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VR – will it be DOA just like stereo 3D ?
replied 2 days, 19 hours ago 22 Members · 58 Replies
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[Tim Wilson] “But I do continue to maintain that, for the time being anyway, the most compelling uses of 360/VR are to put us in new PLACES to let us explore, rather than to slip us into story streams that “ideally” approach conventionality. “
Agree 100%!
We’re mostly interested in exploring 360/VR as a medium for what my colleague Michael Naimark calls “Thereness”.
It’s not surprising there’s a lot of interest in adapting narrative to VR. Early stuff usually starts on familiar grounds. But we think the more interesting stuff is at the margins, especially in the area of interactive representation of place.
I think if you want to tell a filmic story, you should make a movie. It’s hard enough to do that well! 🙂 VR/360 is a different kind of beast.
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David Lawrence
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[David Lawrence] “We’re mostly interested in exploring 360/VR as a medium for what my colleague Michael Naimark calls “Thereness”.
It’s not surprising there’s a lot of interest in adapting narrative to VR. Early stuff usually starts on familiar grounds. But we think the more interesting stuff is at the margins, especially in the area of interactive representation of place.”
Freakin’ A! I knew I could count on you man! I’ll take two! LOL
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[David Lawrence] “It’s not surprising there’s a lot of interest in adapting narrative to VR. Early stuff usually starts on familiar grounds. But we think the more interesting stuff is at the margins, especially in the area of interactive representation of place.”
We’ve been working on a couple of VR projects with real-time engines. I like your line about making it up as we go along, because the first things we tried were big failures. It’s easy to approach VR with a bunch of assumptions from years of experience in another medium, and it’s important to identify and address those latent premises.
One of the preconceptions we’re trying to break is the whole idea of “audience.” For lack of a better term, we’ve been calling the person wearing the headset a “user” or a “participant.”
I think the distinction is important. An audience member or a viewer is a passive recipient; in VR, the participant is a co-creator of their own experience. You can build a world around them, but they control their own perception of it. Delivering a successful VR experience involves trusting your participants to find something interesting moreso than forcing them to look where you want them to.
Our best “storytelling” tool so far has been encouraging exploration and rewarding curiosity — a luxury we have in interactive VR that you don’t have in 360 video in the same way.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
I hate to throw cold water on this but we’ve been here a number of times before over the past 25 years and it failed because the learning curve was too steep for the benefits.
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[Robert Olhsson] “I hate to throw cold water on this but we’ve been here a number of times before over the past 25 years and it failed because the learning curve was too steep for the benefits.”
There’s a lot that makes this go-around on VR very different from the past, and I think that the acceleration in development and commoditization of components in mobile technologies is the most significant. The technology needed for truly immersive VR has just recently become available at modest price points.
But it’s also certainly true that the hype cycle in VR is in overdrive. Cold water is necessary and very useful. I was extremely skeptical myself of the merit of VR before one of my partners really pushed me into exploring it in more depth.
Have you tried any current-gen VR experiences?
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[Walter Soyka] “I was extremely skeptical myself of the merit of VR before one of my partners really pushed me into exploring it in more depth.
Have you tried any current-gen VR experiences?”
It seems worth mentioning in the context of this particular forum that I *DO* feel that non-users have a valid perspective to offer on a thing. LOL
But I want to underscore Walter’s point. I haven’t personally encountered anyone who’s tried it and thinks it’s hooey.
Perhaps not quiiiiite there yet, but there’s a reason for the hype. This time around, It Just Works™. Not that it’s necessarily trying to do too much, but I think that’s GOOD.
But strap a current cell-phone on some $16 Google Cardboard, download the New York Times VR app as a start, and be prepared to be converted, at least a little.
Maybe call it “prepare to be prepared to be converted.” LOL
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[Tim Wilson] “Perhaps not quiiiiite there yet, but there’s a reason for the hype. This time around, It Just Works™. Not that it’s necessarily trying to do too much, but I think that’s GOOD.
But strap a current cell-phone on some $16 Google Cardboard, download the New York Times VR app as a start, and be prepared to be converted, at least a little.”
It’s funny, the first time I tried an Oculus DK2, I wanted to puke about five minutes into it. Had to tear that sucker off my face! And this was for the mellowest possible demo – a walk thru a quiet garden, LOL!
Then I was handed a Cardboard viewer and watched Clouds Over Sidra. Boom. It Just Worked.
The new Viewmaster is what really made me a believer. They’ve done a great job with interactivity and choosing appropriate content for the medium. I got lost for over an hour first time I played with it. That to me was a sign they’re doing something right. BTW, I highly recommend the Viewmaster. It’s cheap and well made. But don’t get the current version. Wait until the release the recently announced version2 which be built on the newer Cardboard 2015 optical standard and adds a headphone port.
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David Lawrence
art~media~design~researchlinkedIn: https://lnkd.in/Cfz92F
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twitter: @dhl -
[David Lawrence] “and adds a headphone port.”
Speaking of which, just a few hours left:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/248983394/ossic-x-the-first-3d-audio-headphones-calibrated-t
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[David Lawrence] “Then I was handed a Cardboard viewer and watched Clouds Over Sidra. Boom. It Just Worked.”
That’s the irony. The simple way is (for now) the right way.
I posted an article earlier in the thread about the editor of the NYT VR – her favorite is good ol’ cardboard.
I had no idea that ViewMaster was doing this, though! Because I mentioned ViewMaster further upthread too! It really does strike me as the model. Shorter pieces, place-focused (“Thereness!”), more about exploration, interaction, experience rather than linear story.
News we just posted: Videoblocks has added some 360 clips to their marketplace, and is soliciting more. Take a gander.
Of particular interest to me was CEO Joel Holland’s observation that they know they’re ahead of the market on this — but they did it with 4K too, and that worked out just fine. 🙂 But it gives them a chance to move first, set the price, and try to shape the market rather than let “the market” “take care of itself” ie, not taking care of ME.
Anyway, I’m a fan of their boldness, AND a fan of their on-the-record acknowledgement that we’re all just a little bit shy of being able to create new discrete revenue streams yet.
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[Walter Soyka] “Speaking of which, just a few hours left:”
Interesting, but gonna pass. 😉
Looks like they’re putting a position sensor and HRTF calibration into the headphone hardware. I can see some merit in the HRTF sensor, but frankly, the position sensor makes more sense in the playback device because it needs to work with properly prepared audio content.
The idea that you would need headphones like these with an HTC Vive (like they show in the KS video) is completely bogus. The Vive is doing the audio spatialization. Same with Cardboard. You don’t need special headphones.
With >$2million in pledges, they seem to be doing just fine. The VR hype machine is strong! 😉
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David Lawrence
art~media~design~researchlinkedIn: https://lnkd.in/Cfz92F
vimeo: vimeo.com/album/2271696
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facebook: /dlawrence
twitter: @dhl
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