Backing up the planet: How scientists are recreating the entire globe in virtual reality

TechFirst with John Koetsier

Today we're stuck at home. Wouldn't it be great to virtually wander the world in virtual reality? (At least until we can go out for real again!)

In this episode of TechFirst we chat with Simon Che de Boer from New Zealand’s Reality Virtual, who took 4,000 photos in Queen Nefertiti's tomb and digitally reconstructed King Tut's mask.

They're working on technology to virtually re-create real physical locations, make them available to all, create ways for people and organizations to contribute to sort of a Wikipedia of virtual places, and tele-present us in more real ways than ever before.

How?

A ton of machine learning, generative adversarial networks, and a lot of computer. Graphics processing tech from Invidia helps, as did a big grant from Epic Games.