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#4364943 - 06/20/17 03:00 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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OK, first I'm happy to say that our baby girl was born about a month ago, everything went well for her and my wife and it's an amazing thing being a parent.

Back to VR, I'm not going to have time to develop anything in the foreseeable future, but there's an interesting development that might lead to ROF and possibly WOFF being playable in VR: openTrack now supports Vive (I don't know whether the Rift works or not), which means that head tracking should be really good using that, and hopefully in ROF it gives us head tracking with no or little latency. And that's great news because the stereo 3D can also be achieved by using Tridef3D to have side by side 3D which can then be used to have stereo 3D in a Vive or Rift using something like virtualDesktop or BigScreen. I'm planning to test that ASAP, but of course currently ASAP could mean in 3 months, who knows...

For WOFF, I'm not sure there's a way to achieve stereo 3D with Tridef or something similar without removing Ankhor's shaders which are currently important for WOFF to function and look as intended. I'll have look at that as well.

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#4365344 - 06/21/17 09:16 PM Re: VR Support [Re: FlyingMonkey]  
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I came back from the Paris Air Show and saw this! Really wonderful news! But first: congratulations on your parenthood and I am glad that you derive so much happiness from your little girl.
So we may be able to enjoy the – in my opinion – best WWI sim in VR after all. If you need help in testing let me know. I have not installed RoF on my sim-VR computer yet but I will make it a top priority if there is something to test. And I am sure that, if and when VR is working in RoF, more and more people will want to try it. Seat-of-the-pants flying is an experience to behold in VR.
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4365400 - 06/22/17 03:36 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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For RoF the real test will be whether or not head tracking can happen with minimal lag using openTrack. If yes, then it will be easy to fine tune everything else. I almost got to try that yesterday. First I'll just load RoF in VR using vorpx. It's not ideal visually because it's not in 3D but it will do the trick to test the head tracking. If that goes well, then I'll go back to re installing Tridef, finding the profile for RoF (I used that on my 3D monitor a few years back) and getting this setup to display in the HMD using either Virtual Desktop or Big Screen.

If head tracking is crap, then I'll look into WOFF too. From what I've read, there are some variants of shaders that can output in side by side stereo 3D. If I can use that as a testing basis (replacing Ankhor shaders for testing purpose), I can do some simple tests to start with. Then ideally it would be something to add to Ankhor's shaders. I might PM him in the future to see whether he'd be motivated.

#4365577 - 06/22/17 07:51 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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FlyingMonkey, you make it sound quite easy even if I have not even heard of most of the software that you mention. I hope that your intuition is right! And I am sure that Jason Williams and his crew hope so too.
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4365630 - 06/23/17 02:02 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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In fact for Rise of Flight I'm going to have a look at an even better alternative by using Reshade - someone has developed a variant of that which can display the game in stereo 3D and apply the proper barrel distortion for a Rift or Vive. The good news is that this is free software with source code available, and there is an active community developing it, including people who use this for VR. This would remove the need for Tridef 3D. Then we still need something to display the result in the VR headset, which could be free like BigScreen or payware like Virtual Desktop. Reshade is not guaranteed to work but it is likely that it will because other shaders like ENB are known to work with it, and the stereo 3D which Tridef 3D uses for RoF uses the same method as the Reshade one, so colour me optimistic.

In any case, if I've got it figured out and fined tune for Vive I'll post a guide here on SimHQ. My objective is to test all of this over the weekend, but that's assuming that baby goes back to sleeping a bit more as she's been up and crying a lot after her 6 weeks vaccines...

#4365673 - 06/23/17 01:34 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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So back to square one I think. I've tried vorpx + opentrack with RoF, but just as I feared the head tracking in RoF is either smooth but laggy (with inertia) or not laggy and stuttery (when you set camera speed to max and inertia to zero). This is an issue that I remember having seen trackIR user reporting specifically for RoF. In VR it kills any sense of comfort and means instant nausea. As far as RoF is concerned to make VR work it would have to involve custom code that takes control of the view directly, which is technically feasible but a lot of work and not something I'll do for a long while.

Next step is to try the same sort of trick with WOFF, ie opentrack and something to display it in VR - I might try BigScreen for that tomorrow as I think Vorpx won't play nicely with Ankhor shaders. If that doesn't work I can try removing Ankhor shaders just for testing purpose but ultimately I'll need to find something that works along them because a lof of WOFF improvements involve these shaders.

#4365699 - 06/23/17 05:57 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello FlyingMonkey,
I’m not sure I understand. In your last post you say that vorpx does not work with RoF and that you have to go back to square one. But in your previous post you write that there is an even better alternative: reshade. Or does reshade not work after all?
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4365781 - 06/24/17 01:44 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Vorpx works, what doesn't work is that headtracking lags and stutters in RoF, and that's not linked to vorpx at all. This, as far as I understand (the issue existed with trackIR before) is because something in the way RoF implements camera movement makes it stuttery unless you apply some smoothing. Smoothing introduces a lag, and this delay between head movement and actual camera movement on screen is a no go in terms of nausea.

So Reshade might very well work for RoF, I expect it to, but the head tracking problem will remain because in both case the method I'm using is simply openTrack, ie emulating a trackIR device using steamVR tracking information. I was only going to investigate Reshade if the head tracking was going to work fine. If you've got vorpx and would like to do the same test I can explain how to set things up for that, it's very simple (although in vorpx you need to fine tune the picture a lot to get it the right aspect and zoom level, and it's not stereo 3D either. I certainly recommend not buying it now if you don't own it already).

So my next step is to try the same with WOFF and hope that there is a direct match between openTrack and in game camera movement. Some people are apparently getting IL2 CloD and IL2 1946 to work using openTrack and similar methods to display them in VR hmd (but I"m less excited by that given that IL2 BOS in VR is covering my ww2 needs now anyway), so in some case openTrack works well for that.

Now if this fails for both RoF and WOFF, then it will be back to square 1 in the sense that my only option will be to code a proper interface between the game and steamVR, with all the complications of connecting a dx8 or dx9 game to an API which requires dx11+. For that there is no way I can do something before end 2017 at best.

#4365817 - 06/24/17 08:11 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello FlyingMonkey,
Thank you for this explanation. I do not have vorpx and if you recommend me not to buy it I will follow your advice.
Hopefully WOFF will give fewer problems. I can fully understand that you do not want to start work on a new interface for the moment. It would be great if you could do it in the future at all, but I suppose you first have to decide whether it is worth all the work. Perhaps you could make it payware?
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4365938 - 06/25/17 06:45 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Good news regarding WOFF: the openTrack head tracking is super smooth - I've only tested it while running WOFF in the desktop view of steamVR for a quick test but it felt and looked great already. Now the next step will be to use Reshade to apply stereo 3D and proper distortion to display WOFF in 3D in the headset!

#4365946 - 06/25/17 11:05 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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FkyingMonkey, you made my day! Fantastic news! I have an older version of WOFF but will buy Ultimate Edition as soon as VR is available (I can test if needed). Despite your parenthood duties you manage to work fast!
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4366046 - 06/26/17 04:51 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Well, I'm not having much luck launching Reshade with WOFF - I've tried both version 2.0 and 3.0 but it leads to crashes. If I try searching for Reshade and WOFF or even Reshade and CFS3 I don't find anything on the net, so it might not possible to make it work. I know that people used sweetFX 2 with CFS3 and WOFF. So we might be out of luck with WOFF too unfortunately. Later on if I can free more time I can try adapting the shaders code which I have for Reshade to something else that works with WOFF or something custom, but this will have to wait. I'll probably ask around in the WOFF sub forums whether anyone had an experience using Reshade with WOFF (and maybe AnKor will know too).

The reason while I got to do so much this weekend is that after 2 weeks of hell during which Ella didn't sleep much (due to growth spurt), this weekend she has slept both at night and during daytime. Having a couple of spare hours here and there felt like being on holidays! It probably won't last though.

#4366157 - 06/26/17 09:29 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello FlyingMonkey,
That is a pity! I do not completely understand: is the problem that the sound does not work, or that the image cannot be converted into 3D? Even if we would have a 2D VR image for WOFF and mono sound instead of stereo, that would be enough to be able to at least fly. Or is the problem that VR does not work at all?
Good for you that you got some rest. Hopefully it will last for some time…
Best regards,
Stickshajer

#4366206 - 06/27/17 03:37 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Sorry, tha'ts me shortening everything: by stereo 3D I meand stereoscopic 3D, ie the proper 3D where 2 images are used to convey depth. But currently my problem is not only to get stereo 3D working, I also need to apply distortion to the image so that it can display properly in the VR headset. I've got a shader for that in Reshade, as well as one for the 3D, and that's really a convenient platform because we have access to the shaders code so that I could just use that, fine tune it or modify them if needed. Anyway, since someone on the WOFF forums got Reshade to work with WOFF I'll persevere and hopefully get it to work. WOFF UE is really a great ww1 sim. I had OFF years ago and went back to WOFF UE last year when I decided to try VR on it and it's really improved a lot, both visually and probably most importantly with the depth of its historical simulation. Even if I fail to implement a proper VR solution, I plan (wishful thinking probably with baby) to play using openTrack and displaying the game on virtual big screen in VR (using BigScreen for example) - not as good as proper VR but my only way to play it now that I've installed all my gear in the VR room and nowhere near a monitor.

#4366620 - 06/28/17 08:34 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello FlyingMonkey,
Thank you for your explanation, I think I understand now. Hopefully a solution is there to be found. I asked the developers of WOFF but understand that they are already in contact with you.
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4366683 - 06/29/17 03:55 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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No worries. Check the WOFF forums, I'm going to keep posting more details there as I go.

#4366772 - 06/29/17 04:19 PM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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I'll follow you there!

#4367024 - 07/01/17 01:41 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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I'm also going to try one more thing for RoF, just in case the stuttery feeling of the head tracking is in fact a result of vorpx. Are you using a Vive or Rift? My plan is to quickly give a go at the non direct mode, ie the mode in which our vr headset simply appears as another monitor to the system (which is how the Rift DK1 and DK2 started). It's a Vive only trick (and which can come with bugs) as the Rift cannot function in this mode. If you have a Vive, then all you have to do is follow the guide I've posted in the WOFF forums to try have RoF working with Reshade, and then if you get the SBS + barrel distortion working, put your Vive in extended mode and try either moving the RoF window to the Vive and expanding it there, or even better make the Vive the primary monitor and do the same (ie move RoF to the Vive).

#4367050 - 07/01/17 10:41 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello FlyingMonkey,
It is a neat trick, but, unfortunately in this case, I have the Rift… But hopefully your perseverance pays off for other people. . And perhaps one day there will come a way to emulate the trick for the Rift.
Best regards,
Stickshaker

#4367244 - 07/03/17 11:55 AM Re: VR Support [Re: Stickshaker]  
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Hello everyone!

I am very interested in this thread as i use ROF only with the HTC Vive now.

I use Bigscreen Beta and Opentrack. It is not in 3d, but the immersion is still great in my opinion.

The headtracking is 100 % smooth.
I had headtracking lag when i used the Accela filter.
After i switched to EWMA filter everything worked perfect. (If it is of any help i gladly upload my opentrack profile for ROF)

I hope very much you get it to work. ROF is such a great sim and fun to play!

Edit:
The time this thread was started Opentrack had a severe bug with the Vive headtracking. Another update to version 2.3.7 fixed this. So be sure you got the newest opentrack version installed.

Last edited by Runzel; 07/03/17 11:58 AM.
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