With Samsung jumping on the virtual reality (VR) niche with the Gear VR and Galaxy Note 4 combo, and with LG following close behind teaming up with Google Cardboard plus the LG G3 – not to mention the revival of the View-Master in modern VR style – it will not surprise us if the smaller manufacturers make efforts to jump on this market as well. But as OnePlus has yet to jump on the VR bandwagon, photographer Rene Meeh has taken it upon himself to make a VR headset for his OnePlus One, via 3D printing.
No doubt at all, the advent of 3D printing has made things like these possible – that a hobbyist like Meeh could design and bring to existence his own take of what a VR headset for the OnePlus One should look like. And in many cases it seems to be better than the ones already out there, as Meeh has incorporated his own improvements to the basic design.
Firstly, Meeh understood that his headset should be able to accommodate the size of the OnePlus One – which is bigger than most phones. Another innovation is that he is able to adjust pupillary distance for people who are slightly near or far-sighted. His design is also ready for augmented reality – he can switch from VR to real environment using the phone’s camera.
With a great design like this, you would expect that there will be electrical parts in his headset. The reality is that there is none. This means that anyone with a 3D printer can copy and make tweaks with the design he made. He uses software already available via the Google Play Store, and uses voice recognition and commands to interface with his OnePlus One device while in VR mode.
Lastly, he printed his design using a Chinese clone of the MakerBot Replicator – which is called the CTC Printer. He says that the print quality is acceptable in light of the price tag. So here we are hoping that OnePlus would actually contact the guy and possibly strike a partnership. Check out the source link below for more details into this project.
VIA: 3Dprint.com
