Pr0n for Cardboard coming in 3... 2... 1... hours.
I'm still trying to figure out how to explain to my wife why we need to get a Vive.
I haven't played around much with Cardboard apps specifically, but definitely check out the many rollercoaster apps/videos, and have a look at the 360 videos on Youtube (I don't know if Youtube has any 3D videos). This Reddit thread may be useful.
Other than that, here are some Gear VR things to check out which may or may not be available on Cardboard:
Land's End - simple puzzle game from the makers of Monument Valley
Darknet - more complex puzzle game, not super VR-y but well made
Rose - charming animated short, gives an idea of what VR film-making could become
Yeah, I thought it was super fun.
Forget the VR nerdery. ogged subscribes to the NYT?
Now why is that surprising? I'm trying to decide whether to also subscribe to the Trib.
I just approached my wife on on the Vive discussion. Her first question was "how much?" and that was basically the end of that.
6: Do you enjoy reading local interest stories written at a second grade reading level? Seeing John Kass' wedding photo from 30 years ago? (That said, it's really cheap.)
That's the dilemma: there's a lot of shit, and politically it's far to my right, but they have some really good local reporters, and they let Michael Robbins write his commie book reviews.
Ours is $4/month. For us, that was cheap enough to sign up. The app is pretty bad, though, so I read in the browser. But seriously, it gets dumber and less informative every year.
Huh, I see $8/month. How'd you get that deal?
Re gizmos, ogged, did you get a sois vide device and if so what do you think of it?
Sois vide sounds like a Buddhist slogan, or greeting or something.
did you get a sois vide device
I did not. I thought, do I need a new hobby? No. Do I want to cook my food in plastic? No. A couple of friends have bought the Anova device and like it a lot, particularly for fish.
If you want to play around with sous vide cooking there's always this trick which is supposed to work pretty well for a lot of recipes, and could give a feel for the results.
I've done 17. It works alright. But its a bit of work, and having to sear the food after anyway seems kind of ridiculous. If I'm going to sear it in a pan anyway, why not just cook it that way to begin with?
11: Just a sale, nothing too clever on our part. We signed up around the holidays.
17 looks like a pain to be honest. And re 18, the steak thing doesn't appeal much, I'd be more inclined to cook fish and eat with beurre blanc, or chicken for something with aspic. Or mess about with vegetables!
There are reusable silicone bags available and one can also just use a jar, eg make confit in a jar and then pop it in the back of the refrigerator to age a bit, presto changeo just a rocket salad away from dinner! There's going to be a second step with confit anyways. I'm looking for a lightly used anova as it looks about the size of a large stick blender.
18: The once or twice I did it (can't remember) I used it to turn a cut of meat that wouldn't have been very good cooked like a steak into one that was tender enough to make a nice one. It lets you do the equivalent of a four+ hour braise while keeping the temperature low enough that you can sear it at the end and still have a medium rare steak. (Also if you seal it in with butter and rosemary and salt everything mingles together nicely.) And it's not as complicated as it sounds, unless you have a very small cooler. I just filled mine with hot water, dropped a probe thermometer in there, added more hot/cold water until it would where I wanted it, dropped in the food, put a blanket on top of the thing and walked away. Every hour or two I would come back to check the temperature and (usually) add a little more boiling water, but that's it.
But there's also food that you don't generally sear that gets cooled that way - fish mainly. It's nice there because you can actually cook it to a specific temperature rather than just sort of staring at the pan and occasionally prodding it. And you could use it to cook chicken as well, though probably not to too high of a temperature. That would depend on your cooler though.
Slightly related, I was persuaded to watch Burnt recently, and once my general initial loathing gave way to specific loathing, on of the clanging details was the female-lead sous chef explaining to the douchebag main character how sous vide cooking works. He's striving for his third Michelin star, and he doesn't know? God, what an awful film. Avoid it. This has been a public service announcement.
I have an Anova. It's great. Mostly it's "just" a convenient way to get perfect doneness every time, but sous vide chicken breast/thigh is sooo much juicier than roasted/grilled and it works wonders with tough cuts of meat.
We jury-rigged one with a hotplate and a temperature controller. Thinking we'll get an Anova one of these days soon. We do find it is amazingly effective. Don't love the bags though.
If I'm going to sear it in a pan anyway, why not just cook it that way to begin with?
Because the pan won't cook it as well.
Yeah, it's a lot easier to manage the timing when all you're doing in the pan is the searing. Especially for thick cuts.
It really is something seeing a reasonably thick cut of meat just uniformly perfectly medium rare.
To the OP: I've been meaning to link to Hugh Hancock's guest posts about VR at Charlie Stross's blog:
1) On the frontiers of high-tech sex (not about VR specifically, but in response to 1).
2) Three Unexpectedly Good Things VR Will Probably Cause
on of the clanging details was the female-lead sous chef explaining to the douchebag main character how sous vide cooking works.
I had a similar clanging moment watching Chef when it was revealed that the obnoxious main character, who has spent his career working as a chef in Miami and LA, doesn't speak any Spanish. It made the film's plot, "white guy re-discovers his mojo by cooking simple, soulful ethnic food" feel really appropriational.