I continue to look back over the past 9 years I’ve spent in and around VR, as I prepare to start a new role. If you’ve come straight into Pt.2, be sure to read Pt.1 first.
The Nu[clear] Power Generation
Another of the early explorers of immersive technologies with the studio was EDF Energy, as part of their construction of Hinkley Point C (HPC) nuclear power station and the various training content necessary internally, and externally.
In 2014 they were busy finishing off fit-out of Cannington Court, a converted 12th century monastery in Somerset, near to the construction site of HPC, as a centre of digital learning excellence. For the next 8 years the studio worked with various facets and departments within EDF Energy creating a range of immersive learning experiences for employees, using the full gamut of the scale, from tablets to web to AR and VR and bespoke physical installations.
The first project adopted Oculus DK2 and Razer Hydra controllers to allow users to construct the internal workings of a nuclear power primary and secondary loops in a gamified experience. Thankfully when HTC Vive was commercially launched in 2016, this could be upgraded to support a fully roomscale experience that travelled around various events aimed at increasing awareness of STEM employment opportunities for future female engineers.
Over 20 projects deployed covered aspects of the fundamentals of nuclear power generation, smart meter installation and enterprise power sales toolkits to name a few. Building content with Unity allowed projects to easily morph from a multi-user tablet experience for training to a physical arcade cabinet single player experience installed in Glasgow Science Museum. This was so popular and well received, EDF Energy then commissioned a second version in upright cabinet form for their Cannington Court staff room. The most recent installation there saw the revamped HPC Visitor Centre reopen post-lockdowns with an array of interactive physical learning experiences.
The Built Environment
“Hard skills” in VR are always an obvious choice for training scenarios, with the benefits of placing learners in dangerous simulated environments safely, enabling virtual access to plant assets too large or costly to put in a training yard and engaging with a digital workforce in new, exciting ways.
After BLSC the studio looked at how to utilise VR for similar outcomes or other use cases. BLSC was a costly project, requiring expensive projectors, live actors and a lot of space to operate. With VR, that could be recreated in the headset fairly cheaply in comparison.
At the time, the BLSC content was built for Presagis Vega Prime, full flight simulator 3D database engine software, so had to be converted for Unity use. This gave us a lot of content quickly, which we could use to start exploring VR environments and uses. Over the years, having created so much content around the built environment (term we use to cover AEC, utilities, transportation and infrastructure), the studio has amassed a huge library of related 3D assets to repurpose. The BLSC timeslices and system has also since been upgraded to be fully Unity-based, avoiding costly annual licences and allowing the system to operate off a single monster PC/GFX card rather than four PCs as per original design.
Whilst the HTC Vive had launched in 2016 with room scale and tracked input controllers, when we got early access to the Oculus Touch controllers before launch, we started to explore natural hand gestures and input afforded by the capacitive capabilities they offered.
This resulted in a prototype for Vodafone, that went on to become Working at Height, which won the AIXR VRAwards 2019 ‘Best Use of VR for Training’ award. Initially the prototype was designed to test out climbing in VR and whether it was a realistic sensation useful for training purposes. This was tested in-house, within Vodafone and at many events we had booths at. London Build event specifically saw a group of bored, drunk builders loudly informing us “VR’s bullshit, it’s not real” at 10am. However we soon had to help one gentleman out of the headset and prise his sweaty, locked-frozen hands off the controllers when he was halfway climbing up the bullshit virtual mobile phone mast. Some words were eaten shortly afterwards.
This prototype provided useful for creating the full, final experience. We realised we didn’t need to make people climb a full-height tower (25m) as we weren’t looking to train them how to climb, just give the sensation of doing it and it also took way too long for most people. The full mast became a rooftop mast with about 10 rungs to provide the experience quickly, to focus on the core area and outcomes of the content, raising empathy of the maintenance crew managers.
After exploring soft-skills for Severn Trent Water (more on that in another part), they wanted to look at improving posture of manhole maintenance crews. This turned out to be one of our more complicated, yet interesting experiences where we had to extrapolate a full human posture from three points of measurement/reference only (headset and two tracked controllers). IK has been used for years for character and avatar animation and is fine for use but we needed that extra level of finesse to be able to measure, rate and feedback to users on their specific lifting posture and movements.
We tried out all sorts of additional sensors strapped to various parts of our bodies but in the end just brute-forced a solution of our own to keep it simple and scalable for the organisation to use effectively.
After approaching us to help with some Microsoft HoloLens development in Unity and realising it’s tough for a beginner dev, we ended up building a number of multi-user interactive schedules of works displayed in AR for pre-sales activities. These were so effective, they lead to the formation of a JV between the studio and Keltbray Group, a large construction organisation in the UK.
This has led to a number of VR training applications to be created over the past 3–4 years but more importantly, a number of unique immersive tools for construction training, planning and rehearsal. SkillShield and Presentive were borne out of necessity at the time but have since become valid products in their own right.
