For those that follow wrestling the road to Wrestlemania is well under way following last night’s Royal Rumble pay per view event by WWE.
We’ve covered them a couple of times recently on the Saturday VR In Sports articles thanks to the adventures of their stars on the PlayStation VR. They have also appeared a coupleof times on Life In 360° thanks to occasional ‘WWE 360’ videos. It’s been a while since we featured those however, partly because it’s been a little while since WWE itself featured them on its channel.
That being said, they recently released two videos featuring superstars Bailey and The Undertaker which puts you on the front row of the crowd for their entrances. You can view them both below.
VRFocus will be back on Wednesday with another trip into the realm of 360 degree video.
When you’re a company, especially a technology company the idea that you should ‘dream big’ is a relatively easy one. At least in theory. In practice of course it’s a little bit more difficult than it seems. For many though if you said to them make the company ‘go as far as you can’ they wouldn’t necessarily think upwards.
Today’s video shows what happens when a space traveler (Anousheh Ansari), a astronautics professor (David Barnhart), a hotel expert (Brian Kelly) and an interior designer (Nicole Hollis) come together. It may sound like the beginning of the joke but using Cisco Spark collaboration platform has resulted in the design of the very first space hotel. The ‘tour’, produced by studio Gentleman Scholar, takes the idea of space tourism to its end goal. With an orbital rest stop comprising a lobby, bedrooms, a dining area, an observation deck and even – somehow – a zero-G swimming pool which you need to see to wrap your head around.
“Late last year, both President Obama and Elon Musk announced plans for a trip to Mars, so this idea doesn’t seem that far fetched,” said Associate Partner and Creative Director Will Elliott from Goodby Silverstein & Partners (GS&P). “Our new campaign shows how Cisco Spark helps teams turn big ideas, such as the galaxy’s first space hotel, into reality.”
“What’s really interesting is today’s technology is enabling the move from fiction to fact,” added Barnhart, “We are all wanderers and explorers, and now it’s time for us to look outside to space.”
You can see the 360 degree video below ans well as a making-of film to show you what went into making it. VRFocus will, of course, be back on Monday with another trip- maybe not into space, but into Life In 360°.
We’re staying with America for today’s 360 degree video, more specifically we’re off to Miami to take in last weekend’s Race of Champions (ROC) in Marlins Park. If you don’t know what ROC is, the name is pretty bang on. It’s an annual cross-discipline competition between racing drivers from all formulas. Rallycross people square off against touring car people and Formula 1 people. It’s a big party to see who is the best of the best.
Of the best. If that is possible.
Today’s video comes from 360 Racing as has the camera situated just behind the start/finish line. It is, without question, the longest video we’ve ever featured. Because this 360 degree stream clocks in at over FOUR HOURS LONG. It’s like you’re sat in the middle of the track for the whole event(!)
VRFocus will bring you another video on Friday. Enjoy!
Cinematic VR company JauntVR has established itself as one of the leading 360-degree production companies, with collaborations spanning from ESPN to ABC News, and they’ve put together a lengthy document to help others capture
JauntVR, which announced a slew of titles at the Sundance Film Festival this weekend including a VR re-imagining of the cult classic “Lawnmower Man” film, announced on their blog the availability of “The Cinematic VR Guide: A Guide To Best Practices Shooting in 360-degrees”. The guide includes over 50 sections covering lighting, framing, types of cameras, and post-production. There are even some parts that address directing the action and minimizing motion sickness.
As the cost to produce 360-degree video falls and quantity of cinematic VR experiences increases, hopefully a guide like this will help quality keep pace. As stated in the blog, “many of the old rules of cinematography no longer apply” so even the most well versed in traditional film could benefit from a few tips. This is only the beginning, though, as Jaunt plans for this guide to serve as a “living document” that is continuously updated as new technology and techniques surface.
Producing the content is a significant part of stepping forward as a major force in any creative field, but putting together a document such as this and paying it forward is a way to solidify that space especially in the minds of those just now getting involved. It will be interesting to see how such a guide is accepted by the rest of the creative community buy hopefully it, along with initiatives to make 360-video clearer, will result in high-tier production.
As Professor Farnsworth on Futurama would say: “Good news, everyone!” Because Monday’s Life In 360° has absolutely nothing about the American political process. Yes, regular readers were probably expecting me to find some form of 360 degree coverage of the Inauguration or subsequent events for today’s post. But no. I think we’ve all had quite enough of that, and besides we’ve already reported on something Trump and virtual reality (VR) related in the last week. Let’s just get away from all that for a bit, shall we?
We’re sticking with America though, or the U.S. Navy at least. As thanks to defense company Raytheon we have a ringside seat for the testing of a new missile. It’s called the Standard Missile-6 (SM-6), and has in actuality been in use for some time at this point. However the footage, which shows the missiles both being loaded onto and launched from the deck of USS John Paul Jones actually took place back on August 1st 2015.
Or as Raytheon describes it: “The SM-6® missile delivers a proven over-the-horizon defensive and offensive capability by leveraging the time-tested advantages of the legacy Standard Missile airframe and propulsion. It’s the only missile in the world that can perform both anti-air warfare and terminal ballistic missile defense from sea, and it recently added anti-surface warfare to its repertoire.”
Fancy. I guess.
You can see the video below. VRFocus will be back Wednesday for another look into 360 degree video.
We’ve mentioned or discussed a number of times on VRFocus about the importance, not just of visual fidelity in virtual reality (VR) but of audio as well. Sound quality can make or break an experience in just the same way as the look. As such a new release from Los Angeles-based studio G’Audio Lab is looking to provide an additional audio solution for VR and 360 degree video content in the form of G’Audio Works.
Features include support for the simultaneous use of three audio signals to create realistic sound with environmental ambience. Incorporating simple mono tracks, traditional 2.0 or 5.1 channel-based tracks and so-called ‘ambisonics’ to deliver sounds captured by 360° microphones. It also includes the G’Audio Lab’s own patented binaural rendering technology and suite of tools. Real-time editing and off-line bouncing are also supported.
Speaking on the release, G’Audio Lab’s CEO and founder Henney Oh said, “We’re passionate about empowering VR content creators across the film, animation and gaming industries to produce more immersive experiences, which require fully interactive 3D audio to support 3D video components. Works delivers unparalleled freedom for mixing multiple audio signals to create the most realistic sounds possible.”
“While today’s 3D movies and interactive video content are successfully immersing users in a simulated experience, there’s still a void in the market for audio solutions that can deliver truly interactive sound,” continues Oh. “We are filling that void by offering the interactive 3D audio tools needed to cultivate better and more dynamic sound experiences with any regular headphones.”
Interested parties can find G’Audio Works available a free download from the company website. A tutorial video can also be found below. VRFocus will bring you more news on new audio and visual VR solutions soon.
We’re off on our travels once again, this time to Scotland. Not only that we’re going back in time, so you’re getting plenty of Li360 Air Miles today.
We’re heading back for today’s video to the New Year, because 2016 was so gosh darn horrendous I think it’s worth celebrating it’s end again. We’re also of to the beautiful city of Edinburgh where we get to see the celebrations and fireworks of another glorious Hogmanay, courtesy of BBC Scotland.
Hogmanay for those who aren’t aware is effectively the Scottish term for new year’s celebrations. Being synonymous with that, although technically is actually means the last day of the year.
VRFocus returns with another 360 degree video on Monday.
25 years ago, the cult sci-fi classic 1992 film “The Lawnmower Man” transported audiences into a thrilling narrative built on virtual reality. In it, a young man with mental disability (Jobe Smith, played by Jeff Fahey) uses VR to evolve intellectually at an incredible pace. The film takes an incredibly dark turn, though, and essentially turns into a science fiction recreation of the classic horror film Carrie. JauntVR, one of the leaders for 360-degree video content, has announced at the Sundance Film Festival that they’re working on a line of VR films for 2017 with a re-imagined Lawnmower Man being one of them.
“The original movie was a film of unsurpassed imagination and creativity with its ground-breaking use of VR back in 1992,” says Jim Howell, one of the holders of the rights for the film, in a press release for the announcement. “Together with Jaunt we look forward to a contemporary team bringing to life a whole new world of VR; a world of immersive entertainment and communication. We are very excited to be working with Jaunt to create a VR realization of the film.”
It’s frankly a little surprising that there hasn’t been a direct remake or reboot in the 25 years since the film debuted. Marrying the film’s ideas with actual VR headsets will hopefully produce a top-quality remake.
JauntVR also announced a handful of other VR features at Sundance. They’re working with Robert Schwentke, the man responsible for The Time Traveler’s Wife and the Divergent series of films, on a 12-episode sci-fi/thriller called Luna. They are also teaming with the director of Harold and Kumar 3D, Todd Strauss-Schulson, for a stoner comedy called Bad Trip that will recreate drug-induced hallucinations for the viewers.
Midweek and another 360 degree video start things off. In fact, let’s all just take in some breakfast since it is an appropriate time when this is going up!
So, you may recall last month during the Christmas Life In 360°-fest that at one point we headed over to the kitchen of Tastemade for some 360 degree surf and turf cookery. The result of this step-by-step guide to “Hors d’oeuVRes” was a sudden craving for properly done lobster.
Well we’re heading back to the series today as Tastemade‘s Megan and Jimmy make some tasty breakfast tacos – or to be more precise, cheesy breakfast tacos with bacon and avocado relish. Which sounds positively scrummy. You can check out the video below.
Speaking of things to check out, after three weeks my little VR vs. mini-series on predictions for 2017 is complete. Part 3 went up yesterday and you can find Part 1 and Part 2 via the links. Life In 360° returns to VRFocus, of course,on Friday.
