using eye tracking. This was built in the concept design iterations of half dome that has been progressing since 2017. 

Coupled with the focal length challenges is then fixing optical distortion. This is now being done in software and mark says it needs to be dynamic rather than static through software. To research this reality labs built a distortion simulator with 3D tv technology so they test out new lens designs without actually building all new headsets which can take months. This tech again relies on eye tracking to only render what the user is focusing on rather than the whole scene which is necessary to cut down on the processing power cost and subsequently the heat that is produced from the device to be safe for your face.

Lastly let's get our nit on. Meta really wants to push HDR in VR headsets to try and match the dynamic range and light we see in real life. Right now we get around 100 nits for a VR headset while the desired nits for a tv is around 10,000. To research this challenge Reality labs made another prototype called starburst that put a super bright lamp behind the lcd panels. I personally just love those noctua fans on the top. Mark touted the prototype to be the first HDR VR system that they know of in existence which is pretty cool and said obviously its wildly impractical in this first generation of its design but its has been invaluable in learning a bout HDRl in vr.

All of these paths and challenges have led to one fully fleshed out design that you may have actually seen on this channel before. Combining everything they have learned to create visual realism and pass the visual turing test Meta has created holocake 2. We’ve seen Andrew bosworth in a photo with the headset on before. The design is the lightest and thinnest headset Meta has ever created and Mark stated it can run any existing PCVR title. The team at reality labs removed the need for thick and heavy pancake lenses by not sending light through a lens, but it sends light through a holograph of a lens. Which as he explains holographs are recordings of what happens when light hits something. So basically the lenses inside the holocake are much thinner and flatter holographic models of the standard heavy lenses we see today Kind of like what we saw from Nvidia a few months ago.. They then combine this with polarized reflection to reduce the effective distance between the display and eye for a more efficient use of light.

But here’s the bad news. Which I feel like in this interview Zuck is the dreamer and Mike was the cautious yet optimistic Dad coming in with reality. In its current state Holocake 2 requires specialized lasers to give it the proper light source it needs to be a usable headset. The lasers that it uses in testing currently aren't available in consumer products nor at the cost, performance and size that is needed for this headset to be a consumer ready stand alone product. But he did have this to say…. “The jury is still out”

Lastly to end the video Mike shared the latest headset design Meta is working on to try and combine all of that research from the last 7 years entitled Mirror Lake. This is what a complete next gen display system could look like. So this design combines the advanced eye tracking, varifocal tech, and holographic lenses to make everything thin and flat. It also plans to have prescription correction remove the need for glasses attachments. But again I’ll let daddy mike give the warning.

So meta has given us a great and transparent look at what they have been working on for the past few years and the plans for the future. It all looks very exciting. What year do you think we will see a headset with holographic lenses? Or will we see one at all? Let me know down below and I’ll catch you in the next quickie. Sorry this one wasn’t exactly quick…