Virtual reality experience offered at S. Butler library
SAXONBURG — When you pick up a good book, you leave reality behind as you get caught up in its plot, but lately the South Butler Community Library has been offering another way to escape reality.
With a HTC Vive, a headset that transports people to a virtual reality, library visitors can play a 5-minute game, draw 3-D artwork or just enjoy walking around in the virtual world.
“You can look from different angles, and it seems very real,” said Kevin Lesniak, the Penn State graduate student and researcher who brought the technology to the library, 240 W. Main St.
One of the environments, for example, is a mountain top. Lesniak said people feel as though they might fall off as they approach the edge and look down. Despite the lack of guardrails, they have nothing to fear as they are really just standing inside the library.
“A lot of them are just amazed that they can reach out and grab the (game) controllers,” Lesniak said. “It looks so realistic.”
After buying his own HTC Vive, Lesniak wanted to share it with others. His mother, Michelle Lesniak, joked about it, saying that family members would stop by their house just to try it out.
“They do it for just five minutes, and they say it’s a totally different experience (than they’ve ever had),” Michelle Lesniak said.
Then, the Lesniaks had the idea to bring it to the library where Michelle is currently serving as the interim director.
The outreach project is held in collaboration with Conrad Tucker, the director of the Data Analysis Technology Advancement (DATA) Lab at Penn State University, but led by Lesniak who grew up around Saxonburg.
Lesniak graduated from Knoch High School a year early. He took his last two high school classes — economics and physical education — as a freshman at Penn State. He started as a mechanical engineering student, before changing his major to computer science as an undergraduate. At 22, he is a first-year graduate student, where he is studying industrial engineering.
Lesniak bought his virtual reality headset after being hired as a researcher at the university, where he works with the technology. He was looking for a job to use his computer science skills, and the job introduced him to virtual reality.
“There’s a lot of potential for it,” Lesniak said.
It can be used in a variety of fields: entertainment, education and medicine, among others. Lesniak said virtual reality could make video games come to life, help students who are taking online classes, or train doctors and surgeons before they treat real patients.
“We focus on education,” Tucker said.
In addition to trying the headset out, people can enter to win their own. The library will raffle a HTC Vive and virtual-reality-ready computer. The prize is worth more than $2,000.
Lesniak has already brought his HTC Vive to the library several times. The next opportunity to experience the virtual reality will be from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Oct. 29.
Next month, available times are 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Nov. 12; noon to 3 p.m. Nov. 23; and 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Nov. 26.
People are asked to register by calling 724-352-4810. Walk-ins will be accepted if time allows.
