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. 2022 Dec 13;378(1869):20210450. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2021.0450

Table 1.

An overview of the visual environments available to investigate the neural encoding and perception of optic flow. The table also summarizes available methods to couple visual displays to a subject's self-motion. VR ‘CAVE’ image from: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=868395.

Real environments Large display environments Head-mounted displays
graphic file with name rstb20210450f07.jpg graphic file with name rstb20210450f08.jpg graphic file with name rstb20210450f09.jpg
A photograph of a woodland.


— Natural visual inputs.
— World and eye cameras can be used to reconstruct observed visual scene [9,103].— Lenses [106] and prisms [107] can be used to manipulate visual inputs.		 Left: a VR ‘CAVE’. Right: two-dimensional rodent VR [102].

— Flexible presentation of visual inputs.
— Curved or multiple display devices can achieve large visual field coverage.
— Virtual [95,108,109] / augmented [108,110,111] reality.		 Left and right eye views of a head-mounted display.

— Flexible stereoscopic presentations of visual inputs.
— Virtual [104] / augmented reality [105].
Coupling with movement
— Natural free movement.
— Passive motion platforms and treadmills can be incorporated [112].		 — One-dimensional/two-dimensional treadmills [49,72,102].
— Passive motion platforms [113,114].
— Free movement interaction is possible with motion tracking cameras (e.g. ‘VR CAVEs’) [115].		 — Natural free movement using built-in tracking of rotational and translational head movements.
— One-dimensional/two-dimensional treadmills [104].
— Passive motion platforms.