What is it like to watch a 2-hour movie with VR glasses?

I have been working on a VR project for almost two months. To be honest, except when I need to research competing products or review new versions during the project, I rarely wear VR glasses for a long time. On the one hand, for a person who doesn’t usually wear glasses, VR glasses are as uncomfortable as the golden hoop on Wukong’s head; on the other hand, the dizziness caused by VR browsing is really unbearable for a long time. Therefore, I have always felt that the current limit of use time of VR glasses is 20 minutes. For users who exceed this time, I can only describe them as "strong".

However, competing products are doing exactly the opposite. Almost all resource aggregation VR APPs on the market have launched feature-length movie resources. Youku VR added a virtual cinema function to watch movies in its new version on July 28. So in line with the principle that if you don’t experience it (seeking death), you can’t design well, I decided to challenge VR to watch a feature film on the weekend. The following is a record of the entire experience.

? Device?

Baofeng Mirror Little D

iPhone6s

APP: Youku VR

Movie: "Master" Director Xu Haofeng

In line with the principle that if you want to experience it, you must find a movie you want to watch, and chose last year's well-received but not very popular movie "Master". The narrative of the movie itself It has a moderate proportion to the action scenes and is very suitable to be experienced as a sample film. It just so happens that Youku VR has high-definition resources for "The Master", so I want to emphasize here that this is not a soft article! This is not a soft article! This is not a soft article!

? Preparation stage ?

Let’s first talk about the interaction of Youku VR. The playback principle is the same as that of the Storm Mirror. A patch (screen) is placed in a built 3D environment to play the video on the patch. The difference is that Baofeng Mirror is a movie theater environment, while Youku is a completely black 3D environment, as shown below. Youku VR supports functions such as play/pause, switching to the previous/next video, and resetting the screen position. However, all operations require clicking on the screen, which makes the app only support glasses with physical buttons such as Google Cardboard. Obviously, the Baofeng Magic Mirror Small D I chose is not suitable, but the movies have been selected, so I can only Just use it.

Youku VR playback interface

? Wearing glasses?

Since Xiao D has no physical buttons, you cannot operate the phone screen after installing the glasses on the phone. , so you can only adjust the video playback angle with your hands before putting it into the glasses. This problem can be solved by staring and clicking, so I won’t complain about this experience, but here comes the next point - the elastic bands of the glasses are like a tightening curse, and there are three elastic bands to prevent them from sliding down, which is worse than Wukong. No. The weight of the Little D is 275g, which is relatively light among the glasses, but there is still a noticeable feeling of falling after wearing them (after all, they are only half a catty). The curvature of the lens is slightly larger, and the fisheye effect in the video image is more obvious, but it is still within the acceptable range. Choose to watch while leaning back on the couch.

? First cut out in 15 minutes?

Reason for cut out: I always feel that my glasses are falling down while sitting. Although it only weighs half a kilogram, I still feel that my neck is sore after 15 minutes. , need to adjust posture.

Adjusting the posture requires resetting the playback screen. What Youku does is to display the text "Click here to center the display" when the cursor moves out of the screen. After adjusting to a comfortable position and clicking the button on the glasses (if any), the screen will be reset to the center of the current field of view. As shown below: (Because the glasses are not matching, it took almost 5 minutes to adjust them, so Youku VR is almost unusable for glasses without physical buttons)

Playback screen reset operation

? Second cutout at 24 minutes?

Reason for cutout: The video freezes for no reason. There is no loading prompt and other controls are normal.

Can only be solved by reloading the video.

(Later, I found that there were two places in the entire movie that would get stuck for no reason. There might be a resource problem.) Similar to commonly used players, the progress bar becomes difficult to drag (will roll back) after multiple fine-tunings. In a VR environment, It became more difficult to operate, and I could only skip nearly 10 minutes of the plot.

? The third time to switch out in about 34 minutes?

Reason for switching out: A system low battery prompt pops up.

The power consumption of 54 is 20. Compared with traditional video playback, the power consumption is indeed a bit large. Calculated this way, it should be difficult for a full charge to sustain a movie, so you have to lie next to the power supply in case you need it. Another drawback is that the system pop-up window is non-VR, that is, a "big white box" suddenly pops up between your eyes. At that time, I was watching Xiao Song Jia and Liao Fan affectionately in bed, and I was almost frightened out of a mental disorder. . I took off my glasses and clicked "Turn on low power mode". This was great. The screen was turned off for one minute by default. You can imagine my inner collapse when I finally put on my glasses and was about to continue watching the "sex scene" and had to take them off again. This is the first time I want to give up watching movies, which shows the difference in user experience here.

After cutting out this time, the viewing location was changed from the sofa to the bed. I lay on my back to watch and plugged in my mobile phone.

? The fourth cutout in about 50 minutes?

The movie watching process during this period was quite immersive. Although sometimes WeChat notification messages would pop up, but fortunately the notification bar did not Does not affect movie viewing. But maybe I was lying motionless on the bed, and the cat at home thought something had happened to me, so he stepped on me a few times and then started licking me. So I had to pause the movie, tell my cat that I was still alive, and go to the bathroom. But taking off and putting on glasses is a costly operation, so every interruption can be quite annoying.

After that, I experienced another freeze for no reason. Once my wife asked me to confirm the style of the ceiling lamp in my new home and cut it out twice before I finally "successfully" watched the 1 hour and 50 minutes of the movie. When I took off my glasses, I felt that my scalp was numb due to the elastic band. My eyes felt dazzling due to the sudden switch from darkness to light. There were also red marks from the glasses frames on my face. It felt like I had woken up after a hangover and pulled away. The feeling of curtains. However, it may be summer, but there is no problem of lens fogging reported by other users, and it is not too stuffy to wear in an air-conditioned room.

Generally speaking, "The Master" is a pretty good movie, but VR viewing is not satisfactory. The following briefly records the advantages and disadvantages of VR viewing. Advantages ?

●Immersion●

Generally speaking, the immersion of a movie is related to the size of the playback area, the viewing environment and the number of surrounding disturbing factors. Therefore, playing videos on mobile phones rarely achieves an immersive experience. However, VR cinema creates an immersive experience unique to cinemas by isolating surrounding environmental interference and filling the field of view with a playback size that is only available in cinemas. This aspect also performed quite well in this experience (even if it was interrupted many times).

●Comfortable●

In fact, wearing glasses on the head is not comfortable, but lying on the bed with glasses is quite comfortable, and you don’t have to hold the phone with your hands all the time, and you can lie down Any posture, especially suitable for "Beijing Paralyzers" in air-conditioned rooms in summer.

●Privacy●

Basically plug in your headphones and other people won’t know what you are watching. So this is also a selling point promoted by Baofeng Magic Mirror’s official website.

? Disadvantages?

●Basically cannot do other things●

Going to the toilet, drinking water, eating snacks, checking the time, etc. while watching movies in the theater Almost all of the common needs in the process cannot be completed after wearing VR glasses, and can only be done by taking off the glasses to restore vision. I saw that the Baofeng Magic Mirror has a "peeping" function before (it turns on the rear camera so that you can "see" the things in front of you while wearing glasses) and I didn't quite understand it. Now I think the peeping function is still necessary.

●The cost of taking off and wearing glasses is very high●

The lenses of VR glasses on the market now are relatively rough. After putting them on, you have to adjust them repeatedly to focus, and it is difficult to focus both eyes. The process can cause severe dizziness.

Therefore, it is necessary to avoid taking off and wearing glasses frequently, and it is best not to use them more than three times at a time.

●It is difficult to perceive changes in the surrounding environment●

A warning sign has been erected next to an HTC vive experience machine that the company needs to build for the project: "Please be accompanied by others. "Experience", mainly because during the experience it is really easy to bump into tables, chairs and benches and accidentally injure people passing by. One of the usage scenarios promoted by the official website of Baofeng Magic Mirror is commuting to and from get off work on the subway and long-distance travel, and I was stunned. If you think it is very safe for a blind person to take the subway, then feel free to wear your VR glasses on the subway. Bar.

Finally, I would like to write down some points that I think should be paid attention to in the design, and please readers to complain gently:

1 It is best to place the button to reset the scene globally, not globally. At least this function should be added to the video playback page, because watching movies for a long time requires constantly changing body positions to relieve local muscle compression.

2. The system prompt pop-up window should preferably be in split-screen mode and can be operated while wearing glasses.

3. The current battery level and network status can be displayed during video playback. Of course, I personally think the current time is also useful information.

4 During the movie viewing process, you can turn on the rear camera to display the image of the environment in front of you, so that you can observe the surrounding environment without taking off your glasses and deal with small emergencies (it is better to take off your glasses to deal with big problems) .

5 error prompts and loading changes. Letting users know what happened and how to fix it should be a common design rule.

6. Determine whether to start playing the video based on whether the user wears glasses. If you can switch videos through head control in the VR environment like Baofeng Magic Mirror, you can open a video and play it directly. But if you select a movie in a 2D interface like Youku VR and play it in a VR environment, you need to give the user time to wear glasses and debug. Since the user will unconsciously become confused when the video starts before the glasses are put on, it is more appropriate to pause the video at this time.