What is a CAVE Good For?

ynakai asks: "Today, I had the fortune to be allowed to play with demo applications in a CAVE. This technology is stunning, but what is the killer app? A staffer said that despite the potential use as a teaching tool for medical students, the system is rarely used now except by digital artists (who admittedly create some stunning experiences - try the VRML versions of some). Surely Slashdot can think up better ways to make use of a multimillion dollar room of fully immersive 3D interaction, besides FPS games?"

for those of you who don't have an Indigo2...

[niff]

you can download a vrml plugin here:

http://ca.com/cosmo/ [ca.com]

CAVE experience here

[Robbat2]

From working with a CAVE enviroment in a research lab for 2 years, I came to the simple conclussion that other than for developing and utilizing some custom 3D (with immersive stereo glasses, head tracking etc.) applications, and showing off your work on a big screen (with 3D of course).

There is a definate wow factor to it that helps in promoting the research, but for the most part it becomes stale fast.

Another shameless plug here, a custom math visualization system I spent quite a while in the development with: http://mvs.sourceforge.net/

Re:CAVE experience here

[davechen]

Yeah, I'm with you. I worked in a lab with a CAVE for several years, and I've visited other places with CAVEs. They're mainly good for making gee-whiz demos to impress funding agencies. I have yet to see anyone actually doing real work in a CAVE.