Google will build its own version of a new virtual reality headset after all, the company’s VR chief revealed today.

At yesterday’s opening keynote for the Google I/O developer conference, an improvement upon the bare-bones Cardboard smartphone VR device failed to materialize. Google did show a sketch of what it might look like and said that unnamed manufacturers would have headsets based on the reference design out by fall.

Today, however, Clay Bavor (pictured above, with opening VR mode smartphone screen), Google’s vice president of virtual reality, said at the very end of his own I/O presentation that Google will in fact build its own version of the headset and accompanying controller.

Google’s reference design for its VR headset and controller (Photo: Google)

Although he didn’t elaborate, it’s apparent that Google doesn’t want to compete with its partners in a big way. Although it’s not yet calling the device the Nexus headset, Google clearly wants to provide a pole star for other manufacturers just as its Nexus phones and tablets are intended to set the state of the art on those devices.

And Google does need to make sure that whatever it comes out with works pretty well, because it’s coming behind not only high-end devices such as Facebook’s Oculus Rift, but also smartphone-powered devices such as Samsung Gear VR. That’s all the more challenging because it will be depending on smartphone makers such as Samsung, LG and HTC that will be building VR-enabled smartphones.

Indeed, Bavor and his compatriots at Google spent most of the morning session today outlining the various specifications that phones will have to meet in order to be deemed ready for Google’s VR software and hardware platform, which it calls Daydream.

Daydream was designed from the outset to make the hardware and software work in concert. The smartphones will have to use low-persistence displays so there’s no lag on images as people move, high-quality chip sets that can handle the processing load, and low-latency, high-quality sensors.

Likewise, the new Android N mobile software’s VR mode provide low-latency support so lagging image movement doesn’t make people sick, a sustained-performance mode that manages hardware so you can stay in VR as long as you want, head tracking and a system user interface that give you the option of taking a call or text message that comes in or keep playing in VR mode.

While phones clearly pose challenges in their ability to handle VR, they have the great advantage of being the main computing device at least a couple of billion people use. “Everyone has a phone,” said Ken Libreri, chief technology officer of Epic Games, which makes the Unreal Engine suite of tools for creating games. “This really takes VR to the masses.”

That notion was echoed by John Riccitiello, chief executive officer of game development platform Unity Technologies. “VR is going to be driven by mobile,” he said. He added that it won’t be all about games and shopping, the prime VR use cases cited today. “It’s literally going to extend the human experience,” he said, allowing people to be virtually onstage with their favorite band, taking classes anywhere, and walking on Mars with an astronaut. Like in Star Trek, he said, “The holodeck will happen.”

So, apparently, will VR movies. Bavor also announced deals with Imax to create a cinema-grade camera array based on Google’s Jump computer vision system that uses multiple cameras to create 3-D video. Google will start promoting Jump at its YouTube Spaces in Los Angeles and New York, where YouTube creators produce their videos, and later other locations.

Google also introduced a new playground for its own developers to try out new applications: Daydream Labs. Google has been creating about two app experiments a week for the last seven months or so, and it plans to share them on its developers blog.

At another panel on lessons Google itself has learned from its Daydream Lab experiments, the range of potential applications was apparent. The controllers can be programmed to be almost any tool inside the VR apps, such as a laser pointer, virtual hands, a hammer, a tennis racket, a fishing rod, or a frying pan to flip pancakes, said Stefan Welker, a Daydream software engineer.

There are also several interaction models, such as picking things up with virtual hands, throwing things, and lifting “heavy” objects such as couches.

Photo by Robert Hof