OVR_multiview Extension Completed For More Efficient OpenGL VR

[phoronix]

Phoronix: OVR_multiview Extension Completed For More Efficient OpenGL VR

The OVR_multiview OpenGL Extension developed via the OpenVR initiative has been around for several months in an incomplete form for allowing more efficient virtual reality (VR) rendering while now the extension is complete...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=OpenGL-OVR_multiview-Complete

[uid313]

Is OpenGL even suitable for VR?
Or does it have too much overhead and perhaps Vulkan is what is needed?

[cj.wijtmans]

Is OpenGL even suitable for VR?
Or does it have too much overhead and perhaps Vulkan is what is needed?

Modern OpenGL is AZDO.

[L_A_G]

Is OpenGL even suitable for VR?
Or does it have too much overhead and perhaps Vulkan is what is needed?

Seeing how most PC VR titles use D3D11 (to my knowledge at least) I can't see why OpenGL wouldn't be suited for VR use. Low level APIs like Vulkan and D3D12 are obviously better suited to the requirements of VR (constant high frame rates and no big dips being the biggest), but so far they haven't been absolutely necessary. They probably will become that once developers start populating their VR worlds with more and higher detailed objects rather than the more spartan visuals of titles like Job Simulator.

[haagch]

If you look at https://highfidelity.com/, they default to an OpenGL 4.5 renderer (they have a 4.1 renderer too) and I believe they use quite some modern extensions https://github.com/highfidelity/hifi...l/src/gpu/gl45

If you want to try it on linux you probably want my master branch https://github.com/ChristophHaag/hifi
I was really surprised how well it runs in VR on radeonsi.

Anyway,

The OVR_multiview OpenGL Extension developed via the OpenVR initiative

Really? The OVR prefix was really only used by oculus for all their stuff and the contributors

Contributors

    John Carmack, Oculus
    Tom Forsyth, Oculus
    Maurice Ribble, Qualcomm
    James Dolan, NVIDIA Corporation
    Mark Kilgard, NVIDIA Corporation
    Michael Songy, NVIDIA Corporation
    Yury Uralsky, NVIDIA Corporation
    Jesse Hall, Google
    Timothy Lottes, Epic
    Jan-Harald Fredriksen, ARM
    Jonas Gustavsson, Sony Mobile
    Sam Holmes, Qualcomm
    Nigel Williams, Qualcomm
    Tobias Hector, Imagination Technologies
    Daniel Koch, NVIDIA Corporation

don't make me think otherwise...

[schmidtbag]

Is OpenGL even suitable for VR?
Or does it have too much overhead and perhaps Vulkan is what is needed?

I would argue "suitable" is relative. I wouldn't say OpenGL is bad for VR, but DX12 and Vulkan are definitely better. As long as OGL is still in use, anything to improve upon it is a welcome change.

Every millisecond counts. OGL is just one of many things that could use some reduced latency for a nausea-free experience.

[timofonic]

Why still wasting efforts in OpenGL? This is only slowing down the migration to Vulkan.