Prospect by IrisVR: A Brief Introduction

IrisVR is marketing a VR design product called Prospect, which is a building industry design tool which supports multiuser meetings:

Intended for the architecture, engineering and construction trades, Prospect offers full automatic conversion from Nacisworks, SketchUp, Revit, Rhino, FBX, OBJ and other 3D content creation formats and tools. You can then share your imported work with others:

Walk through your 3D files with colleagues in VR, no matter their location. Multiuser provides reliable voice chat and a shared virtual environment for presentations and design reviews.

Prospect supports Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest, HTC Vive, and Windows Mixed Reality headsets. You can follow IrisVR on social media: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube.

And (of course), I have added it to my ever-growing list of social VR/virtual worlds.

Dimension10: A Brief Introduction

Dimenison10 is similar to products I have reviewed earlier such as InsiteVR and The Wild, in that their purpose is to experience a three-dimenstional model in a virtual meeting space for collaborative design meetings. (This appears to be a growth area for social VR.)

Dimension10 supports models created using the following software:

  • AutoCAD
  • Catia
  • Revit
  • Maya
  • Solidworks
  • 3ds Max
  • Navisworks
  • Catia
  • Rhino3D
  • Sketchup

Dimension10 is a Norwegian company with an impressive list of case studies on how its software has been used on projects throughout Europe. They also offer quite a few tutorial videos for their product on their website. The product appears to support both Oculus Rift and HTC Vive headsets.

You can sign up for their newsletter on their website. You can also follow the company on Facebook and LinkedIn. (They also have a YouTube channel, but many of their videos are in Norwegian! The tutorial videos have English subtitles, however.)

InsiteVR: A Brief Introduction to a Social VR App for Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Meetings

InsiteVR is a social VR platform that is intended to work with designs created in software such as BIM 360, Navisworks, Revit, Sketchup, and other programs that create three-dimensional models. Planners and designers can meet up in a virtual space to explore and “walk through” their 3D models. According to their website, the benefits of InsiteVR are:

REDUCE COSTLY SURPRISES: Eliminate model error ambiguity: Validate designs and identify issues before construction begins and it’s too late.

UNDERSTAND THE SPACE: Experience designs from a human perspective to increase understanding and confidence across all project collaborators.

IMPROVE CONFIDENCE: Coordinating with VR meetings helps ensure everyone is on the same page about issues and resolutions.

DIRECT INTEGRATIONS WITH EXISTING AEC TOOLS: All you need to get started is a BIM 360, Navisworks, Revit, or Sketchup model. In the click of a button your model will be VR ready and synced to the InsiteVR cloud for your coordination meetings.

VR MEETINGS MADE EASY: Inviting collaborators to your VR meeting is as easy as sending them a link. Participants can see other as VR avatars, talk over VOIP, and review model issues together. Compatible across desktop and standalone VR like Oculus Quest and Oculus Go.

BUILT-IN ISSUE TRACKING: Keeping track of issues identified during a VR meeting is critical. With speech-to-text annotations you can easily flag issues identified without removing your headset or requiring a second person for note taking.

PDF MEETING REPORTS: InsiteVR will automatically generate a PDF report of your annotations and screenshots so you can review and address issues after your VR meeting.

InsiteVR supports The Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest, Oculus Go, HTC Vive, and Windows Mixed Reality headsets, as well as desktop users.

You can contact the company to request a demo using this form. You can also follow InsiteVR on social media via Facebook and Twitter.

VersaillesVR: Explore the Palace of Versailles in Virtual Reality

When I was 27, I took one of those three-week Trafalgar bus trips on an excursion across Western Europe: England, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Austria…I’m sure some of you have done it too.

While I got to see Notre Dame Cathedral, the Louvre museum, and the Eiffel Tower in Paris, sadly I did not get an opportunity to go see a place I had always dreamed of visiting: the sprawling, ornate Palace of Versailles, once home to the Kings and Queens of France and the royal court.

If, like me, you always wanted to wander the halls and galleries of Versailles as a tourist, you will welcome a brand new release from Google Arts & Culture, titled VersaillesVR: The Palace Is Yours:

You can teleport around various rooms and halls in the famous palace, including the Hall of Mirrors, the Royal Chapel, and the Royal Opera House. A handy map of the palace on your left wrist lets you jump from one room to another in an instant! And no crowds; you get the entire palace to yourself!

I have only one complaint with this wonderful program. Oddly, there are no snap or smooth turns available to reorient yourself using your hand controllers! You will need to physically turn yourself around at times, which means that you can get tangled up in your VR headset cable, or have your back to your tracking stations! It’s a bit irritating. But other than that, I am overjoyed with this new app! You can spend hours exploring.

And the best part? It’s totally free!

VersaillesVR is available now as a free download from Steam, and it works with the Valve Index, HTC Vive, and Oculus Rift VR headsets only. The experience requires a Windows 10 PC with 20GB of available storage and at least a NVIDIA GTX 1060 GPU. VersaillesVR is available in French, English, or Chinese.

Le château de Versailles est à vous de découvrir!
The Palace of Versailles is yours to discover!

The Royal Chapel at Versailles (from the VersaillesVR app):
You can click on objects to learn more about them, like the pipe organ.