EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES Oscar Biason – 903

What is emerging Technologies?

The problem with predicting the future is that we don’t know what we don’t know. The reason for this is because of how our minds think. We often try to adapt our technology to an upcoming problem so if we are unaware of any problems that are coming up then we have no idea on how to solve them. Even if the problems start to appear we are unaware of how people in the tech industry will attempt to solve it . Due to this fact we are not trying to predict new technologies with in this documentary but exploring ones that have been created but are still in development, close to being manufactured or are still being planned on.

Description of the technology

The technology that our industry has decided to cover to fill in the part of emerging technology in the documentary are the ways we are trying to increase the features, interactivity and a greater sense of immersion into the virtual realty world. These features include better auditory equipment like creating a built in surround sound piece with in the VR headset and using physical features to play in a game like running on a treadmill in real life to determine the speed and direction you want to move in the game instead of using a joystick or keyboard to move. If there is enough time to tackle AR technology we will also look into it because instead of transporting you into a virtual world in VR, AR brings the virtual world to yours.

Where/How is it used?

Right now there is a new technology developing in Microsoft called the HoloLens 2 which has inbuilt AR and VR features. Due to the problem of VR having low quality displays because it requires double the power Microsoft is attempting to tackle this problem by enhancing the quality of it’s Hololens. We can expect 4k video to come out of this system at 60 frames per second (fps) as well as supporting head tracking and spatial sounds. Microsoft has also confirmed that the HoloLens 2 will pack a dedicated holographic processing unit. It is also enhancing its AI which helps it to learn voice recognition and image recognition without relying on the cloud. This means that it AI could adapt to any accent in your voice to understand what you are saying.

how it will influence society

Both AR and VR had made headlines in the last 5 years with its new technology. AR has been seen on the news with Pokemon Go and VR so common and widely known that youtube has a format to view VR videos. The Hololens 2 has been released on 25th February 2019 and has made strides in how we can work. In the first Hololens 2 AR demonstration it shows how the way we can work is no longer just on our screens but we are able to plan and do other parts of other work in a much larger field of work. Also seen in the demonstration is the way we are able to make much larger simulations using this technology. Companies might be able to create large scale, 3D blueprints for much larger projects in the future. This will drastically affect society because this new technology can develop the way we work and plan. It can create a more efficient and cleaner workplace than using pen and paper on a desk.

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