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gofreak

Member
Oct 26, 2017
7,823
Great to see progress on this. I wonder how costly it is to implement...hopefully it comes down the cost curve quickly.

Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?

You can increase the rendered resolution where the eye is looking, and decrease it where it's not. So you can have a higher res display, for example, without necessarily having to drive a high resolution across the screen, but where the eye is focusing. So it makes it easier to drive higher res displays.
 

DarthBuzzard

Banned
Jul 17, 2018
5,122
Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?
It doesn't magically improve resolution as that is locked in by the display, but it allows for much higher resolution displays to require the same workload as current displays. With a perfect form of eye-tracking and foveated rendering, you can go straight from the current 1080x1200 per eye of Rift/Vive to 5000x5000 per eye with basically no difference in performance.
 

low-G

Member
Oct 25, 2017
8,144
Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?

If you know where the player is looking you can choose to just render that portion of the screen at high resolution. Peripheral vision can be extremely low resolution and not be at all perceivable as low res.

Turing specifically allows shaders to be lower fidelity in the out of focus portion of the screen as well (reducing complexity beyond just lower res), further increasing performance.
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?

it doesn't improve the resolution of existing screens, rather it solves the problem of needing absurdly powerful hardware to push high resolutions. It makes it so that super high resolution screens are now viable, because our current hardware can now push enough pixels for them to work.

Like how you need so, so much more power to go from 1080p to 4k? Well, with foveated rendering, you no longer need those sorts of insane power increases, just a higher resolutions screen. Existing hardware, with foveated rendering, can in theory push resolutions higher than any screen that exists, without needing exponentially more powerful hardware. This is specifically due to quirks about how our own eyes and brains work, and how in truth we really only see a very tiny spot in the center of our vision at "full resolution" and our brain fills in the rest. It's similar to how games use level of details for models or frustum culling to reduce the amount of stuff that needs to be rendered, so it can focus on providing a very detailed scene. Like this:

ucoln8kedwfglsrlxvm5.gif


Except instead of only culling down to the totality of your screen, it culls down to a tiny spot in the center of your vision, cutting out the vast, vast majority of things that need to be (expensively) rendered otherwise.
 

Dr. Mario

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
14,042
Netherlands
Keep in mind, eye tracking kits already exist:

original_20ac196dc137fcc55559902fb26f6ff1.gif


they're just in the price ranges of tens of thousands of dollars, and have been until super recently way too slow to actually accomodate foveated rendering (since the tracking has to be lightning quick). Seeing a consumer headset with eye tracking this early is honestly mind blowing.
Yeah we bought eye tracking glasses like three or four years ago for $30k. A year later SMI brags in an interview they're confident they can bring the price down to $100 for HMDs. Thanks you fucks, lol. That it's apparently already ready for consumer headsets is stupefying really. I guess if the tracking tech is not yet quick enough they can make the high resolution rendering area a lot bigger, meaning it's a bit less efficient but still (I say this while having no idea what the average eye saccade number of degrees is though). Amazing.
 

EvilBoris

Prophet of Truth - HDTVtest
Verified
Oct 29, 2017
16,709
Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?

The human eye only offers detail vision on a very small area of our field of vision the area of our retinal membrane that deals with this super important part of our vision is called the Fovea.
(Which is you can't read words on one side of a display and the other side, without your eyes moving)

With eye tracking you can render the part that you are looking at with maximum resolution, the best anti aliasing, the highest quality texture.
All of the rest of the image can be rendered at a level of resolution and level of detail we physically discern any difference of.
It means 8K screens could be inside the headset, but you are only rendering an area 5% of that in full resolution at any given time as the fovea is so small.

This potentially makes it cheaper to render for VR than it does to render on a traditional display, albeit the framerate requirement is more important
 

Bookoo

Member
Nov 3, 2017
997
Sounds neat, but I have a hard time getting super excited for this because I assume it's going to be extremely expensive and targeted more for the business users.
 

Aztechnology

Community Resettler
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
14,171
We are still a few years out. Keep in mind this is an enterprise headset. It either has inperfect eye tracking that won't work 100% on point for everyone, or it's using a very expensive eye tracking solution that is nigh perfect, but keeps it out of consumer reach for a few years.
I meant from even introduction into the ecosystem. But you have to start getting this into the hands of devs to have it established once it's out. Partnering with Nvidia for that is bad news for ecosystem lock in. But good news for progress in the area though. Trade off. Exclusivity for speedier/effective dev.
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
Sounds neat, but I have a hard time getting super excited for this because I assume it's going to be extremely expensive and targeted more for the business users.

It's super exciting because it's evidence that VR tech is driving graphics technology at a skyrocketing pace. As in, way, way faster than most people -- even Michael Abrash -- imagined. This is a tech that went from flat out not existing, to being tens of thousands of dollars, to now being consumer tech in like the span of 5 years, when optimistic expectations were 10-15 years.

Even if this winds up being like $3k, which I actually doubt it will be, it would still be an insane price drop for the tech, something that happened way, way quicker than other visual technologies.
 

Equanimity

Member
Oct 27, 2017
14,994
London
more than all that, it bodes extremely well for all-in-one headsets. The biggest thing holding back all-in-one mobile headsets is the need for mobile GPUs to dissipate heat, which takes up space. The more they work, the hotter they get. Early GearVRs with note 4s, for example, used to overheat and give you error messages.

This is a tech that could make much, much cooler mobile GPUs go way further. This is an important step towards getting stuff that is actually glasses shaped, not goggles shaped.

Chips running cooler not only means smaller form and better performance, but also better battery too. There are lots and lots of reasons to be excited about foveated rendering wrt wearables.

Yeah, I mentioned mobile VR shortly after posting my previous comment. This seems like the perfect tech for all three platforms - PC, consoles and mobile.
 

Hayvic

Member
Oct 27, 2017
264
Pardon my ignorance, is this implementation bij HTC exclusive to Nvidia hardware or is the API hardware agnostic?
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
Pardon my ignorance, is this implementation bij HTC exclusive to Nvidia hardware or is the API hardware agnostic?

No details yet, but foveated rendering is a holy grail graphics technology that, even if it's exclusive to Nvidia at first, surly AMD will have their own solution soon enough.
 

Aztechnology

Community Resettler
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
14,171
Secure the ignorance, how does this eye tracking improve resolution?
So the way the fovea of the eye works. Is we have a point of absolutely clarity, then everything around it gradually loses focus until we hit our peripherals. Effectively when we look at any screen, but VR especially there is unnecessary clarity that's taking up processing power by having to render more in higher fidelity on the screen than we actually need. So assuming we know where the person is looking, and based on what we know about the eye/vision. We can effectively render much less of the screen in high detail at any given time. Reducing the cost of rendering that scene dramatically.

Up to 80% I believe if we just go by normal usage and not more advanced methods on top.

Foveated rendering is integral to mobile VR's future in my opinion.
 

RowdyReverb

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,940
Austin, TX
Is it going to take a lot of work for game engines to accommodate this? It's like you have two render targets, the one the player is looking at and all of the rest, and the game needs to switch between them nearly instantaneously in response to eye movements, otherwise you'll see pop-in or briefly blurry IQ every time you make a saccade
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
Another thing worth talking about RE: Foveated Rendering is that it'd be an enormous break through for those with limited mobility. I think about people who are paralyzed from the neck down, and a technology like this could change their life. This type of tech could allow for the development of entirely gaze-controlled UIs.
 

godofcookery

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
950
Question from an ignoramus: Would the response time of foveated rendering come into play? Time between moving your eye to a new position vs the apparatus + 3D engine responds to your movement. Or is that a non issue?
 

DarthBuzzard

Banned
Jul 17, 2018
5,122
Another thing worth talking about RE: Foveated Rendering is that it'd be an enormous break through for those with limited mobility. I think about people who are paralyzed from the neck down, and a technology like this could change their life. This type of tech could allow for the development of entirely gaze-controlled UIs.
That's technically the result of eye tracking rather than foveated rendering, but it's a good point. There are loads of uses for eye-tracking, one important one being socialization.
 

Sidewinder

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,299
So good, if PSVR2 can get this tech on board by 2021 or 2022 I'll be there day 0, but if it isn't and stays PC only or too expensive I'll be a sad panda. This tech would fit consoles perfectly, because you just can't throw ever more power at it like on a PC.

VR is gonna get so awesome in the next couple of years.
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
Question from an ignoramus: Would the response time of foveated rendering come into play? Time between moving your eye to a new position vs the apparatus + 3D engine responds to your movement. Or is that a non issue?

No, it's a huge issue, and the main reason foveated rendering has been a "holy grail tech." In silence, behind the scenes, over the last several years, the tracking tech for eyes has been getting exponentially better. It's improvements in ways people not paying attention to larger pictures wouldn't quite understand. For example, things like predictive technologies used to assist with things like head tracking in VR, is also applied to speed up eye tracking.

The announcement of the first consumer headset with eye tracking is a signal that the technology has progressed much, much faster than even the most optimistic expected.
 

dpranker

Member
Oct 28, 2017
4
My understanding was that foveated rendering wasn't worth it until you have 4k per eye displays, any idea if that is the case for this or are they just getting ahead of the technology?
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 12790

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
24,537
My understanding was that foveated rendering wasn't worth it until you have 4k per eye displays, any idea if that is the case for this or are they just getting ahead of the technology?

Eye tracking and foveated rendering have lots and lots of immediate benefits, even before screens catch up to them.
 

xyla

Member
Oct 27, 2017
8,443
Germany
So what about Valve's nuckle controllers? Did HTC break with Valve?

I might just buy my own VR headset this year, but I don't really know what to buy yet. This seems like it's amazing tech, but the price will probably be bonkers. And I can't wait for the knuckle controllers Valve has been working on.
 

alexlf

The Fallen
Nov 1, 2017
745
Question from an ignoramus: Would the response time of foveated rendering come into play? Time between moving your eye to a new position vs the apparatus + 3D engine responds to your movement. Or is that a non issue?
The eye tracking should ideally be faster than a single frame so that, with a little help from prediction based on eye velocity, artifacts will be as noticeable to the eye as frames rolling over are with your current monitor (aka not visible at all).
 
Oct 25, 2017
2,952
So this is a virtualink port driven headset? No Wireless Adapter Support? Kind of a sidegrade in the short term compared to the 2018 Pro, unless other specs have been upgraded.
 

Alucardx23

Member
Nov 8, 2017
4,717
This will be something REALLY big. Imagine a VR headset with a high enough resolution to show 4K games. With foveated rendering you only need to render 90% of the pixels, that alone will give you incredible performance gains from playing games in VR. That also applies for traditional games as well. When you compare that to a traditional monitor/TV that has to render a lot more pixels to fill the screen, the performance savings will be amazing.
 
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Bookoo

Member
Nov 3, 2017
997
It's super exciting because it's evidence that VR tech is driving graphics technology at a skyrocketing pace. As in, way, way faster than most people -- even Michael Abrash -- imagined. This is a tech that went from flat out not existing, to being tens of thousands of dollars, to now being consumer tech in like the span of 5 years, when optimistic expectations were 10-15 years.

Even if this winds up being like $3k, which I actually doubt it will be, it would still be an insane price drop for the tech, something that happened way, way quicker than other visual technologies.

I mean sure exciting to see progress, but it was also something we knew was coming. Abrash's annual predictions put it at like 2021/2022 for it to be integrated into a consumer headset, which I interpreted as falling in the $400-600 price range.

Since this is part of the "Pro" line it's targeted for enterprise so I would be surprised to see it cheaper than $1000 for the HMD Only and based on the few articles I read there are no other major upgrades to the resolution or anything. It's the Vive Pro with built-in eye tracking.
 

Alucardx23

Member
Nov 8, 2017
4,717
Question from an ignoramus: Would the response time of foveated rendering come into play? Time between moving your eye to a new position vs the apparatus + 3D engine responds to your movement. Or is that a non issue?

As far as I know HTC has not announced the hz for the eye tracking system on the Pro Eye, but I guess it should be around 250hz or more.

SMI's 250Hz Eye Tracking and Foveated Rendering Are For Real, and the Cost May Surprise You

The IR lights are invisible to the human eye but are picked up by each of the two Omnivision 250Hz camera sensors inside the headset, which use SMI's proprietary eye tracking SDK to tell the computer exactly where the user is looking. All of this information is processed by the hardware and software in under 2ms, allowing for fluid and most importantly accurate eye tracking.

"Getting over the 240Hz mark was important," says Villwock, "it allows us to track the saccadic motion of the eye." Saccadic motion being the unnoticed and involuntary motion of your eye as it moves between planes of focus.

https://uploadvr.com/smi-hands-on-250hz-eye-tracking/
 
Oct 25, 2017
4,378
That's great news. I'll wait for real-world reporting but foveated rendering, if it's the real deal, is huge. Would love much higher displays for the upgrade from my OG Vive to be worth it, though.
 

spookyduzt

Drive-In Mutant
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
10,932
That's cool as hell! Hope Sony is working on that for the PS5's VR. Some new controllers too...
 

Admiral Woofington

The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
14,892
All the more reason I'm saving up for my lasik. Already thinking vr is the best having to play with glasses or with vr insert lenses is the worst. Hopefully in a near future we have this plus the claw controller.
 

DarthBuzzard

Banned
Jul 17, 2018
5,122
You are aware of how much it costs? Because adding that to PSVR2 would make it far more expensive that the PS5.
Completely depends on how long they take. Oculus are aiming to get perfect eye-tracking along with many other major features in a consumer headset for 2022. There is no way they would ever release a headset higher than $600, so if Oculus can push all of that for sub $600 by 2022, Sony can likely push something for $400 if they don't have every advancement under the sun like Oculus.
 

VallenValiant

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,598
I don't expect them to launch PSVR2 alongside the PS5, so I expect the cost to come down in the interim. But maybe I'll be wrong.
No, you don't understand; this tech is far from being cheap enough for ever regular PCVR. If you want your PSVR2 to be $1000, you are in the wrong end of the VR gaming. if you want to spend that much then give up on Consoles, such tech are two gens out.

Completely depends on how long they take. Oculus are aiming to get perfect eye-tracking along with many other major features in a consumer headset for 2022. There is no way they would ever release a headset higher than $600, so if Oculus can push all of that for sub $600 by 2022, Sony can likely push something for $400 if they don't have every advancement under the sun like Oculus.
Sony is NOT interested in selling PSVR2 for $400. We saw how small a market that is, Sony want above all else to get the price down as priority. They are about selling to the mass market, if you want cutting edge then go PC. Sony would rather getting the headset down to $200, if not $150.
 

Mechaplum

Enlightened
Member
Oct 26, 2017
18,943
JP
This just made my day. I have been waiting for something like this. Hope other manufacturers follow suit.
 

Weltall Zero

Game Developer
Banned
Oct 26, 2017
19,343
Madrid
Foveated rendering already? Damn.

Frankly the only thing surprising me is that it took this long. Although I guess display resolution needed to get to a point where it made sense / where GPUs could not keep up.

For the people in the know, chances of PSVR2 using for foveated rendering?

Edit: I guess slim. What exactly is costly about it? The sensors / cameras tracking the eyes?

Edit 2: I guess I should read the thread, hahah. Didn't know these sensors were so expensive.
 

-COOLIO-

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,125
boring things about this headset taht i already really like:

- no more strap that goes over the top of the head. that thing was annoying
- analog sticks!

i wouldnt mind if it could fallback to lighthouse tracking since i already have em set up.
 

iswasdoes

Member
Nov 13, 2017
3,087
Londinium
Foveated Rendering, taken to its extreme, could offer the single best discernable resolution for a display, ever. The big problem with increasing display clarity has been pushing raw number of pixels to fill said screen, even today's super GPUs struggle. Foveated rendering solves this. This is a type of tech that could, in theory, make VR and AR headsets infinitely clearer than any television.


To give a heads up about how big of a breakthrough this is, Abrash thought the first viable foveated rendering headsets would come in 2021:



The long short of it all -- multiple generational leaps in visual quality instantly. Forget things like 4k or 8k, with foveated rendering you can have resolutions that approach real life. This, basically, solves the age-old graphics


I know you know this, but your posts make it sound like FR is going to magically deliver an 8k+ image to users eyes

It will enable pcs to render at that res but we still need screens capable of displaying the images

An 8k image through even the vive pro lenses ain't gonna look crisp

There are microdisplays out there that can do circa 5k right now, but they're hugely expensive and it still will lose a lot when magnified for VR

But this is still exciting news

Edit - fucking mobile piece of shit
 

Alucardx23

Member
Nov 8, 2017
4,717
Frankly the only thing surprising me is that it took this long. Although I guess display resolution needed to get to a point where it made sense / where GPUs could not keep up.

For the people in the know, chances of PSVR2 using for foveated rendering?

Edit: I guess slim. What exactly is costly about it? The sensors / cameras tracking the eyes?

Edit 2: I guess I should read the thread, hahah. Didn't know these sensors were so expensive.

If this article is anything to go by there's a good chance. Eye tracking and Foveated Rendering makes even more sense on console VR, as the available power is more limited relative to what you can have on a PC and the hardware is locked for years. As soon as other headsets start to add eye tracking the prices should go way down.

SMI's 250Hz Eye Tracking and Foveated Rendering Are For Real, and the Cost May Surprise You

Right now, SMI's integration into current VR hardware requires a bit of handcrafting, it has to be hacked into the headsets. Then there are economies of scale. At small scale these parts, the software that drives them, and the labor to integrate them manually are too expensive for some sort of consumer upgrade driving the price upwards of $12,000 or more. That takes it wildly out of the range of the average consumer, but what happens when we get to a production scale of 1 million units?

"The total cost of all the hardware at scale is in the single digits," says Villwock, "a few dollars."

https://uploadvr.com/smi-hands-on-250hz-eye-tracking/