Virtual Reality (VR) has always been interesting to me, but I haven’t really gotten excited about it. From a technology standpoint I think that VR in general is really cool, but I haven’t gotten to the point that I really want to go out and buy a headset. This makes sense, because if I am really honest with myself I am a late early adopter. Which means that I like new products and ventures and I am willing to buy something before most of my friends do, but I am not in line the first day something is released. VR isn’t really all that new, but the areas that it seems to be growing fastest don’t really interest me all that much, namely video games. Sorry to all the gamers out there; I will likely stay a noob. Recently I came across a new application to VR that really got me thinking and excited for the possibilities and future of VR.

The Tilt Brush by Google was released on April 6th 2016 and the name gives a pretty big hint as to the purpose. The Tilt Brush lets you paint in a 3D virtual reality. Tilt Brush itself is a software developed by Google on Steam. You use the HTC Vive VR headset combined with a special wand that ships with every Vive to create masterpieces in VR.

The best way to truly understand it is to watch the video.

Now I don’t really consider myself much of an artist. For my day job I am a mechanical design engineer. I spend a lot of time designing in computer aided design (CAD) software. You may have heard of software like Solidworks, AutoCad, or Rhino. The Tilt Brush made me realize that VR is the future for almost all design. Some day we will be designing anything from cell phones to bridges in a 3D VR environment. It will be incredible to do reviews with the customer in this environment.

A few years ago Elon Musk the founder of Tesla and SpaceX demonstrated some work they did on being able to manipulate 3D models using your hands. It is really cool to watch and imagine the possibilities.

But I think there was one big thing that Elon Musk was missing, and that is a wand/controller. The Tilt Brush bridged the gap in my mind. In order to have all of the functionality we have in CAD you still need buttons and maybe even a joystick. I think in the future we will be designing in VR in a similar way to what Elon Musk described, but with some sort of hand held controller.

I am excited for the future of design. It is going to be really cool.