Laser's track movements in virtual and augmented reality

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The infrared laser diode as light source

The light source is an 850 nm infrared laser diode. The laser is modulated at speeds greater than 50 megahertz, so that the time of flight is determined from the phase shift between the emitted and reflected light pulse. An important requirement for the laser is a high duty cycle, i.e. short pulse lengths at high optical power.

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Structured light solutions offer an alternative approach. Here, a defined pattern of light dots is projected onto the scene and the camera detects how these points shift when an object in the observed space moves. An 850 nm single mode laser diode is used as the light source. The light hits a diffractive optical element (DOE), which produces an interference pattern – similar to an optical lattice – and thus creates the desired pattern of light dots.

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Virtual reality – a billion dollar niche?

Deloitte Global predicts that virtual reality (VR) will have its first billion dollar year in 2016, with about US-$ 700 million in hardware sales, and the remainder from content. They estimate sales of about 2.5 million VR headsets and 10 million game copies sold. VR is likely to have multiple applications, both consumer and enterprise, in the longer term, but in 2016 they expect the vast majority of commercial activity to focus on video games. This implies that while anyone with a smartphone could try out a variant of VR, the majority of VR’s revenues in 2016 will likely be driven by a base of tens of millions of core gamers rather than the hundreds of millions of occasional console or PC gamers, or the billions who play casual games.

As for enterprise adoption of VR, the analysts expect 2016 will be a year of experimentation, with a range of companies dabbling with using VR for sales and marketing purposes. These activities are likely to be commercially insignificant this year.

Innovative infrared light sources

Instead of relying on input devices such as smartphones or tablets, VR and AR systems are increasingly observing their users and responding directly to their actions or integrating them into the simulated environment or action. The outcome is the most intuitive way that humans currently have to interact with machines. This technology requires innovative infrared light sources and constant new developments tailored to each use case scenario to support the advance of these applications.

* Bianka Schnabel is Marketing Manager Infrared, focusing on Consumer products, at Osram Opto Semiconductors.

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Infrared laser

Laser's track movements in virtual and augmented reality

The infrared laser diode as light source

Innovative infrared light sources