DIY 3D virtual reality glasses. How to make virtual reality glasses yourself

At first glance, the assembly diagram looks quite simple - an ordinary smartphone and a pair of lenses. However, in reality everything is much more complicated, if only because the process will require quite serious knowledge in the field of optics.

Let's not forget that enormous efforts and resources are invested in the development of the devices we are considering, the bulk of which is aimed at finding components that are optimal for the user's eyes.

If you are interested in the question “How to assemble Google Cardboard glasses?”, then we bring to your attention the simplest version of the concept of self-assembly of virtual reality glasses.

DIY cardboard assembly diagram

Firstly, we will need a smartphone running Android OS with a special Cardboard application installed on it, a sheet of cardboard, tape, a ruler, a pencil and a knife. As you can see, nothing complicated. In this case, in the end we will get a completely functional device. Don't forget to download Cardboard drawings from electronic version template. The whole thing takes three A4 sheets and must be pre-printed on a printer.

Cardboard diagram for printing

First, we turn a sheet of cardboard into a body for VR glasses. The easiest way to do this is with scissors. The result should be three walls: left, right and back, the front is not required.

The next design element is two biconvex lenses. The longer their focal length, the better (optimally 40 mm). Don't forget to do the back wall housing holes for their installation. Next, secure the optics with tape.

After this, you can start adjusting the image. To do this, you need to position the smartphone with the display towards the lenses and, moving it in different directions, determine the position at which the clarity of the picture will be maximum.

The Cardboard application allows you to watch videos or launch a program for viewing panoramic scenes Google Street View, which makes it possible to take virtual walks through distant cities.

Technologies need investment

The virtual reality device diagram we discussed earlier is extremely simple. Helmets from the world's leading manufacturers are distinguished by a much more complex design and “advanced” functionality. Our sample cannot boast of the presence of a gyroscope and accelerometer, nor the wear resistance of the case, nor ergonomics. We strongly recommend that you do not use this device for long period time, it may not be safe for the eyes since no optical experts were involved in the assembly process.

However, even if it is superficial, the gadget we assembled still gives a very indicative impression of the operation of such devices. Plus it's incredible useful experience self-made virtual reality glasses, the characteristics of which are quite comparable to the best factory samples.

To ensure the glasses work, only special lenses and software package, which allows you to track the position of the user’s head in space and provides general control of the system.

However, in order to get a truly high-tech device, the mere ability to assemble it at home will clearly not be enough; you will need a serious, well-organized and well-funded business project.

The last notes:

• 01/09/2019 Kyocera Card Keitai KY-01L is a 4G phone with a thickness of 5.3 mm and is intended as a “companion” for a larger phone. The e-ink display has touch controls, a return button and a home button. In addition to implementing […]
• 01/15/2019 The new Honor 8 smartphone appeared in live photos. The gadget will have a 6.09-inch screen with a resolution of 1560 by 720 pixels. The device will be based on the Helio P35 chipset and 3 GB of RAM. The rear camera is single - 13 MP. For battery power [...]
• 01/12/2019 Agree, almost everyone has their own home computer or laptop, which is used for various purposes. Yes, the older generation uses this device more for work, but this does not mean that […]
• 07/17/2017 If you can’t imagine your life without social networks, where you can post new selfies every hour, then you urgently need to acquire a unique invention - a monopod. The AWM store offers a large selection [...]
• 01/22/2019 By tradition, the new flagship smartphones Samsung Galaxy S10 will receive different single-chip systems depending on the region - Exynos 9820 and Snapdragon 855. According to network sources, the top-end smartphone Galaxy Note10, whose release […]

So, you have downloaded and tried the methods described above, and have chosen the one most suitable for you personally. fast work. Let's agree that you have a smartphone or tablet with a 6-7" diagonal, two pairs of lenses (you can try with one pair, but my scheme is still two, discrepancies are possible, use at your discretion), installed programs and purchased materials from tools. The first step will be to make the first frame for the first pair of lenses. I made it from foam plastic, and in theory, it would be nice to have a centrifugal drill on hand, even for concrete, which is used to cut sockets, but in general, any kind, such as a sliding milling cutter for wood, will do or even a compass. I didn’t have any of this on hand, so I had to cut out the round holes with a Walter White stationery knife, which, with a lens diameter smaller than mine, would be completely untidy. So, the first blank is a frame for two lenses, as in picture below.

In order to make it, you will need to place the smartphone on the table with the screen up, lean over it, and picking up the lenses, bring them to your eyes, trying to find the focal length. You need to strive for the minimum distance between your face and the screen, so that it fits into the “lens” and the 3D effect is observed. If this effect is not observed, is shifted or distorted, do not despair; first, it will be enough to understand the focal length, or more precisely, the amount by which you need to remove the lenses from the smartphone. What about the distance between the lenses in this pair? It's simple - find the value that is halfway between the distance between the pupils and the distance between the centers of the halves of the frame (half the long side of the screen). Let's say we have 65 mm between our eyes, and the screen is 135 mm, half of it is 67.5 mm, which means you need to place the centers of the lenses at approximately 66 mm, for a first approximation this is enough.

Now, after we have marked the required distances, we cut out the holes for the lenses. Having approximately estimated the density of the foam, I considered that it was enough to firmly install the lens; if I made a hole for it with a diameter slightly smaller than the lens itself, I reduced the cut circle by 2 mm in diameter, which coincided perfectly with the assumption. Your parameters may be different, but the essence is the same - make the holes a little smaller. You need to recess the lens shallowly, I recessed it by 2 mm, below it will be clear why, and there is probably no need to mention that it would be nice to place the lenses in the same plane, that is, they should both be recessed evenly.

The first stage is completed, now we have a mock-up of the screen-to-lens distance, and we can move on. Remember what I said about two pairs of lenses? They may not be that important in an optical sense (they actually are), but they are invaluable for further tuning. Let's say you installed the first pair of lenses as described above, turned on a 3D image on your smartphone (game, movie, your choice), and are trying to find three-dimensionality. One pair of lenses did not allow me to do this at once. But when I brought the second pair to my eyes and, after playing with the distances, found the desired position, a three-dimensional image immediately appeared on the screen. To achieve this, you need to simultaneously move the lenses relative to the screen, in a plane parallel to this screen and the first pair of lenses, up and down and to the sides. Find a detail in the image that you can use to track the parallax effect, focus on it and try to connect the images in each eye so that they match. With some skill, this can be done very quickly, but, unfortunately, I cannot tell you a way to speed up this process. This test stand helped me, here the lower pair of lenses is already in foam plastic and adjusted to the screen, and the upper pair, framed in polyethylene, and each lens separately, I moved in front of my eyes, in search of “stereo”, and under the entire structure - screen at the desired height:

Sooner or later you will get fresh, juicy, fashionable youth 3D, but due to the introduction of a second optical pair into the circuit, the first focus setting will be a little off. There is no need to be scared, all that is required is to reconfigure the focus again. To do this, you first need to make a frame for the second pair of lenses you just adjusted. My advice is to first copy your first frame adjusted for the changed distance between the lenses, and then visually estimate the distance between the first and second pair of lenses after you have adjusted the three-dimensionality. It will be enough by eye, and this distance should be compared with the thickness of the material - well, literally, whether the distance between the pairs is greater or less than the thickness of the foam. If it’s less, everything is simple, you will need to install the lenses in the second frame a little deeper, by the required amount, but if this distance is greater than the thickness of the foam, you can simply turn the first frame over with the more recessed side facing you, so you don’t have to fence a garden made of spacers between two frames. In my case, this is what happened, I turned the first frame upside down, folded these frames with their more recessed sides facing each other, and recessed the lenses slightly inward on each side.

So, we did it optical device, allowing you to view 3D on your smartphone screen. But, of course, we remember about the focus, which was changed first by introducing a second pair of lenses, and then by turning the first pair over to the other side, so the focus needs to be adjusted again. When, through simple movements, you catch the focus, you will need to notice this distance, and make foam supports of such a height that by installing your first frame above the screen, the image in the lenses will be focused.

Here it is necessary to say the following, in my opinion, an important property; I am not exactly sure of its nature, but I have observed it several times in experimental subjects. Many activities in life require repeated approaches, approximation, and iteration. This, apparently, is not clear to everyone, but almost always this method works, and gives better results if you follow a simple algorithm - try and improve. And in the case of this helmet, it’s the same story, perhaps you won’t be able to make two correct pairs of frames the first time, for example, I remade one pair three times, and the second twice, and I already know that I will redo it again, because there are ideas for improvements. But with each redoing, the quality increased and the picture became better, so if you made a couple of approaches, but “nothing worked out” for you, don’t despair, take a break and start again, continue. The result is worth it.

A small hint - if the resulting eyepiece (as I will call a block of two pairs of lenses and their frames, assembled together) has a good stereo image, but the focal length has increased significantly relative to the first approximations, disassemble the eyepiece in half into two frames and play with the distances, perhaps there will be a more optimal one - maybe you will need to turn one of the eyepieces the other way around, or maybe space them further away from each other. We remember what needs to be achieved maximum quantity useful pixels (otherwise it will be uninformative) and the minimum distance from the screen (otherwise it will be cumbersome). If you have a wonderful, wonderful focal length, but for some reason the stereo base is not successful, carefully cut the foam plastic in the middle between the lenses with a knife and look - you need to move them apart, or bring them closer together, and then act according to the situation. Roughly speaking, you will have two eyepieces, one for each eye, adjust them, and when it works, glue them together with double-sided tape.

At this stage, the story with the lenses ends, and now it doesn’t matter whether you made the optical design according to my version, or based on your own considerations, then it won’t be so important, the rest of the story is suitable for any option.

Helmet prototype assembly

Having found the total focal length from the eyepiece to the screen, we have to make a box on its base, and here there are even more options than at the lens stage. But, now you have in your hands the “heart”, or rather the “eyes” of the device, and its most complex part, which means that it will be easier in the future. Let's say you managed to do everything described above correctly, and you can confidently observe the 3D image by placing the eyepieces to your eyes and leaning over your smartphone. After playing around with this demo layout a lot, you will probably notice some features of the placement of lenses and the convenience of eyepieces, which you personally find most in need of optimization. Don’t limit yourself too much, optimize and improve something for yourself, for your vision, the shape of your nose and skull, and so on.

For example, after making the eyepiece, I applied it to my face and realized that I had touched it to a foam brick. There is absolutely zero convenience, and you still have to wear this helmet on your head for some time! Therefore, when making the box, I tried to increase the wearing comfort while simultaneously placing the smartphone securely and conveniently inside. I had to get rid of the inner side of the foam and replace it with polyethylene foam, it’s in the picture yellow color. It is more flexible and allows the shape to be twisted within a wide range, which is why the inner surface of the helmet is made of it. It should fit snugly to the face in the area of ​​the eyes and around the nose, otherwise you will constantly observe fogging of the lenses from breathing, immediately take this point into account. There was an idea to make this part from a construction or swimming mask, but I didn’t have any at hand, so I did it myself, however, the option with a ready-made mask may seem preferable to you, and I happily recommend it. I myself decided to also make the sides for the helmet adjacent to the head.

Another point worth remembering is the weight of the smartphone and the lever on which it will work, exerting pressure on the support. My Xperia Ultra weighs 212 grams, and the required distance at which it is removed from the face is 85 mm, plus the own weight of the box - all this together, I would say, makes the helmet comfortable with reservations. It has one strap at the back, this will be visible in the picture at the end of the section, this strap is made of a rubber band, 40mm wide, which pulls it quite tightly to the back of the head, but if the screen was heavier, or the lever was larger (read focal length longer) - it would have been possible to wear a helmet would be much more difficult. So for owners of devices with a larger diagonal or weight, I advise you to immediately think through a mounting scheme on the head with a second, transverse strap from the bridge of the nose to the back of the head, it will be more convenient and safer.

Also, at this stage you will need to think about one more nuance - sound output. I have several pairs of headphones, both closed-back and open types, there are earbuds and so on, but after thinking about it, I did not build a helmet around the large and comfortable Sony MDRs with large ear pads, but chose simple earphones. Perhaps it will be critical for you to make a helmet with a cool sound, in which case you need to immediately imagine how exactly you will articulate the headphones, their arch and the helmet with its mount. I had such a temptation, which quickly evaporated at the prototyping stage, but I will definitely return to it in the next, improved version of the helmet, if I decide to make it. In any case, you will need a hole in the helmet body that matches the position of the audio output of your smartphone.

So, I have this device on my desk - an eyepiece with the inner surface slightly adjusted to the shape of the head. It already sits comfortably on the face, fits the width, and to make it I only needed this template, cut from a piece of foam curved to the shape of the head; it will fit, with some adjustments, to both the top and bottom of the helmet:

Previously, we found out the focal length of the eyepiece in several approaches. Now you need to position the smartphone screen at the required distance. Remember that the screen must be positioned so that it horizontal axis symmetry coincided in height with the imaginary line between the pupils, but the fact that it needs to be positioned symmetrically relative to the face is already clear to you. In my case, the distance between the screen and the side of the eyepiece closest to it was 43 mm, so I made the top and bottom surfaces from foam, as well as two side inserts. The result was a foam plastic box, which, once placed on the screen, could be used for its intended purpose, which is where the template shown above was needed.

At this stage, there were several small adjustments to the focusing and positioning of the smartphone, after that - accurate measurement of the results obtained and cutting of the outer, cardboard case. It serves two purposes - it protects the rather delicate foam from mechanical damage, I quite easily pressed it with my fingers at the stage of initial experiments, I had to keep an eye on this, and the second and main purpose is that the cardboard will hold the screen in the desired position, pressing it against the foam.

The result is a box with a lid on the top front, under which the smartphone is hidden.

Having tried the helmet on my head, and having seen enough of all kinds of 3D, I corrected minor inconveniences inside the helmet, and made a fastening - an elastic band to the head. It is simply sewn together with a ring and glued with double-sided tape to the cardboard, plus it is secured on top with a silver oracle, which was used to replace the tape. The result was something like this:

By the way, this image shows another technical hole, which is used to connect a USB cable, which we will need a little later. And this is what the helmet looks like on the head of the test subject who donated the lenses for this helmet:

So what happened in the end?
Dimensions: 184x190x124 mm
Curb weight: 380 grams
USB input/output
3.5mm headphone jack
Useful screen area 142x75 mm
Resolution 1920x1020 pixels

It's time to move on to the program part of our journey.

Available features of the VR helmet

Watching 3D video

The very first thing that comes to mind is watching movies in 3D. This is a very simple and understandable entry point into virtual reality, although, more strictly speaking, it is rather a threshold not far from it, the previous step. But, in order not to detract from the merits of this type of entertainment, I inform you that watching 3D movies in the resulting helmet is a very interesting and fun activity. I've only watched two films, so I'm not fed up yet, but the feeling is very good: imagine that you are one and a half meters from the wall that you are looking directly at. Without turning your head, try to look around the area around you - this will be the screen available to you. Yes, the resolution is small - each eye gets only 960x540 pixels from a fullHD film, but nevertheless it leaves a quite noticeable impression.

To watch movies in this form, you will need a free MX Player player with a codec installed for your processor, I have it ARMv7 Neon, and, in fact, a video file. You can easily find them on all kinds of torrent trackers, the technology is called Side-By-Side or SBS for short, feel free to search using these keywords. The player has the ability to adjust the aspect ratio of the video being played, which is extremely useful for SBS files, which otherwise stretch vertically to fill the entire screen. In my case, I needed to go to settings - “screen” - “aspect” and selecting “manually” to set the aspect ratio to 18 to 4, otherwise you will get vertically elongated images. I tried to look for other players with similar functionality, but I couldn’t find them, if you know, add them to your knowledge base.

In general, I have nothing more to add to this point - an ordinary 3D cinema is in front of your eyes, everything is very similar to going to the cinema, or watching on a 3D TV with polarized glasses, for example, but at the same time there are differences, in general, if you love 3D, you should try a VR helmet.

Android applications for Durovis Dive and similar systems

This whole story actually began from this point. Basically, the following three links show almost all possible programs for Android at the moment:
www.divegames.com/games.html
www.refugio3d.net/downloads
play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.samples.apps.cardboarddemo

What do we need to experience virtual reality comfortably? Obviously - a joystick, or any other controller, for example - a wireless keyboard. In my case, with a Sony smartphone, the natural and logical choice is the native and natively supported controller from the PS3, but since I didn’t have one on hand, but the good old Genius MaxFire G-12U, I added an adapter from microUSB to USB to it , hooked it up to the smartphone, and was not even surprised that it immediately began working both in the device interface and in individual programs without any questions.

You will also need headphones, because immersion in virtual reality without sound will be incomplete. I have these ordinary plugs, and you can figure out for yourself which is more convenient.

What should you expect and what should you not expect from the applications presented in this section? The fact is that all applications in general that are written for Android on the topic of virtual reality are very meager, to put it mildly. If you run them without a helmet and try, well, to see what kind of virtuality this is, then there is a chance that you will not want to buy or make a helmet. They are frankly very crude and miserable, and do not represent anything super-interesting.

But. When you put your head in the helmet, everything becomes completely different, and personally, I, skeptical of everything, would never believe it, but nevertheless it is so.

The main thing to consider is head movement tracking. Even with poor implementation, or slowdowns, this is a completely new and unexplored field of sensations, believe me, before the advent of the helmet, you had not felt anything like this for a very long time, since the times of adventures with rock climbers in the mountains, walks along the bottom of the oceans, overnight stays in the forest and other massive murders that we all love so much. The helmet provides a completely unrealistic sense of reality, I apologize for the pun, and any, even the poorest graphics will seem like candy inside it, in general, I must say - if you like to play games, or experience new things, the helmet is the device for you.

From own experience: imagine you are in 1998 and, say, a Polish production studio computer games I made a demo in which you landed on the moon, exited the module, saw the canonical American flag, looking like a piece of cardboard nailed to a stick, stuck in the ground, and above the flag in the sky there was an inscription in the sky in an extremely poor font “gather your tools, 3 pieces left.” At the same time, the graphics are made up of very, very simple elements, where the monotonously copied starry sky and the square-repeating soil under your feet occupy 98% of the usable screen area, and somewhere a couple of pixels of those “tools” that you have to find are visible. Not really. You can already see them, you just need to walk to them for 10 minutes. Just go. By the moon. Soundless. By repeating sprites. No action at all.

Tell me, after how many seconds would you delete this game from your computer or even your smartphone? That's it. And wearing a helmet, this miracle allows you to experience (!) the devastation and loneliness of the only person on the planet. No kidding. After 15 minutes of the game, I found myself desperately afraid that I was alone on the Moon, under the cover of the stars, and it was completely unknown what to do.

More or less the same story with all other games and applications. They are miserable, they are creepy as hell, but at the same time inside the helmet - they send you back 15-20 years ago, and who even earlier, to the very games that they played, and not with which they spent time. So far my only question for the developers is why there aren’t any games with full-fledged plot under this schedule? A single game would save the situation incredibly, because now, showing people virtual reality on Android, there’s nothing special to show, everything with the reservations “this is a demo, you can’t shoot here,” and “that’s it, the whole game is completed, yes, in 4 minutes." By the way, almost all of these applications are written in Unity, which makes them all the more surprising low level, or I don't know how to search.

But don’t listen to me anyway, try it yourself and tell me your version, I’m interested. And season it with links, I will do it immensely. For example, I even installed a demo with the outrageous name Toilet Simulator. Because.

A small easter egg

In fact, on the Durovis Dive website there is a link to Quake 2, a demo version of the game that can be installed on Android and has the ability to display SBS mode, at the bottom of this page - detailed instructions how to do it. The only thing that did not work in automatic mode was that a separate archive was not unpacked, so it will be there in the settings running game links to mirrors, you need to retype one of them into the browser on your desktop, download the self-extracting archive, pull out the pak0.pak file from there and put it in the directory of the game installed on your phone, I have it called baseq2.

After that, the same Q2 started up for me without problems - it works very quickly, and everything is clearly visible. It became scary after literally 30 seconds, a chill down the spine, but I won’t describe it further, try it yourself. It was not possible to take a screenshot, unfortunately, and the joystick currently only works in the “wander” mode, it can’t shoot, you’ll have to fiddle with the settings.

Thus, all this sluggishness of Android developers (attention Android developers!) led me to the thought - well, there are no games for Android - let's try a desktop computer, keeping in mind the main advantages virtual helmet- a huge screen with immersion in the image and head position tracking, and we will try not to lose them.

Connecting to a computer as a VR device

To be honest, the idea of ​​such a connection appeared immediately, but there was not a single idea of ​​how, what and in what order to do it. Therefore, while I was drawing, cutting and gluing parts, I was simultaneously thinking about where to get information on how to display an image from a computer’s video card, while simultaneously transferring head tracking, that is, gyroscope and accelerometer data to the computer. And all this, preferably with minimal delay.

And you know, a solution was found. It consists of three stages, each of which we will consider separately, and first I will describe the working options, and then I will go through those that turned out to be ineffective in my case, but may be useful to you.

We create 3D output on a computer.

It turned out to be relatively simple, but without knowing right away, you can get lost. So, the ideal computer that allows you to play full-fledged 3D games in stereo output format has a video card based on conventional NVidia or ATI chips than more modern than that better, and, what is very important, the drivers allow you to configure an arbitrary resolution. If you have a laptop (my case) or a video card whose drivers do not support arbitrary resolutions, the image in the helmet will be elongated vertically, and Possible Solution, unsafe and quite tedious - digging into the registry and registering permissions there. Your suggestions, again, are warmly welcome!

In general, you will need to install a version of the video card drivers that supports arbitrary resolutions. If your smartphone and your monitor each have 1920x1080 pixels on the screen, then everything is very simple - in the video card settings you need to create an arbitrary resolution of 1920x540, and then apply it to the monitor. You will see how the working area of ​​the screen has become smaller in height and is located in the middle of the screen. If the picture on your screen is something like this, then you did everything right:

So, everything was tested on a regular but powerful desktop computer with an NVidia video card and latest version drivers. It is important that the conditions are met - when running the game in stereo mode, the image on each half of the frame is not elongated.

The second thing you need is to download the 3D driver - which has a full trial version for a period of two weeks, and allows you to output 3D images to peripheral devices in arbitrary configurations, side-by-side, top-bottom, and anaglyph, in basically, whatever you want.

Install in the usual way, launch the TriDef 3D Display Setup utility and select the Side-by-side option, now when you launch games from this driver, they will be in stereo mode “each eye has half a frame.” If you have games installed, then you can open the TriDef 3D Ignition utility and search for installed games, a shortcut to your game will appear in the window - voila, you can use it.

I didn’t have any games installed, so I installed Steam and bought Portal 2 for 99 rubles on sale, but this is an advertisement. And here comes a point that you need to be aware of - the driver that serves stereo output can output stereo for any game that can be launched in full screen, but cannot create output for a window whose area is smaller than the size of the desktop. Remember this point, below it will become critical, like a red rag to a bull.

In general, if the drivers are installed and configured, the game is purchased and launched, and it all looks something like this on the screen:

You can move on to the next stage.

Transferring an image from a computer to a smartphone screen

There are several ways here, and judging by the numerous icons in the market, there are not so few programs that allow you to convey what is required. I was “lucky” before I found a convenient and workable application, I tried several other, depressing and frustrating hacks from Google Play, and I’m sorry that they put any slag there. I spent more time searching and setting up applications than making the device. Moreover, I had to buy one of the applications, and everything would have been fine with it, if everything had not been bad. But first things first: you will definitely need a local Wi-Fi connection between your computer and smartphone.

You will also need a good and fast "remote desktop" that does not log you out of your account on the desktop when logging in via remote control. Such a program turned out to be the free Splashtop, and the half-paid iDisplay was also found.

The one that is paid - everything is fine with it, only it did not allow placing the screen cropped at the top and bottom exactly in the middle of the display, so I had to abandon it, but overall it works well, there was even a review on Habré, where I got it from. But Splashtop worked as it should, so install it.

All programs of this type work in approximately the same way - you need to download and install the host version for your desktop, and the receiver version for your smartphone. I think there won’t be any problems with this, so I won’t describe these processes, it only takes about five minutes to complete - downloaded, installed, registered, configured, connected. The only thing I will mention is that you will need to go into the settings and indicate that your wireless connection needs to be used locally, for which you will need to explicitly specify the IP of your computer in the Android version; you can find out this address using the ipconfig utility on the command line. Actually, these are all the settings, everything should already work, here, for example, is a screenshot from a smartphone at the moment:

If you launch the game from the 3D Ignition utility, it will appear on the screen of your smartphone at the same time as it will appear on the monitor. Or not. Because here lies the hottest pitfall of our history, and yes, you will laugh as much as I did. Watch out for sleight of hand: the driver that displays a stereo image from the game requires full screen (if you select the “windowed” mode, stereo will not work, the game will launch normally), and the program for accessing the desktop from your smartphone screams “I can’t” launch fullscreen, sorry, yes, absolutely,” and can only show the desktop and the windows on it.

Therefore, the most subtle point. Most likely, you will be able to play any games that run in the “borderless window” mode. I don’t know for sure why and where such a mode exists in games, for this reason, or for some other - but it turned out to be a salvation: on the one hand, it deceives the desktop and tells it that it launched the game in full screen, and on the other hand, it formally displays only a window on the smartphone, albeit without frames and expanded to fill the entire screen. This is the same case when the wolves are fed and the sheep are safe.

So I was lucky, Portal-2, which I downloaded from Steam, turned out to be exactly the game that supports all three launch modes. So you just have to check at your own discretion which games will launch this way and which won’t.

Now you can launch the game and play it wearing a helmet. But, as they say, the picture would be incomplete if there were no head movement tracking.

Connecting head tracking

You have read this far, for which I congratulate you. I don’t want to deceive you, this point is the most complex and least studied, however, do not despair. So.

The first thought was to “disassemble” the Oculus Rift SDK or Durovis Dive SDK, since the source code is publicly available. Perhaps this should have been done, but I am not a programmer, and I don’t understand anything about this. Therefore, my attention was turned to ready-made solutions that transfer the position of the smartphone in space to the desktop. As it turns out, there is simply a gigantic number of programs that supposedly can do this. Judging by the descriptions, almost everything is like that. And again, I went through dozens of programs with sweet promises, but in reality it was even more scary, disgusting and wretched than going through programs for displaying images on the screen of a smartphone, and what’s more, even more wretched than those demo games for Durovis Dive, which I described above. If at this stage you catch a wave of frustration, then that’s it, “goodbye helmet.” Nevertheless, the necessary (with reservations) program was found. But first the fly in the ointment - Monect, UControl, Ultimate Mouse, Ultimate Gamepad, Sensor Mouse - all this did not work. Especially the first one on this list - the description says that Monect Portable provides a mode

FPS mode - Using gyroscope to aim the target just like a real gun in your hand, perfect support COD serial!

But let's move on to successful options. You will again need to download the host and client version of the program called DroidPad. It was she who, when setting up one of the modes, made it possible to do the necessary and transmit the parameters of the sensors in real time via wireless access. The algorithm is as follows: install the program on your desktop and smartphone, launch it on the smartphone, select the “Mouse - Mouse using device tilting” mode, and then launch its desktop version.

If everything is done in this order, the connection should work, and voila - you control the mouse cursor on the computer screen! So far it’s chaotic and chaotic, but wait, we’ll set it up now. In my case, in the Android version of the application, the screenshot of the settings window looks like this:

You can set the name of the device, but it’s better not to touch the port - it works by default, but it’s better not to touch what works for now. In the desktop version, everything is a little more complicated, my settings are like this, but they still need to be optimized, so use them only as a guide, nothing more:

Here are the X and Y axis settings on the computer screen, and the sensor strength from the phone. How exactly this all works is still a black box for me, because the application developers do not provide any documentation, so I provide the information “as is”. I completely forgot to add that I have a program installed on my smartphone that controls the launch of applications in landscape or portrait orientation, and all the applications that were tested for this venture were tested in landscape mode. The application is called Rotation Manager, and auto-rotation of the screen is globally disabled on the smartphone.

Having configured your applications accordingly, you will need to connect your smartphone to the computer according to the algorithm described earlier (for me, any discrepancy with the specified order leads to the termination of the application), and, holding the smartphone in your hand as it will be located inside the helmet, try to configure the settings - alternately adjusting the desktop sliders and clicking on the “Calibrate” button in the Android version window. I’ll say right away - after quite a few attempts, I managed to adjust the angles and turns relatively decently, but then, while adjusting more precisely, I lost those settings without thinking about taking a photo of them, and those that are now in the screenshot are only an approximation to the previous ones that were It still feels better. One more thing - all these sliders are very sensitive, and holding the smartphone in one position in your hand so that it does not move the cursor arbitrarily is inconvenient, so you constantly have to disconnect the connection and configure, then connect and check. After some time, the information in the article on this subject will be updated, but even with the current settings - inside the game world it looks very impressive.

So, how does it feel? On this moment Due to lack of time, I have installed the games Portal 2 and the free robot shooter HAWKEN, offered by Steam. As for the portal, you are quickly enslaved by the surrounding atmosphere and sound, and the immersion is so strong that there is nothing to compare it with, except maybe sitting in front of the computer 10 years ago at four in the morning, everything is perceived about as acutely. But if there it was fatigue and darkness around, then in the helmet it was a slightly different, brighter effect of the same presence. But the second game, where you sit in the canonical “huge humanoid robot”, surprised me. If you have a helmet on your head, reality, projected as if onto the surface of the helmet in the game, becomes closer, warmer and brighter, and very quickly. Amazingly fast.

You shouldn’t assume that the sensations caused by a VR helmet will be the same for everyone, but based on all the “guinea pigs” I can confidently say that absolutely everyone appreciated this device, the reviews are extremely positive and interested. Therefore, I confidently recommend that you spend one day making this helmet and judge for yourself. My personal goal was exactly this - to quickly satisfy curiosity, without special waste of money and time on waiting. I spent about three days of searching and setting everything up, and now I’m passing the baton to you, in a condensed form.

Personally, I decided that I would most likely make a second version of this helmet, with minor modifications and improvements, and subsequently purchase the latest consumer version of the Oculus Rift. It turned out to be very interesting and informative.

I’m really looking forward to new applications for Android, and partly this article was written with the hope that one of the developers will become interested and reveal some interesting stuff for everyone to see. And, a small wish - if you know any programs and solutions that I did not mention, but which would expand the quality of the article and improve the performance of the device - write about them in the comments, and I will definitely add valuable information to the article for future generations.

TL;DR: the article describes a fast and high-quality method for making a virtual reality helmet based on an HD smartphone or tablet with Android on board, complete step-by-step instruction And general principles this process, and also describes the main available methods Applications of the resulting helmet: watching movies in 3D format, games and applications for Android, and connecting the helmet to a computer to immerse yourself in the reality of desktop 3D games.

Virtual reality technology is very popular now, but it is still quite expensive and not available to everyone. Probably everyone has heard about Oculus Rift and its numerous analogues. In this article you will learn how to make 3D virtual reality glasses yourself for free and very simply. And according to impressions, this homemade product will be almost comparable to expensive analogues. These glasses are called "Google Cardboard". So let's get started.

You will need

• cardboard or paper;
• scissors;
• stationery knife;
• paper glue;
• Printer;
• 2 flat-convex lenses;
• Velcro for clothes;
• smartphone.

Instructions for assembling Google Cardboard virtual reality glasses

1 Preparing the template for Google Cardboard

First of all download the archive with a template for future virtual reality glasses(In chapter "Do it yourself" at the very bottom of the page). Let's unzip it into a separate folder. File Scissor-cut template.pdf will contain the pattern we need. You need to print it on a printer at a scale of 1:1. It will fit on 3 A4 sheets.

Google often improves its developments, including Google Cardboard. Because of this, the files in the archive may change over time. Therefore, I am attaching it for printing on a printer.

2 Template cutting for virtual reality glasses

Now carefully glue the pattern onto the cardboard. When the glue dries, you need to cut out all the parts along solid lines.

3 Corps formation 3D glasses

We bend the parts along the lines marked in red in the instructions. We insert flat-convex lenses into special holes with focal length 4.5 cm. We connect everything as shown on the pattern. We insert the lenses into the holes for the lenses, with the flat part towards the eyes. It should look like in the photo.

The most important detail- these are correctly selected lenses. They must be exactly the same, and the focal length must correspond to the distance from your eyes to the smartphone screen. The choice of lenses determines your comfort and quality of experience when using virtual reality glasses. The downloaded archive contains detailed information about the selection of lenses and focal length, check it out.

4 3D application for smartphone

Now you need to download smartphone applications that support 3D technology. If the smartphone is on the Android operating system, then applications can be downloaded, for example, from Google Play, searching for the keywords “cardboard”, “virtual reality” or “vr”. Typically, the icons of such applications contain a stylized image of our 3D glasses.

5 Improvement of glasses virtual reality

We glue Velcro on the top of the glasses so that the smartphone compartment can be secured when closed. It is also advisable to make rubber straps so that the glasses can be secured to the head. From the photo you can see how it should look in the end.

6 Virtual reality glasses In action

We launch any of the downloaded 3D applications and insert the smartphone into the special place designated for it in the resulting glasses. Close it and secure it with Velcro. Now, looking at our homemade glasses, we can completely immerse ourselves in a virtual three-dimensional world.

Many smartphone users have heard, but due to their high cost, they could not afford such a purchase. However, quite quickly people realized that all the sensors that function in virtual reality glasses are also in ordinary smartphones, thanks to which you can easily make excellent VR glasses from them with your own hands, you just need to attach a very ordinary case and a few lenses.

In fact, all the designs of glasses that you can find on the Internet are made on the basis of drawings (from English “cardboard”), and the only difference is in the source materials. Some people are happy with cardboard of any thickness found at home, others go to the office supply store for thinner ones, and some craftsmen have distinguished themselves by making their VR devices from metal, polycarbonate, foam plastic and other foam materials.

The lucky owners of 3D printers immediately began printing the template. Using this pattern, it’s easy to understand how to make virtual reality glasses with your own hands, and we will help you with this by giving some tips.

Using an ordinary knife, a pair of magnifying glasses and cardboard, you can make a resemblance of an ordinary smartphone with your own hands. However, many people don’t know how to make virtual reality glasses from a smartphone, which is why they buy expensive models or order cardboard kits, like Google Cardboard.

The design of homemade glasses has several advantages over a custom-made case, because the lenses in it can be moved along an axis that is located relative to the screen. Thanks to this, virtual reality glasses can be finely adjusted to the vision characteristics of any user.

To make 3D glasses for a smartphone with your own hands, you need to:

1. Measure the diameter of the lenses you will need. To do this, you need to place your smartphone on a stable, flat surface and turn on the virtual reality application on it. Look at the screen through the lenses while adjusting the distance. This way you will not only understand what lenses you need, but also decide on the focal length.
2. Next, try to either design a cardboard box yourself, which will serve as the body, or download a scan from the Internet. The main thing is that the bottom of the body is not as long as its top, because do not forget about the hole for the nose. Make ledges for your smartphone to rest on. Also, don’t forget about the cutouts for buttons on the sides of the phone.
3. Paint the insides of the body black. Thanks to paint of this color, you can avoid various glares and reflections that will interfere with concentrating on viewing.

Another option for making glasses for a smartphone with your own hands:

1). For thicker cardboard, it is better to take a stationery knife; it is more convenient for them to work directly on top of the sheet. If you want to assemble the glasses manually by inserting the keys, then you need to cut out the cardboard along with them, as in the picture. If your homemade virtual reality glasses are subsequently glued together, then you don’t have to leave such a reserve.

2). Next, you will need 2 lenses, preferably biconvex. Google recommends taking lenses with a diameter of 25 mm. The focal length of the lenses should be 45 mm. Craftsmen even take lenses from hardware stores, and some video bloggers on Youtube, when making 3D glasses for a smartphone with their own hands, use improvised means instead of lenses.

So, for example, you can cut from a regular plastic bottle 4 identical circles, glue them together 2 pieces each with a blowtorch, leaving a small distance at the top. Then water from the tap is drawn into the syringe, the space between the biconvex “lenses” made of plastic is filled with it, then the remaining gap is also sealed, and in your hands you find yourself with almost completed home-assembled virtual reality glasses.

3). Some smartphone models support magnetic switching, which allows you to control the device without removing it from the box. To implement such an idea, you will need a simple system of magnets: a neodymium ring magnet and a ceramic disk magnet with a diameter of about 19 mm and a thickness of about 3 mm. But even without them, all control will be simple and convenient; it is enough to make a hole for your finger in the design of homemade virtual reality glasses on the bottom or side.

4). When almost everything is ready, all that remains is to solve the problem of attaching the smartphone to the glasses. To do this, you can use a rubber ring and 2 Velcro strips (approximately 20x30 mm) to secure the cover.

DIY virtual reality glasses for smartphones: frequently asked questions

— Is it really possible to do it yourself? virtual glasses for a smartphone, which will be convenient?

For regular use, of course, it is better to purchase inexpensive but comfortable glasses with a factory mount, for example, or more expensive and high-quality ones, etc. Do-it-yourself VR glasses for a smartphone are more likely to be suitable as a device for the first acquaintance with virtuality.

— How to make virtual reality glasses from a smartphone if you have never done anything like this?

This is where the Google Cardboard drawing, widely circulated on the Internet, and our article come to the rescue. Even if you don’t succeed the first time, don’t be discouraged, because the materials are practically free, and homemade virtual reality glasses for a smartphone can be modified at any time. For example, follow the example of those who made them from ceiling tiles - light and invisible, they can easily withstand the weight of a smartphone.

— How to make virtual reality glasses for a phone that does not have an accelerometer?

Unfortunately, such glasses will not be able to support operation correctly.

So, we can say that making VR glasses for a smartphone with your own hands is quite simple; the whole question is the ease of use of such a device. Indeed, in addition to glasses, quite a lot of devices are now being produced in the world for a deeper immersion into virtuality, with which viewing photos and videos becomes an entire adventure, and games do not allow you to relax for a second, keeping you in suspense.

For example, virtual reality in controller gloves allows you to touch objects as if in reality, and some VR chairs almost instantly react to the movements of your head, turning your body in the same direction. The future is very close, you just need to feel it.

Perhaps this video will help you:

But just recently people paid a lot of money for it! In those days when virtual reality glasses were on movie screens, only wealthy enthusiasts could afford them. You had to shell out several thousand dollars for a window into the virtual world - after all, the treasured device used miniature color displays with a resolution of at least 640 x 480 (and the corresponding pixel size) and amazing “gyroscopic” sensors.

Fashion is a capricious lady: virtual reality devices came off movie screens much faster than they managed to fall in price and become widespread. They were forgotten for a long time, and when they remembered again, it turned out that a good half of citizens carry both the display with dots that are indistinguishable even under a magnifying glass, and accelerometers with angular sensors every day. Just attach a case and a pair of lenses to any modern smartphone, and you’ll get VR glasses no worse than those worn by Johnny Mnemonic.

Reliable mounting of the Galaxy Note phablet, comfortable fit on the head, specially selected optics with a precisely adjusted field of view and minimal distortion - a serious purchase for true lovers of 3D entertainment.

There are several ways to get your hands on the coveted case with lenses. You can buy a serious (and expensive) device with a lot of adjustments, such as the Samsung Gear VR. You can order one of the cardboard kits for twenty bucks, the most famous of which is Google Cardboard. Or you can not wait for delivery, but make VR glasses with your own hands from available materials.

The sleek, Google-recommended design is cut and folded from a single, flat piece of cardboard. The only negative is that you will have to obtain lenses with a strictly defined focal length and diameter.

Size matters

The design of the glasses, which we came up with ourselves, has an advantage over Google Cardboard: the lenses in it can move relative to the screen, so you can adjust the glasses to the particular vision of a particular person.

We drew the details of our glasses directly on cardboard, in free creativity mode, by eye, which is what we wish for you: we really liked the result. In case you want to repeat our experience exactly, we took dimensions from the resulting parts and drew a drawing. The parts are suitable for the Samsung Galaxy S4 smartphone and lenses with a diameter of 3.5 cm with a focal length of 3.5 cm. When marking the bottom wall of the case according to your dimensions, do not forget to leave room for the nose. Be sure to provide a mechanism for attaching the smartphone (in our case, these are hooks and elastic bands).

The length of the body is determined by the characteristics of the glass: with an equal lens diameter, the longer the focal length, the longer the body will be, and vice versa. We came across two magnifying glasses in the store with a focal length of 3.5 cm and a diameter of 3.5 cm. If you find the same glasses, feel free to copy our scans.

If the lenses turn out to be different, adjust the length of the body to their characteristics. This is easy to do by eye: place your smartphone on the table, turn on the VR application and look at the screen through the lenses. You will see that the concept works great even without the case. After enjoying the spectacle, you will also get an idea of ​​the size of the future device.

The width and height of the case are determined by the smartphone model. The distance between the side walls is equal to the width of the screen, and the distance between the top and bottom plates corresponds to the width of the phone body. Our scans are designed with the Samsung Galaxy S4 in mind.

A piece of thick tape in the corner of the case does important function: Protects the smartphone's power button from accidental pressing. The adjustment mechanism allows you to move the lenses between the screen and the eyes, adapting to the player’s vision.

To make the case, we chose thick millimeter cardboard. The design must be rigid enough to support the weight of the smartphone and maintain a specified distance between the screen and the lenses. The partition separating the images for the right and left eyes is made of thick paper. Lens brackets are also made of paper. Both cardboard and paper can be easily cut with a stationery knife along a ruler.

Welcome to the matrix

There are not many applications for “mobile virtual reality”, but a lot. You can find them by the keyword Cardboard (cardboard) or by the abbreviation VR. Among them there are attractions and games, concerts and films, 3D tours of cities around the world and educational journeys into the depths of the Universe. We have selected the most worthwhile apps with which to start getting acquainted with the world of virtual reality.
Roller Coaster Vr. There are dozens of applications with this name, because the “roller coaster” is a classic virtual reality attraction, a kind of “Tetris” of VR applications. You will find the most spectacular “slides” by the name of the developer FIBRUM. Rotate your head and direct your eyes as you wish, and you'll enjoy breathtaking views of the rolling jungle, breathtaking flights and speed against a lovingly rendered background. By the way, the Russian company FIBRUM not only develops excellent software, but also produces a very advanced virtual reality headset for smartphones with 4.5-5.5-inch screens.
Zombie Shooter Vr. If you want to see your friend spinning wildly in the middle of the room shouting inarticulate curses, invite him to play this game. The undoubted advantage of the application (again from FIBRUM) is that it is a real 3D shooter, without requiring additional controllers (joysticks, gamepads or keyboards). The player moves the crosshair by rotating his head. When accurately aimed at an enemy, the shot occurs automatically. Thus, the game implements the principle “where I look, I shoot.” I would like to say a special thank you to the developers for not letting enemies get closer than a couple of meters to the player, otherwise you could end up with a heart attack: a virtual zombie in 3D looks much scarier than in the most advanced 2D toy.
Paul McCartney. An application from Jaunt Inc. is named after the great Sir Paul, which offers you to be on the same stage with a member of The Beatles and see him literally at arm's length. Complete immersion in the atmosphere of the concert is facilitated not only by the three-dimensional image and excellent camera work, but also by surround sound. Unfortunately, the app is only available for devices with a screen size larger than five inches.
Orbulus. The most obvious advantage of virtual reality is the opportunity to visit the most interesting corners of the world without leaving your chair. The Orbulus application serves precisely this purpose, designed to transport the viewer to the most worthwhile places on our planet and even beyond. Walk on Mars, visit the Oxford Natural History Museum, enjoy the Northern Lights and enjoy Hong Kong's New Year's fireworks. The application implements an interesting mechanics of control using your gaze: to go to the desired place, you just need to look at it.

Underwater rocks

Building a cardboard box with lenses is not easy, but very simple. But still, there are some subtleties here too. The bottom of the body should be shorter than its top plate to allow room for the viewer's nose. The bevel cuts on lens mounts serve the same purpose.

It is highly recommended to paint the inside of the case black to avoid unrealistic screen reflections. On the outside, we left the glasses in their original cardboard form: we like their brutal, artisanal appearance.

At the front of the case, the top and bottom plates protrude slightly beyond the side walls. This is done so that the smartphone rests on the resulting protrusions. The plates have hooks: rubber bands are put on them to secure the phone. Securely mounting the device is very important, since most VR applications require active head rotation.

The buttons on the side edges of the smartphone, being sandwiched between the panels of the VR glasses body, can present a surprise. To prevent them from being pressed spontaneously, it is worth providing cutouts for them or, conversely, supports.

The inner surface of the glasses case should be painted black. A little more than half of the screen falls into the field of view of each eye. It creates the feeling of watching in a movie theater, when in addition to the screen you can see side walls, floor and ceiling. Black ink prevents unnecessary reflections and glare, helping you focus on the screen.

One last piece of advice: when inviting someone to try out your new VR glasses, have a second smartphone or camera ready in advance. You'll probably want to videotape the tester. The deliberately “cardboard” design of VR glasses is deceptive: homemade device creates an unexpectedly strong effect of immersion in the virtual world, causing a storm of emotions among viewers.