Mixed Reality

Getting Started with Mixed Reality

This week I created a video where I discussed the definition of Mixed Reality as well as showed a quick demo of getting started with creating apps, games, or experiences with the immersive headsets.

Just like HoloLens development, the Mixed Reality Toolkit (the toolkit formerly known as  HoloToolkit) is your best friend.

Simply start a new Unity project – making sure you have the UWP components installed – and then import the Mixed Reality Toolkit (MRTK). From there, delete the original scene camera. Bring the MixedRealityCameraParent prefab into the hierarchy followed by the DefaultCursor and InputManager.

Create your scene like you want. I simply added a cube.

You save your scene and apply project settings by clicking hte Mixed Reality Toolkit in the Unity menu and selecting Configure and then selecting Apply Mixed Reality Project Settings. Make sure that Enable XR is selected as well as Target Occluded Devices.

When you hit play in the Unity editor, it will launch the Mixed Reality Portal and you will be able to look around your environment with your immersive headset.

If you want to just work inside of Unity and not have to use the headset during different parts of development, simply uncheck the Virtual Reality Supported checkbox under XR Settings in the PlayerSettings. You can get to PlayerSettings by opening the Build Settings window. That is done by clicking Ctrl+Shift+B or by clicking File > Build Settings.

Part 0: Getting Started with Mixed Reality
Part 1: Setup
Part 2: Core Game Logic
Part 3: Game Controller
Part 4: Motion Controller Support / Input
Part 5: Keeping Score
Part 6: Hiding Items and Disabling Input
Part 7: Displaying Score and Strikes
Part 8: High Scores
Part 9: Adding Animation
Part 10: Implementing Animation
Part 11: Adding Sounds
Part 12: Adding Particles
Part 13: Deploying to Devices

Enjoy the video!

Chad Carter 9 Comments

Having Fun with SteamVR in Windows Mixed Reality

This week, since Windows 10 Fall Creators Update came out, I was able to upgrade my main development machine. I have been waiting on that for a while as my main dev machine has the NVIDIA 1080Ti GTX.

Now a few weeks back Microsoft announced that SteamVR would be supported on the Mixed Reality devices. But there was little information as to what that looked like exactly. In fact, I had a fellow MVP tell me that “’SteamVR’ was a marketing promise, not a real one”.

Fortunately, that turned out not to be the case. After I installed the Fall Creators Update, I opened a couple of native Windows Store apps first. The first one being vTime. It is a VR social area like a few others out there. I setup my avatar and tried out a couple of the cool locations they had. But I didn’t actually try to connect with anyone… I had more things to try out!

I did a couple of other things but then I brought up SteamVR and played the “War Robots VR: The Skirmish” game I downloaded when I first got the headsets to see if it would work. It didn’t work then, but I was able to launch a beta version of SteamVR that actually launched inside of the Mixed Reality Portal.

I transferred from my Cliff House room and I was brought into the SteamVR room. From there, I was able to browse the SteamVR store and my library and then I was able to play that War Robots game. It was a great experience. I really liked how I could move my head and it used that to turn the big mech I was in around.

I then grabbed a few more free titles from SteamVR like Google Earth VR, The Lab, Rec Room, Anyland, Bigscreen, and some more. I actually only tried out Google Earth VR and the Lab. I spent a lot of time playing and enjoy the Lab. I wanted Google Earth VR to work, but it was pretty buggy and I couldn’t get it to actually get past step 5 of 7 in the tour to get started. Assuming I can figure it out, I liked what I saw and would love to be able to see different places in VR.

The Lab was really a great experience. I think some of it is because of my love for Portal and Portal 2, but the actual Slingshot gameplay was really a lot of fun. You can see me playing that part of the game in this week’s video:

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Developer Contests FTW

A couple of months ago I mentioned that Dream Build Play was happening. There are some sweet prizes available.

Well, now there is another contest where you could win all of the following:

  • Surface Studio (2TB / Intel Core i7)
  • Surface Pro (256GB / Intel Core i5)
  • Surface Dial
  • Acer Windows Mixed Reality headset
  • Xbox One X
  • Custom Xbox controller with engraving
  • $2,500 USD advertising credit

To have a chance to win, all you need to do is update or publish an app targeting the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update (build 16299) by November 17, 2017.

So go ahead and update that app you already have out there, or create something new…

And if you are making a game then you could really rack-up with the awesome prizes from Dream Build Play.

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HoloTour on Mixed Reality Headset

Back in April of last year, I talked about the top 5 apps on the HoloLens. It was a pretty popular video… I guess “top x” usually are…

Anyway, one of the top 5 apps was the HoloTour app. When I first ran this on the HoloLens and saw the cobblestone appear I was truly amazed.

About a month later, I did a “Deeper Look” into the HoloTour app as a request from a subscriber.

Well, here we are well over a year later and I’m doing another demo with the HoloTour app.

This is also by request from another subscriber. It appears the app was crashing for them, but I didn’t have any issues running the app.

As of 8/23/2017 I’m running the Creators Update and for the machine I was running this on, I did not have any preview builds of Windows. My understanding is the latest fast ring is actually a lot more stable. Two of my machines are using that build, but neither have a powerful enough graphics card to run these MR devices. I prefer for my main development machine to stay in a stable state.

My machine is currently running a NVIDIA GTX 1080 Ti. You don’t need anything that powerful to run it, but I did want to mention it in case you aren’t able to get the app to run.

It is interesting that even though HoloTour is definitely a VR experience, I enjoyed it more on the HoloLens. Even though the FOV was small, I was blown away originally.

I believe I feel that way simply because it was so new and I was amazed that my carpet turned into cobblestone. Truly being able see environment through these headsets was very nice. I guess I just wasn’t as impressed as I was originally since I already knew what was coming.

It looked really good.

So if you have a device and haven’t tried out HoloTour yet, go ahead. I’d be interested in knowing if you had any problems in getting the app to run.

Here’s a video of me playing HoloTour…

Chad Carter Leave a comment