DomeGS improves virtual reality scenes by blending horizons and backgrounds
DomeGS: Perceptually Consistent Background Completion for Unbounded 3D Gaussian Splatting in Virtual Reality
Graphics
Summary
Virtual reality often struggles to show outdoor scenes with distant horizons because 3D data can be incomplete far away. The authors developed DomeGS, which mixes the sky and horizon into the 3D scene itself rather than just adding flat background images. This makes VR environments feel more realistic and immersive by providing smoother transitions between the foreground and background. User tests showed DomeGS helped people feel more present and found the scenes more believable compared to traditional background methods.
What this means in practice
- •For vr content developers: Create more immersive outdoor VR environments by integrating horizon and sky data directly into 3D reconstructions.
- •For video game designers: Improve the realism of expansive open-world scenes by avoiding visible seams between detailed geometry and distant backgrounds.
Authors
Anastasiya Pechko, Agata Szymańska, Piotr Borycki, Joanna Szelewska, Michał Mnich, Sławomir Tadeja, Przemysław Spurek
Abstract
The growing need for high-quality 3D content remains among the most prevalent challenges in virtual reality (VR). Recently, novel view synthesis techniques have enabled rapid content creation, with 3D Gaussian Splatting (3DGS) emerging as one of the most promising methods for generating high-fidelity 3D scenes. However, using 3DGS to reconstruct unbounded outdoor scenes can leave horizons incomplete due to missing data or a lack of distant geometric constraints. Such incompleteness can break immersion, compromising VR's core characteristic. A typical workaround in traditional VR systems is a textured cube (skybox) or sphere (skydome) surrounding the environment to create the illusion of a distant background. However, these approaches struggle to blend seamlessly with the reconstructed 3DGS geometry. To address these issues, we introduce the DomeGS framework, which incorporates the skydome concept not as a flat background shell, but as a part of the reconstructed Gaussian Splatting 3D scene. By integrating the horizon and sky into the 3DGS representation, our method provides a unified, scene-consistent environment bridging foregrounds and backgrounds for greater realism. Experimental evaluation with N=36 users demonstrates that DomeGS significantly increases spatial presence (p=0.042) and realism (p=0.042) compared to the skybox baseline.