virtual reality and texture mapping

"Texture mapping" is an efficient method to make surfaces for 3D virtual things by overlaying 2D texture gradients on object surfaces. Depth perception of these surfaces can be then be improved through the application of shading and reflected light. "Ray tracing" takes light reflection to a high level by tracking individual rays of light as they bounce among objects and eventually bounce from the exterior surfaces of objects to the viewer. Texture mapping, light shading, and ray tracing are computingly intensive, particularly for challenging virtual constructs with moving objects. Fortunately for the sake of computing cost, people do not track as much vision depth in travelling elements as in stationary objects. Accordingly, computing effort in virtual reality can be reduced absent significant loss in perceptual believability by rendering the surfaces of moving elements of less depth than the exteriors of stationery objects. Linked page DigiTours also deals with these concepts.

Your two eyes see things from two intersecting angles. Although your two eyes see two alternate images, they work together and your brain integrates the two images into a single picture with depth perception. The muscles in both eyes adjust the position of one's eyes to produce a single picture of the object , which is known as axial convergence. In like manner, the lenses in both eyes change shape to focus at the distance of the object -- called accommodation. This is called parallax vision. Realistically artificially creating parallax vision in Virtual Reality is challenging. How can a person cause the eyes see two alternate images? At what distance should the pictures be? In the event that the images are too distant, then the screen might be too small to span enough of the span of vision. If the screen is too close, then muscles that achieve axial convergence and accommodation may fight with each other. Virtual Tours Modesto, California expands discussion of this material.

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