Today’s big announcements have come by way of Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked event which saw the official reveal of the Galaxy Note7 alongside a brand new Gear VR. Virtual reality (VR) had a big part to play in the event with attendees having to don Gear VR’s at certain points, as well as new features being added. One of those was a collaboration with cloud graphics company, OTOY Inc. for an new online browsing experience for the Samsung Internet app for the mobile head-mounted display (HMD).
The new feature gives users the ability to customize their browsing environment, so that when viewing websites VR environments will appear around the browser, chosen either by the viewer or the web page itself. The technology creates a more immersive experience while browsing the web making use of high quality, 360-degree stereo cubemaps rendered in OTOY’s ORBX format.
Available now the latest version of the Samsung Internet application gives users a range of VR scenes to choose, from the weird and wonderful to the calm and serene. And for companies that wish to build brands using VR browsing, OTOY and Samsung are working with partners to develop branded experiences.
“Imagine going to the website of a new film and standing in the middle of that movie’s world while you browse, going to your favorite sports site and suddenly being in the arena where the big game is happening, or visiting a news organization’s site and being transported to where the top story is being told from. Today’s announcement transforms VR browsing for both people and brands, harnessing the visual fidelity of OTOY’s VR technology and the incredible quality of the Samsung Gear VR to deliver a beautiful, customized experience, starting with the Samsung Internet application today, and expanding to all VR browsers in the near future,” said Jules Urbach, Founder and CEO, OTOY.
Those experiences along with details regarding the web specification and process for all organizations looking to add this functionality to their sites will be announced in the near future.
VRFocus will continue its coverage of OTOY and Samsung, reporting back with any further announcements.
