Virtual Reality refers to any technology immerging its user in an artificially computed environment. The environment may be a reproduction of something real or imaginary.
Virtual reality, often shortened as “VR”, may be used through Head Mounted Displays (HMD) such as the HTC Vive or the Microsoft VR product range as well as so called CAVE (for Cave Automatic Virtual Environment), which are basically rooms in which 3D is projected or retroprojected to appear on its walls and equipped with tracking devices (see picture hereunder). The designing and installation of CAVEs is one of Immersion‘s fields of expertise.
There is to this day a dispute with regard to the scope of what should be considered Virtual Reality, particularly with regard to 360° movies and pictures that are considered by some as a distinguishable technology, known as immersive media, and by others as a sub category of virtual reality. The dispute lies mainly on what is understood as being a computed environment and regarding the level of interaction as 360° content allows interaction with the system but not the environment itself.
