Holovis has increased the accessibility of its RideView application by making this available as a portable Oculus Rift solution. Known for creating unique immersive and interactive experiences that take centre stage in the park environment, RideView is a new concept from behind the scenes that facilitates the design and simulation/testing of rides, theme park master plans and site layouts.
RideView is used to create a fully immersive, virtual reality environment that allows the user to engage with the ride experience or explore a theme park layout through a 1:1 scale model / dataset. This means that people can explore designs as if real; walking round a theme park, riding a rollercoaster or engaging with an Interactive Dark Ride as if they were a paying guest.
Designers and engineers can experience rides in real time and from any seat position, with different perspectives calibrated for varying heights. Factors such as sight lines, eye points, ingress and egress around the ride envelope and load/unload issues can all be assessed and monitored easily and with increased accuracy.
Different layers can be added or subtracted including structures, utility services, HVAC systems, theming, media and lighting effects. This flags up any potential design issues much quicker in the design cycle than on a CAD drawing and ensures everyone fully understands how something will look and feel, cutting out descriptive technical jargon.
How it works?
The latest Oculus Rift presents a stereoscopic 3D view of the client’s data with 360° head tracking in real time and a 100° field of view, creating the feeling of very real and natural engagement. Unique and parallel images are created for each eye which mimics the way the brain processes visual data in real life, therefore making the experience more comfortable and realistic than watching a 3D movie.
The content is driven using the unique RideView design and simulation software, which takes the CAD, design and media/game data from the ride designers, master planners and media/game developers and repurposes it through a fast, seamless set of processes for the volumetric 3D viewing medium.
Holovis now includes RideView in all theme park ride projects, with the solution also being available in the company’s VR CAVE, a structure with four or five rear-projected sides that show 3D volumetric, real-time data. This fully immerses users into their virtual world and lets them interact naturally with true perspective. This system within the Holovis Demonstration Suite can be hired for teams to review their existing projects and to do their own proof of concept work.
