Today I came across a YouTube video of The Weather Channel which was a segment on how wildfires spread. I thought it would be just another segment where there will be visualisations of how fire spreads and that sort of thing.

But it was an immersive mixed reality video where the reporter is right there in the visualisation of the whole thing, explaining the phenomena. The graphics looked stunning and the presence of the reporter somehow made you feel that you were present there too.

This made me more involved in the video and the explanation than I would normally be. This, I realised was the power of mixed reality. You have probably already seen videos like this if you live in the US but for me it was totally new.

I know about Augmented reality, virtual reality and mixed reality but today was the first time that I actually 'felt it'. You know that moment where you go, "woah"! That was it for me and I am hooked about the future of this technology.

The Future Is A Mix

Traditionally there has been a clear divide between the real world and the virtual world. If you wanted to experience the virtual world, it was mainly done through gaming, but there was a set distinction. The whole thing was inside a device and you could tell the difference.

Increasingly however, immersive experiences are being built that will make you feel like you are inside the virtual environment and feeling everything you would expect to feel if you were actually, physically there. For example, an experience on a virtual roller coaster ride could make you feel dizzy in the real world too. That sort of thing.

In the future, I think it will be possible that we could experience virual reality directly in our brains, as brain computer interfaces are rapidly getting more advanced. If Elon has his way, Neuralink could be the first to offer such an experience, but who knows!

This would be exactly like the technology that the hit show Black Mirror has showcased on many occasions. The most recent one was probably the most popular example. It was an episode starring Anthony Mackie. If you haven't seen it already, I suggest you do. It will really send you down that rabbit hole of what could happen in the future.

It is almost a certainty at this point that the future is going to be one where virtual elements are constantly overlayed on the real world and we are constantly going to go in and out of many different virtual worlds to fulfill our many demands. How healthy is it going to be? That's anybody's guess. But right now, it seems really cool to ignore.