Get ready for a revolution in virtual reality: interactive high definition video at up to 4K (at least four times as sharp as Full HD) resolutions.

Until now, immersive virtual reality (VR) environments have had trouble rendering data-heavy video clips at a constant frame rate, meaning jerky playback and headache-inducing lags.

Han Suk Kim, a computer science and engineering PhD student at the Jacobs School of Engineering in California, has developed an efficient algorithm that shrinks high-resolution video content so that it can be played interactively in VR.

Kim derived his algorithm from 'mipmapping', a technique to reduce detail that is used widely in computer games, flight simulations and other 3D imaging systems.

Mipmap mayhem

By using mipmap to downscale the size of high-resolution media datasets, Kim was able to stream the video - including a 45GB 4K tornado simulation - in real-time, at 25 frames per second.

By adding various optimizations to allow for constant frame and rendering rates, Kim was able to rotate, zoom in and otherwise manipulate the video playback screen to make the experience fully interactive.

"Our approach reduces the memory required to display high-resolution images, depending on distance and visual perspective," Kim said. "If the area is big and close to the viewer's face, the video is streamed at a high resolution; if it's small and far away from the viewer's face, it's streamed at a low resolution."

The breakthrough should enable much higher resolution video in everything from tele-conferencing and CCTV surveillance to simulators and virtual cinemas.