Virtual reality made my depth perception in base reality richer.

How my usage of Virtual Reality headsets unearthed a medical condition in my eyes, and resulted in me ending seeing the world in its true deepness.

I’ve been wearing glasses since I was a teenager. For many years I had the same corrective glasses for far and near. As I started getting into the best years of life I had to start using bifocals with two different graduations. I know that the recipe in my glasses is not longer optimal when I start getting headaches.

I started working with Virtual and Augmented Reality headsets this year. I had found them a bit hard on my eyes, but did not think much of it.

A few weeks into my VR forays I started getting headaches, and at the same time I noticed that I could read better without my glasses. So thinking nothing about it I decided to go get my eyes checked out. The conversation with the optometrist was bizarre:

• Your prescription for far sightness is the same as before. There is a little correction for near but nothing big.
• So what about my headaches?
• I can not explain it. Are there any medical conditions that you are aware off?
• None that I know.
• I can not understand why the headaches came so unexpected. Any changes in work conditions?
• Not really, well, there is something… I’ve been working with Virtual Reality glasses lately.

The optometrist asked me to bring the glasses the next time, which I did. As he tried the Hololens on, and after the awe of augmented reality he decided to test me for depth correction, something they call Prism correction.

Visual test for correct depth perception

The test is deceivingly simple. Two different images in the right and left eyes that should match. For someone who can see depth properly the cross and the circle would be centered. For me they did not even touch. They were just all over the place. As with other eye conditions, the correction is measured in Dioptrie. The doctor told me I had 7 Dioptrie.

A few days later I pick my new glasses. The store clerk looked at my numbers and she clearly said:

• You might headaches in the next two weeks
• And things would look distorted. You are not driving home are you?

That second question intrigued me, and I understood what she meant when I stood up to leave. It felt like the floor was much closer to me, but as I looked to my feet it would just warp. As if I was walking at a local minimum point in the space continuum.

I walked outside, and nature overwhelmed me. The plant were sticking out, the red flowers were shiny and so close. When I got home I told my wife:

Wow, new haircut!

She looked at me as if I had been smoking something and told me matter-off-factly that her hair was the same as ever. But it was not, it looked fluffier, had more volume as the TV spots make you believe.

On the weekend as I sat on my garden I saw the grass big like in the movie “Honey I shrunk the kids”. Nature was yelling at me. What was interesting was that the changes on all man made buildings were not that extreme. The walls where were they had always been. Walking downhill seemed easier since my local minimum point made the climb look less steep. Going up was the opposite.

And then I realized that my being afraid of heights had probably to do with my previous depth blindness. I had always seen things steeper as they were. As we went hiking over the mountains on the weekend it became clear that those precipices were not that deep.

I’ve been using these new glasses for a few weeks and I got used to them. Headaches are gone, and my local minimum has also receded. But when I look at nature I still awe at the simplest weeds. Virtual reality made my base reality richer.