A recent keynote from Nvidia was notable less for its content and more for who presented it – a virtual recreation of the company’s CEO.

The GTC keynote speech from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang included a segment featuring a virtual recreation of Huang and his kitchen.

The CGI CEO appeared for only 14 seconds in the nearly two-hour video. The technology allowed him to disappear, followed by his kitchen folding away behind him to reveal a virtual background. Huang then reappeared to introduce the company’s DGX Station A100 computer.

Although short, the segment was seamlessly blended into the live action portion of the video.

Creating the virtual Huang required a full face and body scan to create the 3D model. In addition, rather than use traditional animation, the double’s gestures and expressions were mimicked using a specifically trained AI.

The purpose of the CGI sequence was not a simple technological tour de force – it was designed to promote how Nvidia’s technology could enable a Metaverse.

Metaverse?

The idea of the Metaverse is a familiar one. Films ranging from Lawnmower Man and Johnny Mnemonic to Ready Player One and Wreck-it Ralph 2 have depicted the internet as if they were physical spaces.

At present, video games, such as Second Life or Minecraft, have provided the closest examples to a Metaverse available – user-created persistent virtual worlds into which multiple people can enter or exit as they want.

However, the future of the Metaverse is more mundane. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has touted creating an ‘infinite office’, a virtual workspace where works can meet and collaborate.

With remote working having become a major trend since the pandemic, working in a virtual office could theoretically provide the best of both worlds – minimal commutes and ‘in-person’ collaboration.

However, to realise this vision will require hardware. Facebook has already taken steps in that regard – it bought VR headset maker Oculus back in 2014. While this gives users the ability to view the virtual environment, it will take considerable processing power to render a Metaverse environment.

Recommended

• 6 of the worst robots ever conceived
• Government to crack down on energy tariff ‘greenwashing’ practices
• Poly Network heist shines spotlight on white hat hackers

Nvidia used the keynote to demonstrate how its technology could be used to create the sort of spaces needed to create the Metaverse. Not only do they need to be detailed, stable, and dynamic, they need to allow multiple users to interact in the same space at once.

The virtual environment was rendered in Nvidia’s Omniverse platform. This is designed to provide real-time simulation capacity, as well as allowing other people to collaborate in a virtual environment.

It allows designers, engineers, artists, and animators to create and collaborate on digital twins or other complex simulation products. In addition, it supports VR, allowing users to enter virtual environments.

While the technology imagined by Hollywood is a long way off, the Metaverse is being taken seriously as the future of remote working.