Meta shows off latest VR headset prototypes

SAN FRANCISCO: Tech giant Meta's Reality Labs division has revealed new prototypes in its roadmap toward the lightweight, hyper-realistic virtual reality graphics.

The breakthroughs remain far from consumer-ready, but the designs, codenamed Butterscotch, Starburst, Holocake 2, and Mirror Lake, could add up to a slender, brightly lit headset that supports finer detail than its current Quest 2 display, reports The Verge.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Reality Labs chief scientist Michael Abrash, along with other Reality Labs members, presented their work at a virtual roundtable last week.

The event focused on designs that Meta refers to as "time machines": bulky proofs of concept meant for testing one specific feature, like a super-bright backlight or super-high-resolution screen.

"I think we're in the middle right now of a big step forward towards realism," Zuckerberg was quoted as saying.

"I don't think it's going to be that long until we can create scenes with basically perfect fidelity," he added.

Zuckerberg reiterated plans to ship a high-end headset codenamed Project Cambria in 2022, following its initial announcement last year.

Cambria supports full VR as well as mixed reality, thanks to high-resolution cameras that can pass a video feed to an internal screen.

It will also ship with eye-tracking, a key feature for future Meta headsets.