A High Resolution Ultra-Wide FOV Telepresence Display

NASA has embarked on an ever more ambitious path of developing modular space exploration systems, and human exploration missions. To enable missions that are envisioned for the future, advances in the human/robotic interface are required. This proposal provides a new telepresence interface, based on an ultra-wide field-of-view (FOV) HMD. This fully immersive HMD has a FOV which nearly matches the unobstructed human visual field, and maintains high resolution throughout. By combining this immersive display with a custom camera system and appropriate software, a telepresence system capable of high-fidelity depth perception, FOV and resolution is possible. This tool would be a significant benefit to human operators of robotic systems. In Phase 1 we designed a tiled, wide FOV camera array and appropriate 3D software to interface between this array and the HMD. The product of Phase 2 will be a complete working telepresence system with custom camera array and HMD. This system will be integrated into the NASA telerobotic system called Robonaut. There are strong commercialization opportunities in the engineering services industry and various government agencies, as they are known users of telepresence systems for remote operation of robots and vehicles.