If you’re contemplating the creation of a complex virtual reality environment, you’ve undoubtedly asked yourself how to design a system that will also generate ROI over time. An examination of immersive and virtual reality environments that have thus far stood the test of time can offer important lessons in this regard.
The market for graphics computing and content is changing rapidly. As the metaverse continues to take shape, new uses cases are presenting themselves by the day, and AI portends even more sweeping changes. “This is a new ballgame for XR,” says Mechdyne Senior Solutions Architect Gary Quasebarth. “It will profoundly – and rapidly – change how we develop content and deliver it in immersive environments. The ease with which a Snapchat user can create fantastic graphics on their phone is fast coming to the professional realm. Think of the vistas seen in a series like Disney’s The Mandalorian. Using AI, you can create backgrounds for virtual production sets in a fraction of the time it took formerly.”
The upshot: Demand for advanced visualization technology will grow exponentially, and with it the need for powerful computers to render the graphics that AI will drive. “If I can go to Snapchat and create quality content, but when I go to my multi-million-dollar visualization system and can’t even figure out how to turn it on, you know that a transformation is coming. Making content development simple and powerful is a sea change. No longer do you have to spend all this money on a platform and need a PhD to run it,” says Quasebarth.
Physically and metaphorically, this all connects to hardware capability. “Being able to render 3D content on a tablet or TV is one thing,” Quasebarth adds. “But if you take it to large canvases, you need exponentially more horsepower. Now, hardware manufacturers like Nvidia and Silverdraft Supercomputing have always been high-performance GPU companies. The difference is that today’s graphics require more power than ever before and will have to be easier to use than ever.” Combine those requirements with the need for scalability and flexibility to accommodate multiple users and optimize ROI. To accomplish this, large-scale XR systems may require a computing cluster; more than one workstation and multiple GPUs in perfect synchronization. This is where knowledge and experience from the computing company and the integrator are required.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST, BUILDING FOR THE FUTURE
The measure of a successful XR environment isn’t just the results it generates out of the gate, or even the ease with which multiple user groups adopt the system. “A really well-designed XR solution will prove its worth over time,” explains Chad Kickbush, General Manager of Integration at Mechdyne, which in 2009 designed a 100 million pixel immersive, six-sided virtual reality CAVE, called Cornea, at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). At the time, it needed 96 graphics nodes in perfect sync. After 15 years of service, the system and its companion integrations continue to enable new insights. “Cornea delivers ROI in 2023 largely because it was designed with sufficient computer power and built to allow for upgrades as time progressed. Forward-thinking, in combination with dedicated service and support from the Mechdyne team, enabled KAUST to realize tremendous ongoing value from its investment,” adds Kickbush.
A more recent Mechdyne project, the Data Visualisation Observatory (DVO) at the University of Manchester’s Alliance Manchester Business School (AMBS), also broke new ground. It’s Europe’s first extreme resolution 3D immersive visualization suite, designed to enable new insights not only to the business school but departments across the university, many of them working in conjunction with a wide range of industry partners.
Now entering its fifth year of service, the DVO’s CAVE has been a boon for facilitating collaboration among users. “Imagine gathering with your colleagues to analyze disparate data points,” says Mechdyne Solutions Architect Ryan Young. “Multiple datasets can be displayed simultaneously so that people can see relationships between different data. In the DVO, researchers can literally enter the simulation and collaborate to examine and manipulate complex 3D models with natural interaction on a human one-to-one scale. The experience is immersive without being isolating or disorienting.”
Initial utilization rates for the DVO were high, according to Young, and they continue to grow as new use cases are imagined, tested and borne out by the insights the system generates. “A key to the DVO’s success has been the robustness of its computing engine,” says Young. “It was designed to deliver world-class performance, but more than that, it has the scalability and flexibility necessary to process ever growing amounts of data.”
One takeaway from both the DVO and Cornea is that you can never have enough computing power. But that’s not the only lesson Quasebarth would impart to an institution that’s contemplating the creation of collaborative XR environment. “What you need is a combination of vision and muscle. Data is only growing in size and scope, and users’ expectations for how to render and manipulate it are expanding, too,” he explains. “But real success comes from a seamless user experience built not only on computing power, but on an understanding of all the elements that have to be in sync – from software and hardware to ongoing service and support.”
Now more than ever, advises Quasebarth, you need a technology partner that combines a history of achievement with the end-to-end resources necessary to grasp the future that immersive and virtual reality technology can illuminate.