Meet your astrologer
10.01.2024 - 17:21 / skift.com / Aurora Borealis / Justin Dawes
The Apple Vision Pro can help users explore new places virtually and relive travels from the past.
Those features were highlighted this week with Apple’s announcement that the virtual reality headset will be available in the U.S. starting February 2 for $3,499. Pre-orders for Apple Vision Pro begin on January 19.
Apple announced the product last June, an addition to other VR headsets on the market, such those by Meta and Lenovo.
There are a couple of features related to virtual travel built into the Vision Pro headset:
There’s also potential for third-party companies to build apps that can offer more virtual travel experiences. The app Sky Guide will be available on the Vision Pro, giving users the ability to travel through space, stargaze, and view other natural phenomena like the Aurora Borealis.
Apple is partnering with the gaming and software development platform Unity so that companies can design apps for the Vision Pro, such as those that involved with the metaverse.
Unity was used by one company, for example, to make a platform that travel agents and hotel owners can use to create virtual experiences on the Oculus Go headset as a marketing ploy for potential travelers — a way to give them a taste of what they could see in real life.
Susan Black, who is speaking at the CES tech conference in Las Vegas this week, previously told Skift that she is seeing interest in virtual travel from tour operators and travel suppliers who want to sell products to potential customers. Black’s company, Wowzitude, offers virtual tours of travel destinations. Senior living organizations are some of her top clients, providing experiences to people who could not otherwise travel.
Business consulting and research firm McKinsey estimates that virtual travel, driven mostly by advertising and virtual events, could be worth more than $20 billion by 2030.
Users can view photos and videos taken on the iPhone in a high quality through the Vision Pro, which Apple said is meant to help users “relive” experiences.
Pictures and videos can expand as large as the user wants them. Panoramas taken on the iPhone expand and appear to wrap around the user, meant to create the feeling that the user is standing in the photographed place once again.
The headset also includes Apple’s first “3-D camera,” enabling the user to capture videos and audio that can be replayed through the headset later.
The Vision Pro interface is controlled entirely by the user’s eyes, hands, and voice — without the use of extra controls.
The headset’s two screens, each the size of a postage stamp, contain more pixels than a 4K television, enabling extremely high-resolution visuals. The company also said its high-tech audio system is meant to make users
Meet your astrologer
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