So we're talking today about augmented
reality and virtual reality: AR and VR.
Now, obviously these are terms that many of
us will have heard in a number of
different contexts, but if we could just start from the beginning: what do we mean by AR and VR?
- Yeah, sure. So virtual
reality is where you are basically
immersed in digital content and it
surrounds you with digital content which
makes you feel as if you're somewhere
else, normally with a headset on.
Augmented reality is different; you don't
leave the real world behind, but you
perceive the real world with digital
content layered into it so you have both
going on at the same time. So they're
quite similar, but the key difference is
that one of them you're leaving behind
the real world - you might be going into a
version of the real world or you might
be going into a totally fantastical
imaginary world - whereas augmented
reality you never leave the real world
behind you just add to the real world
with digital content.
- And then how do they do that?
Is the technology basically the same ,
or are we talking about fundamentally
 different types of tech?
- Some of it's the same, some of it's quite different.
So, with virtual reality the key thing is to
put a 3D image in front of you
to make your mind think you're
in a 3D context. So the way that that's
done is by putting two slightly
different images, one in front of each
eye, which your brain then constructs
into a 3D scenario. Because
the images it's receiving are slightly
different it assumes, it infers from that
depth and 3D content etc, the image it
receives will also be 360 degrees and
they'll also be synchronised with your
movement. And that's important because, if
the synchronisation is done well, it
gives you the impression that wherever
you're moving actually the digital
content is static and it's you moving
within it. That's the sort of 
clever trick of VR; it makes you think
that you're moving within the digital
environment and that's done using a
combination of gyroscopes to measure the
movement of your head, sensors to tell
where you are within your physical space
all of that sort of thing. Also the
screens in front of your
eyes have to refresh and reload etc, very
very quickly so that your brain can't
perceive any lag between the movements
that you make and the response of the
content in front of you. So it's very
very clever. So that's how VR works,
broadly speaking.
AR, at the simplest end,
is very often you use your smartphone to
access it so it's sort of 2D content. AR at the more sophisticated part
of it is is 3D content. So again,
you'll need two screens if it's going to
be 3D; you need two screens, one for
each eye, to give you a perception of depth.
AR is done in a slightly different
way because you need a camera. You need a
camera to relay what's physically in
front of you and then the digital
content there's three different way,s
broadly speaking. There's three different
ways that it's generated. One is sort of
image recognition generated. So the
camera spots an image which then
triggers some digital content to pop up.
And maybe the digital content is the end
in itself, or maybe it's a link and it
takes you through to a video or some
website content it's something that we've done.
- Yeah something we did in a recent client event and that seemed to
work well, bringing in digital content into
the physical material.
- It makes a really nice interface.
So that is image recognition AR, if you like.
Another way that AR
can be triggered is by location. So,
you're in a particular location and the
app or where the game recognises
where you are and up pops various
different content depending on your
physical location. And the third way
is called SLAM which is simultaneous
localisation and mapping technology.
Now that does two different things at the
same time, simultaneously. It uses GPS or
perhaps other sensors around to know
where you are in your physical
environment and then it also at the same
time spontaneously maps the unknown
physical environment, but immediately
around you. So if we were in this room it
would map where you and I are, the chairs
the tables, this and the bits and pieces
all around us. And it does that and it
combines those two bits of information:
those two maps of location and
context in order to generate digital
content which is integrated into that
environment. So it can be much more
sophisticated in terms of it can be 3D,
it can be interactive so it will be,
you know, layered onto the table but not over
the edges or layered against the wall etc.
- So then between AR and VR there's quite
a range in what they can actually do?
- Yeah, that's right, there is. So at one end
of the spectrum you've got
probably quite simple 2D augmented
reality - It's probably just your
smartphone as the kit that you need to
generate it - things like the filters that
you get on photos sometimes where
you can get cute eyes or bunny ears or
Santa hats - for the time of year that
we're recording this. You can get quite
simple AR all the way down the other end
of the spectrum to the sort of full
immersive virtual reality where you
forget the world that you're actually in
and believe yourself to be in
the digital world that's been created
around you. And in the middle there's a
there's a very important zone which is
where a lot of people think the future
might be which is where you've got the
sophistication of the sort of 3D imagery
that you start to believe is physically
there in front of you. You take that from
the virtual end of the spectrum, then you
take the augmented, you keep a degree of reality and so you combine complex 3D content
with your physical environment around
you, using that sort of SLAM
combination of knowing where you are and
how you're moving. And so you end up with
digital content which is sophisticated
and interfaces really convincingly
with what's physically around you.
- So, just bringing it back to the present for
the time being what are the applications
that we're seeing for AR and VR right now?
-Yeah, so we've mentioned a few already; a
lot of entertainment applications, so
gaming we've talked about, videos, live
streaming - you didn't get a ticket for
that event, but you put on your headset
and it's live streamed into your headset
and it feels like you're there. That's
an area that's well-established already
really. Also anything which is sort of
design, 3D design; there are a lot of
applications around there. There are
virtual reality paint brushes and tools
that you can build an environment around
you. Sometimes it's for designing things
which will then be physically made.
Sometimes it's art for art's sake, you
know, creative 3D creations that are
immersive and you can experience all
around you. There are big applications in
advertising, sales and marketing, lots of
applications there. Very often
the videos - which are the best way to
show people what this sort of thing is
how it works - they're often advertising
particular products or sponsored by
particular products etc.
It can be used very effectively in sales
and marketing - I want to buy a car: what
would it look like with that paint job?
What would it look like with those alloys and thinking
about that. Sofa: what would it look
like in my sitting room? I'm thinking of
painting my wall? What would that colour
look like. And you can sort of layer the
digital colors onto the actual picture
of your room etc.
So, advertising, sales and marketing are very
important. Training - virtual reality in
particular is important in a training
context particularly where you've got
large, expensive - perhaps dangerous -
high-risk kit that needs to be trained
on it can be much safer a lower risk
environment to do that in a virtual
reality context. I mean, if you think
about it we've actually had that for
quite some time when you think about
flight simulators. And that's a sort of
earlier version of virtual reality where
you climb into the box, rather than put
the headset on. The box is constructed
around you but it's the same kind of
idea so there are lots of applications
around industry in that way.
And then I suppose the other one to mention
is the healthcare sector where virtual
reality has proved to be a very very
important tool in relation to therapy
and helping people with phobias, helping
people with PTSD. You can experience the
environment which you find distressing
in a way which is less challenging -
because you can just switch it off - and you can
learn to control the triggers that could
create the distress and you can learn to
cope better using VR therapy. And it's
also proved to be very effective pain
relief. There are studies, for example,
with people with very extensive burns
and when the wounds dressings are changed
that can be excruciatingly painful. And
they've discovered that if you put them
into an immersive VR environment, a very
different environment from the burns
that they experience - a nice icy snowy
world, for example - that can actually
flood the neural pathways with a
different kind of thought and a
different kind of response which blocks
out the pain signals and makes it much
less painful. And it's been shown to more
effective than morphine which is incredible.
- But I think for some of us,
our perceptions will be coloured by
things like smart glasses that there
have been various products launched over
the past few years to great fanfare that
we haven't perhaps seen pan out and have
quite the same impact.
- So if for example you're an engineer and you were
working on something which is bespoke, and unique, and needs specific blueprint, specific
designs etc. If you have to keep
putting down your tools to go back to
the laptop and check the designs
that's quite awkward and quite difficult.
If you've got the images in your field
of vision and all you have to do to turn
the page is tap your glasses or speak a
visual command etc you can see that
that makes life easier and it's when life is
made easier by technology that it really
works and it starts to get sticky. Also
in that environment how the glasses look
doesn't matter so much, you know, you're
not so worried; if it's in the consumer
environment maybe they didn't look so
great, or you didn't like the way you
looked or whatever. Whereas in a business
environment if it's making it easier to
do your job you're probably wearing a
hard hat and safety specs anyway, so you
know there's perhaps that's 
less of an issue. So, if you sort of take
that idea of the business environment of
it making it easier to access digital
files it eases the interface. Part of the
reason that people think this might be
the future, is that where you have these
more powerful headsets there's more
powerful headsets which can convey 3D
vision all of a sudden you get all sorts
of potential being opened up. There's a
very powerful sort of advertising video
for one of the mixed reality headsets
where, for example, in the kitchen you
don't need a screen anymore because it
pops up as a hologram in that
sort of way. Or your digital pets, that
perhaps used to be in a little bit of
kit or a little app, it actually drops
along beside you and you can see it
- I mean that's not a business
environment application - but again, if
you're a designer and you're working
collaboratively with people you're
connected and you can both see the mixed
reality image and representation of what
it is you're designing, you can do it
interactively. Maybe you can do it across
the distance - you're helping somebody
with a task, a physical task, you're
watching what they're doing they can see
your instructions being transmitted in
front of them with instructions
integrated into what it is that you're
doing - directions, points, arrows that sort
of thing. So that is why I think people
think that this could be the future,
because it will ease the interface.
It's all about interface, it's all about
making digital content easily usable
within everyday tasks and just making life simple
- So when we talk about AR and
VR being a future thing
it sounds like mixed reality has a very
big part in that future. 
- Yeah ,that's what people think.
I think the challenge, one of the
challenges is the
size of the headset. So at the moment
they're still pretty large
and they're still very expensive. Now, one
of the things that we we know is
changing is the speed of our
data connections. We've got
next-generation connectivity coming - Osborne Clarke have done our big report with the
Economist Intelligence Unit about it - 
5G connectivity, for example, will give us
very fast data speeds, very low latency
and it may be that that will actually
remove the need to have large bulky
headsets because actually you can have
the sort of hard difficult computing
being done remotely and that can then be
relayed wirelessly because the
connection will be powerful and strong
enough, etc. So it may be that that is
what's needed to stop
us from needing to have big heavy
headsets and to have small - maybe no
bigger than the glasses that you and I
wear every day anyway - maybe no bigger
than this and and with special lenses
that can give us the images across the
lenses in a normal way. It may be that
that's what we're waiting for, but we'll
have to see
- And you mentioned that
Osborne Clarke, we're looking at
next-generation connectivity.
We're lawyers, we're interested
in legal issues. What are the legal
issues can you see around AR or VR?
So, some
technologies throw up difficult legal
problems and they don't really fit with
the state of the law. I don't think we're
in that sort of territory here. So
obviously a lot of this
technology is new, its inventions etc. So
we've got the usual portfolio of patents.
For some of the inventions we've got
copyright around some of the software
that's being written etc. We've got
those sort of issues, but that's nothing
new - that's kind of business as usual if
you're in the research and development
field all of those issues. We've got the
usual, as regards the hardware,
we've got the usual sort of product
council issues around getting the
product fit with, you know, compliant with
regulations, compliant with requirements,
thinking about product liability,
thinking about consumer rights all that
sort of thing. Again, I don't think
there's any unique issues that are
thrown up here are unique difficulties. A
lot of the headsets will be collecting data;
if that's being processed, some of it
will be personal data about your
location, about your movements, about your
eye movements. Some of it might be
healthcare related, it might be being
pooled, it might be being used for
profiling etc - you've got
all of that: we're in GDPR territory with
that sort of data being collected and
processed (if it is). As regards the
content - the digital content falls across
various different buckets, depending on
what it is, where you are etc. There's no
sort of single regime for digital
content it depends on 
what's defined as broadcasting? Is it
video on-demand, is it live streaming, all
sorts of different things. So it's
important to be aware of which territory
you're in to make sure you're being
compliant with all of that. And I suppose
the last thing from a litigation front -
you know there are issues around where
the platform is. You're
within a platform that's been created
through a VR or an AR environment and
there have been, for example,
challenges where people have been
trespassing because they were trying to
find a new creature, a new character in
their AR game. Issues where you are
interacting in your VR environment as
avatars and something happens in there
which affects you in your real life and
was the platform responsible etc?
There's litigation around those kind of
issues. So there's a lot of law, there's a lot of
legal issues are thrown up but
I don't think we're in the territory
where they're more complicated than in
other environments.
- So really, we can see this AR and VR and mixed reality set to grow and grow then?
- Well I think it's certainly one of
the ways the future could go and it's
certainly one to watch.
- Catherine, thank you very much.
- Thank you.
