ABSTRACT
The idea of an HMD was rst patented by McCollum (1945). Heilig also patented a stereoscopic television HMD in 1960 (Heilig, 1960). Then he developed and patented a stationary VR simulator, the Sensorama Simulator in 1962, which was equipped with a variety of input and output devices including a binocular display to give a user virtual experiences. Comeau and Bryan at Philco Corporation built Headsight in 1961, the rst functioning HMD (Comeau and Bryan, 1961). This was more like today’s telepresence system. Using a magnetic tracking system and a single cathode ray tube (CRT) monitor mounted on a helmet, Headsight shows a remote video image according to the measured head direction. Bell Helicopter Company studied a servo-controlled camera-based HMD in the 1960s. This display provides the pilot an augmented view captured by an infrared camera under the helicopter for landing at night. In a sense that the real-world image is augmented in real time, this is the rst video see-through AR system, though computer-generated imagery was not yet used.
