Damon Hernandez has been an interactive 3D developer for the past 15 years, and he’s interested in developing VR applications that solve real world problems within the construction industry. He’s interested in using the web as a distribution platform using open standards because he sees that this will be the most sustainable and robust distribution platform in the long-run. I had a chance to catch up with Damon at the Seattle VR Expo where he gave me a quick tour through the open standards landscape for VR.
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Damon is interested in VR because he sees it as a really powerful communications platform. He cites the saying, “I hear, and I forget; I see, and I remember; I do and I understand.” He sees that VR helps you understand problems within their full context.
Damon has been working at a construction firm named IDEAbuilder for the past 8 years where he’s been able to explore the latest open standards and technologies in delivering 3D content. Rather than looking to the coolest game engine platform, he’s more interested in going with a non-proprietary and completely royalty-free that’s going to both be robust and stand the test of time.
The game engines were also not designed to account for ISO standards. He says, “When you start to get involved with the reality part of virtual reality, you bring in all of the legal aspects of the real world into that.” If your video game goes down, then it may inconvenience someone. However, if you give someone the wrong diagnosis, then it could have fatal consequences where you become liable to pay damages.
Damon believes that the web will continue to serve as a robust distribution platform and that open standards will provide the stability and consistency in the long-run. Some of the open standards for VR and 3D content over the web include VRML, X3D, COLLADA interchange format for geometry. There’s also x3dom for integrated 3D content into web pages, as well as the glTF specification from the Khronos Group that provides compression and efficient transmission of 3D content.
Damon is continuing to develop his content pipeline and delivery over the web as the ecosystem evolves. Even though the web hasn’t fully matured as a distribution mechanism yet, he’s betting that the open web and open standards will eventually provide a robust and solid foundation for VR to be able to solve many real-world problems.
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Rough Transcript
[00:00:05.452] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR Podcast.
[00:00:11.956] Damon Hernandez: My name is Damon Hernandez. I am a virtual reality developer, and more importantly, an interactive 3D developer, which I've been for almost about 15 years now. So VR, I see, is one way of viewing interactive 3D data. And I have a focus on real-world industries that look to use these types of technologies, AR, VR, mixed reality, and so forth, to solve real-world problems and improve industry process.
[00:00:35.742] Kent Bye: Great. And so what kind of problems are you hoping to solve then with VR?
[00:00:40.226] Damon Hernandez: Well, I think with virtual reality, you know, it's all about communication, right? It's about understanding things in context. So virtual reality allows for people to walk a mile in another person's shoes. And so that's what's great. You know, we always hear, to hear is to forget, to see is to remember, but to experience is to know. And so I think that with virtual reality, when a person is in the experience, It helps doctors better understand and communicate with patients. It's helping people who are either buying or building a structure, you know, learn the ins and outs. So, I think as a communication tool, there really isn't a better one. And so, my team looks to focus on how do we use virtual reality for just that, right? Better communication with various different stakeholders involved in those industries.
[00:01:21.355] Kent Bye: And so, you said you've been working in 3D technologies for 15 years. What have you been doing with that?
[00:01:26.113] Damon Hernandez: Mainly it's a focus on Web3D. So Web3D has been around pretty much for about 20 years now. The old VRML specifications. So Web3D is nothing new. And so a lot of what I have done is worked on applications that focus, like I said, mainly on industry. Clean tech, high energy, voltage regulators, that type of things. And the past 10 years, I've been working with a residential construction firm that looks at how do you use the latest in advancements and essentially advanced manufacturing and digital fabrication, not 3D printing or additive manufacturing, but subtractive CNC cutting. And how do you take the data that's generated from that, 2D and 3D, and be able to bring that into environments like virtual reality and augmented reality to help, again, different stakeholders, the homeowner, the builders, the manufacturers. So very much focusing on those types of applications.
[00:02:18.779] Kent Bye: So at this point, a lot of looking at 3D immersive experiences is being generated by either Unreal Engine or Unity. And on the web, browsers are being re-architected to be able to be performant enough. But what do you see as the vision for why do we need to have immersive virtual reality experiences that are mediated through the web?
[00:02:39.622] Damon Hernandez: Well, I think at the end of the day, it's ownership of content, right? If you're an industry or a huge company, it's very hard for you to lock all of your process and assets into any proprietary solution, especially one that doesn't focus on your industry. And that is the problem right now is that a lot of the engines are for gaming. And so they have no sensitivity to medical standards and others. So the onus is on the developer of those solutions to try to find a way of how do I cram this data into this platform that doesn't support and usually isn't interested in supporting what it is that I'm doing. And then also, it's not just about VR. I think that when you look at real world industries, you need collaboration among many different types of platforms. So you need the guy who's in VR communicating with a person who's on the field or in the office with a mobile device, one that's with a web browser. So in that, VR really becomes a feature and not the end destination application. because that collaboration is key and you can't have that barrier to entry of if someone needs to make an important decision on the fly that they have to go log in. So that's where as the web becomes more robust. It's not just the fact that you're building something on a platform that isn't owned by any one person, right? The web's not going to shut down. Unity or Epic could be bought, and they could get shut down, right? So I think that, one, it's the longevity of content and application, which is key, and then also the distribution. It really is, like what the game engines provide, build once to display everywhere because you have to.
[00:04:04.261] Kent Bye: And so what are some of the inputs that you're taking, and then what are some of the outputs in terms of putting it onto the web? So what are you taking in with this 3D data, and then how are you translating it to format it in a way for it to be able to be viewable on the web?
[00:04:16.585] Damon Hernandez: Yeah, well, that's a really good question. So, you know, many different industries have their own way of generating the 3D data. So either you have reality capture, you know, laser scanning and that type of thing. You have just straight up modeling. So you have to really look at what is the pipeline from said industry into then a runtime environment, right? So usually you get these very huge 3D models that do have to be optimized or at least built in an intelligent way to where then the applications can go through and only grab the data that's needed. to display that information. So coming in, that in itself is, there's no standard for that. Now there are standards that are starting to be defined that are actually open standards. So not a de facto industry standard, but open standards like, you know, Vermal, X3D, Collada is another one of these, where it's an interchange format essentially of geometry. Now I've brought this into my scene. Now that it's in my scene, what is the web languages and what is the stack that's going to be, again, standards-based, not proprietary, royalty-free, that's going to be able to deliver this experience? And so that's where you look at your JavaScripts, your WebGLs, your X3DOMs, and these types of technologies. So getting it in and then displaying it, there are standards in place for that. I think it's just now it's about identifying what are the best practices on the content development side. Also on the web side, and then as you pointed out, now the browsers are actually starting to become robust enough that those are the engines, right? And so the web is a platform. So I think that by the time that the problems around content pipeline and delivery, as those get flushed out, that by the time that that is addressed, that now you'll have the web be a lot more robust platform for those types of experiences.
[00:05:55.283] Kent Bye: So I know that there's WebGL, and then there's JavaScript libraries like 3GS, which is a little bit more user-friendly to be able to generate 3D geometry within a web browser experience. And I think that was kind of originated from the web development community to be able to create web design experiences. that may not necessarily be the most optimal way to be able to translate 3D geometry data for other specific applications. And so, from your perspective, what are some of the leading libraries to be able to actually generate and do that translation of the 3D geometry and to be displayed on the web?
[00:06:32.286] Damon Hernandez: Well, you know, that's a good point. I think it all depends on what you're building, right? Again, if you're in countries where standards matter, if you're in industries where standards matter, there is a standards-based framework called XFreedom, which is X3DOM, that is based off of the old X3D standard, which is from the Vermal. It's a standard as well. And so, you know, if you're saying, okay, standards are important because I'm dealing with governments or I'm dealing with big industry, there are those frameworks in place to where you don't have to be a low-level graphics guy and do the WebGL and you can sit higher. If you're just doing a game or something where standards don't matter, then maybe 3JS is a better option, you know, again, depending upon what you like to build in. But then what's great is you have, you know, Recently the Kronos group just announced the glTF format, right? So now you have a lot of things where they're saying, hey, once you have that geometry, how do we compress that and then get that to the browser as quickly as possible? And so now you're starting to see these applications that just do that, right? Great compression to get that model down. So that way you're, yes, you're loading an entire model of a building or of a medical scan. But it's pretty quick now. So there are a lot of standards again that are in place. It's just kind of a matter of going into the kitchen and saying, okay, what's here? Now what can I make with this? And what do I need to make with it that matter the most?
[00:07:47.931] Kent Bye: Yeah, and I know that anytime that someone is choosing a technology, they want to bet on the horse that they see has the most momentum in terms of community adoption, but also that's going to be able to solve all their problems that they need to solve. Let's say if 3GS is being used by the most developers, but it doesn't meet those standards, then how do you personally go about trying to decide which technology to start to really invest in when there are no kind of universal standards at this point?
[00:08:14.577] Damon Hernandez: Well, I think, you know, there aren't any universal standards, but there are ISO standards. And so that's where international standards organization standards. And so that's where I start. Because for me, as you know, as a developer, it's not about so much what is all the other developers building on? What's the flavor of the week? If I'm building an application for industry, it is what is the solution that's going to have the longevity needed for this industry and this use case, right? So my choice is more on the customer side. What is the best to help make sure that this person who's coming into this experience has their data and their experience in a way to where it's going to stand the test of time. There's interoperability. I focus less on what my fellow developers say, hey, what's cool today? Because you need something for real world. And that's the, I think, one of the issues with a lot of virtual reality. When you start to get involved with reality, part of virtual reality, you bring in all the legal aspects of the real world into that. It's not about, hey, my game went down and someone got inconvenienced. The VR experience went down and someone got diagnosed wrong and now they died and now I'm getting sued. So when it comes to making, you know, what's my technology stack, I'm going to go with the standards and the things that are proven to be robust and not necessarily what's the popular thing of the week.
[00:09:25.853] Kent Bye: Yeah, I'm just trying to get a sense of, you know, when these real world companies are coming to you asking to solve these problems, they're giving you stuff. What is it that you're providing them? Are you providing them sort of like a X3 DOM web experience? Are you providing them like a Unity build? And maybe like talk a bit about like the end product that you're producing and if it's just one or if it's just kind of like many different delivery formats.
[00:09:48.604] Damon Hernandez: You know, I think, you know, different customers, different needs, right? I think definitely one looks to try to really start with a standards-based stack because you do want that customer to be able to say, hey, I want to be able to tap into the millions of web developers if I need to build this out instead of a handful of Unity guys who honestly are focused on gaming, right? But if it is something to where, you know, they just say, hey, we need a quick little demo or something. Well, then maybe the game engines, you know, Stingray, Unreal or one of those can solve that specific problem. But again, since you're looking at something that says, how do we improve process across the whole scope of things? That is where, again, they have to have that flexibility and where you do see companies that are embracing those tools. they internally might be using that in their company. The whole industry isn't jumping on that adoption, right? And so that's where it's different. I definitely say stick with the standards. And even if you go into a proprietary solution, as far as the delivery mechanism, be smart about how you actually store your data. So that way, as these other things become more robust, or as you see the need to scale appropriately into other technologies, then it's easier to get your data into that experience, and there's less rework.
[00:11:00.538] Kent Bye: I guess the thing that I wonder is that if you're delivering things on the web and the reason to go with Unity is that it may provide a low latency experience that prevents motion sickness, but yet, like you said, there's only a handful of developers that are really focusing on gaming. So are you at the phase of just letting people suffer through the latency issues of viewing a virtual reality experience through the browser? Or is this something that you're delivering the 3D components through the browser and the immersive VR experience will start to happen once the technology stack kind of catches up to make it not induce simulator sickness?
[00:11:34.492] Damon Hernandez: Well, I think in those specific scenarios, you know, that's where you build out parts of the platform. Because again, VR and a lot of these industries is just a feature. It is not the end goal. So I think it's okay at this point until the web does become more robust to have that unity experience or that unreal experience that is communicating to a web-based platform for everything else. Right. And then how do you grab that same assets from the database to pull into your unity scene? So until the browsers catch up, I think that for, you know, virtual reality, yeah, that is kind of an option right now, right? Now on the flip side, though, I think what's great is a lot of these industries don't need the same requirements that a game needs, right? It's not about high levels of interaction, super good graphics, it's definitely more about function over form, and look and entertainment, because you're truly saying, I need to get in here and better understand something, not entertain me, make it look good, and good frame rates. So that's why a lot of the content that you see that's done by real world industries, yeah, no, it's not as much fun as maybe Epic's bullet train, right? But it's definitely one of those to where, you know, you don't need to say, ah, it has to have these levels of engagement. Because again, it is more about the function that you're getting out of it instead of the entertainment values.
[00:12:46.475] Kent Bye: And finally, what do you see as the ultimate potential of virtual reality and what it might be able to enable?
[00:12:53.648] Damon Hernandez: Better understanding. I think that's the thing about virtual reality that's always intrigued me since I got into the industry, you know, back in 2000 was being able to really, regardless of what it is, if it's a entertainment, if it's for industry, you're in it, you're experiencing data in the way that we do every day. And so that's for me, what I have always been excited about the technology is as a communication tool. There is no better one. There is no better one. And as it continues to develop, we're going to see that, where I think that the blends of reality. And if you have this interactive content, how do I need to see it in the context that's going to resonate with me the most? And so that's where I think that VR and AR and all of those things, it's all the same. It's just I need to view it in a different way for this particular thing.
[00:13:40.955] Kent Bye: Great. Anything else that's left unsaid that you'd like to say?
[00:13:43.417] Damon Hernandez: Well, no. Just keep doing what you're doing, man, and enjoy CBR 2015. So appreciate it. Awesome.
[00:13:49.317] Kent Bye: Well, thank you. Thank you. And thank you for listening. If you'd like to support the Voices of VR podcast, then please consider becoming a patron at patreon.com slash voices of VR.
