Demonstrating the Integration of Real-World Distractions in Virtual Reality

With the proliferation of consumer-level virtual reality (VR) devices, users started experiencing VR in less controlled environments, such as in social gatherings and public areas. While the current VR hardware provides an increasingly immersive experience, it ignores stimuli originating from the physical surroundings that distract users from the VR experience. To block distractions from the outside world, many users wear noise-canceling headphones. However, this is insufcient to block loud or transient sounds (e.g., drilling or hammering) and, especially, multi-modal distractions (e.g., air drafts, temperature shifts from an A/C, construction vibrations, or food smells). To tackle this, in this demonstration, we let participants experience a new approach, in which we directly integrate the distracting stimuli from the user's physical surroundings into their virtual reality experience to enhance presence. Using our novel approach, an otherwise distracting wind gust can be directly mapped to the sway of trees in a VR experience that already contains trees. We demonstrate how to integrate a range of distractive stimuli into the VR experience, such as haptics (temperature, vibrations, touch), sounds, and smells.