Look under physical mods: how to see some of your home cockpit with VR
-
@Snake122 - Yes - I agree about the ability to look under. What I don’t like is that looking from one to the other changes perspective wrt size and position of what I’m trying to touch. Or that a VR goggle may just plain physically interfere with my field of view due to their shape/fit.
It’s also interesting to read of people already complaining of eye strain and focus problems - similar to complaints I’ve read about only being able to see the JHMCS Reticle wrt one eye (with RL NVGs there is also an issue of night vision recovery, as using them amounts to sitting too close to a TV for a time). These are RL problems…and also something I was expecting to hear about. Not a surprise to me.
-
Interesting solutions for cockpit owners here.
I dont have a cockpit as such, but i have two F16 Thrustmaster MFD (though only the frames with buttons -no screens) and an A-10 UFD which I also plan to use. And of course an Hotas solution, Thrustmaster Warthog.
I use a Pico 4, but I don’t want to cut into it because I’m using it for other games too. But fortunately I can just double-tap on the side of the headset and it instantly switches to a color passthrough view from the two front cameras. It is not perfect of course, certainly not 1:1 with what I see while playing, but well enough to press whatever I need to press if my muscle memory isn’t up to it. And then I quickly double tap the headset again, and the passthrough disappears and I’m back into the game. Takes a second.For people with real cockpits I understand the need to do a more dramatic solution to get the most of both worlds. But this was just a tip to those with Pico 4. The Quest 2 passthrough is of less quality so I didn’t bother when I used that. But for Pico 4 - the color passthrough works
-
@Stevie said: @Snake122 - this is why as a cockpit builder I have ZERO interest in VR.
….all VR does for me is turn my efforts building a cockpit into a HUGE waste of $$$.
This is why as a VR User I have ZERO interest in building a pit.
All VR does for me is turn my space into a complete Virtual Cockpit turning my lack of required efforts into a HUGE gain of $$$
Ara’
-
@Aragorn yep there’s that and PointCTRL (and eventually probably other hand tracking) brings in the virtual switches to the whole feel.
-
I tried it with the Pimax. Unfortunately it does absolutey not work for me.
-
@Korbi how so? How much material did you remove, all of the nose piece at least and some to the sides of it? I do have to wear my headband a little tighter without the support of the bottom of facial interface so the headset doesn’t droop down into now empty area
-
@Snake122 said in Look under physical mods: how to see some of your home cockpit with VR:
@Korbi how so? How much material did you remove, all of the nose piece at least and some to the sides of it? I do have to wear my headband a little tighter without the support of the bottom of facial interface so the headset doesn’t droop down into now empty area
I removed even more. Step by step though.
I think my headform is simply not compatible with a VR HMD that misses the lower support. I cannot make it fit in a way to make enough space to look under and have a sharp Picture in the Headset at the same time. -
@Korbi ok, sorry! The PiMax has a smaller sweet spot than others because of the wide view lenses. Like I said in one of the earlier posts, counterweights can also make up for that lack of contact. Do you have a fairly wide nose? Most of what I see is looking around the areas the nose support/cover used to be.
-
@Snake122 Yes I’d say my nose is quite a viewblocker in that case.
No worries, simply waiting for the 12K then -
@Aragorn - and that’s actually quite understandable.
…but as for me, I’ve already spent the $$$.
-
Thanks for these ideas. I have a Reverb G2 and plan on getting a spare gasket that I can cut down.
VR is so immersive I almost get acrophobic! Huge thanks to the devs! So awesome!!
I anticipated trouble seeing my MFD’s and ICP and I hope this lookunder mod helps with that. I did not anticipate so much difficulty checking six o’clock.
My back and neck just aren’t supposed to turn that far
Has anyone installed towel bars near their VR pit to help with this?
-
@Sixpack if you have a 3d printer, there are a several out there.
Overall, Reverb G2 3d printed ones have been a great mod for me, lots of side to side view. The bottom one pictureed was actually too close with a combo of the thinner cushion (I think a Rift S one I had laying around) and the less deep facial interface. I went with the middle one and a thicker Quest 2 cushion I had on hand. With the magnets, these are also the quickest and easiest ones to change too.
The towel racks maybe my next project now @Sixpack. I have a non-1:1 arm rest that houses one of my bass shakers, but adding the towel racks might make some of the movements around the cockpit a little easier.
-
@Snake122 That looks interesting. I found a lot of gaskets offering FOV improvement but didn’t manage to find any that were cut. Can you point me in the right direction?
-
@Sixpack I’ve been cutting all of these myself. In this case, I wanted the extra stability on the printer bed so I waited unt after they printed, plus I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to remove.
-
This post is deleted! -
@danster putting this here in case someone else wants one:
VR Face Cushion Pad for Oculus… https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BPBB22LZ?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_shareBut really your call on whichever of the “Facial interface” meets your wanted features and budget (remember you are going to hack this appart too)
-
@Snake122 Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. I used a table saw with cross-cut sled and the cuts were accurate and precise. A few licks with a file smoothed off the edges very nicely.
Now I have the immersive effect of VR with the ability to look down my nose and see the ICP and MFD buttons in my pit. I can find “P” for pause and even pick up the mouse off the floor without removing my VR headset.
Brilliant!!
-
@Snake122 TL;DR and apologies, it is on my to-read list but isn’t a good light seal essential to immersion in VR? So breaking that would be like watching a movie and some dude in front of you has his phone out at a high brightness setting?
I do “look under” at the start of my flights or when VA doesn’t seem to recognise my voice commands correctly so just to check if things are alright, but when the flight is on, I barely “look under” and feel like doing it would greatly break immersion.
-
@Sixpack said in Look under physical mods: how to see some of your home cockpit with VR:
@Snake122 Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. I used a table saw with cross-cut sled and the cuts were accurate and precise. A few licks with a file smoothed off the edges very nicely.
Now I have the immersive effect of VR with the ability to look down my nose and see the ICP and MFD buttons in my pit. I can find “P” for pause and even pick up the mouse off the floor without removing my VR headset.
Brilliant!!
Good to hear!
@Atlas said in Look under physical mods: how to see some of your home cockpit with VR:
@Snake122 TL;DR and apologies, it is on my to-read list but isn’t a good light seal essential to immersion in VR? So breaking that would be like watching a movie and some dude in front of you has his phone out at a high brightness setting?
I do “look under” at the start of my flights or when VA doesn’t seem to recognise my voice commands correctly so just to check if things are alright, but when the flight is on, I barely “look under” and feel like doing it would greatly break immersion.
I cover that some in the first post first big paragraph (I know TL;DR), but for sims, no not with my preferences. Light seal I would definitely say is important to immersion and readability in traditional VR games, but not so much in sims mostly since it’s a seated experience. Granted I don’t have my cockpit in a super bright area (basement with no windows), but I have an instruments monitor and lights on all the time. Maybe if you had a bright light source underneath you light flood could be an issue.
Most of the time I’m focused in the headset and not really noticing what’s happening in the look under until I actually shift my eyes down there. When you look down it depends, for those of us that have immersive cockpit or even just maybe desktop MFDs it isn’t too immersion breaking. Even with a desk, you’re not seeing much of it. These mods are really only enough to see about one TM MFD at arm’s length or so. You have to some what work at looking down.
Also I would point out the Meta Quest Pro’s headset due to it being productivity focused already has this style of facial interface from the factory apparently. Brightness I think has increased over the years too in VR.
-
@Snake122 Yes, I did read your first post and the first couple of posts in this thread.
I just remember my old HTC Vive and when I got my Reverb G2, I really appreciated the better light seal of the G2 compared to the Vive. I don’t game in a lit room, really the only light source is the TV which I use as a monitor. However, trying out a “look under” mid-flight feels like the old “going back-and-forth from 2D cockpit to 3D cockpit” from Falcon/Allied Force days. Not greatly immersion breaking but it does interrupt some sort of flow.