Humans always seek to create other worlds. We long for a view that reaches past the limits of our own sight, transporting us to places that are out of reach. The tech has played an important role in our ability to dream up new perspectives, especially into otherwise walled-off areas of life such as the solar system, the human body, or entirely fictional settings. It makes sense that our innate desire to explore would eventually spawn products to immerse ourselves in virtual spaces.
In his book, Creativity, Inc., Ed Catmull describes the people-first practices of Pixar and their constant desire to explore. Working toward a graduate degree in 1969, Ed joined forces with Professor Ivan Sutherland, whom he affectionally names, “…one of the pioneers of interactive computer graphics.” This man had great influence in his field and inspired Catmull to pursue new things, including the very first forms of virtual reality hardware.
In 1968, [Catmull] co-created what is widely believed to be the first virtual reality head-mounted display system. The device was named The Sword of Damocles, after the Greek myth, because it was so heavy that in order to be worn by the person using it, it had to be suspended from a mechanical arm bolted to the ceiling.
If only some pictures existed of what this contraption looked like! I would love to look through our little portals and see the world of VR in its infancy. The idea of such a contraption is like seeing mainframe computers the size of several rooms or perhaps some kind of far-future technology that envelopes the user like a Holodeck.
Sutherland and Dave Evans, who was chair of the university’s computer science department, were magnets for bright students with diverse interests, and they led us with a light touch. Basically, they welcomed us to the program, gave us work-space and access to computers, and then let us pursue whatever turned us on. The result was a collaborative, supportive community so inspiriting that I would later seek to replicate it at Pixar.
This is the way. It’s our route forward for explorations into virtual worlds. Since the desire to explore new lands is so foundational to our desire to explore, the question is not IF we will all be gazing through these windows, but WHEN that technology will be commonplace.
When that happens, let’s take a lesson from Catmull, using that collective inspiration and vision to see past the limitations we have in front of us right now. These tools bring what we see in our imaginations forward to something we can see using our eyes. Our desire to gaze through portals into new worlds has never changed – we can see so much further when we go there together.