An immersive virtual environment training system on real-time motion platform

This work is focused on the implementation and integration of virtual environment (VE) technology to support the future Human Mars Mission (HMM) personal training conducted by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). We present a six degrees of freedom (DOF) motion platform, or Flostation, plus a head mounted display (HMD) based virtual environment training system, where the motion platform is used to simulate rover movement and the HMD coupled with a head tracker and a joystick to support interaction. This research demonstrates that we can achieve not only real-time interaction performance but also high level realism in our virtual environment application. The prototype system was developed on an SGI Onyx equipped with an InfiniteReality II, a two pipe graphics system.