Comedy Living Room, the stand-up comedy show created by Matt Lottman and Frank Chad Muniz (and literally held in a living room), is hosting its first show in VR on Thursday, April 27th at 5pm PT. The collaboration between Comedy Living Room, comedy group JASH, and social VR app AltspaceVR will feature six comedians and a “house party complete with pool, BBQ and endless Frisbee”.
Starting in Lottman and Muniz’ living room in 2012 as an open mic with friends, the show became a recognised venue in the LA comedy scene, and has since expanded to different locations, such as the RIOT LA festival, SXSW in Austin, and a monthly residency at The Hollywood Improv.
But now that the landlady has sold the house where it all started, CLR has turned to VR, or specifically, AltspaceVR, asocial VR platform which established itself on early Samsung, Oculus, and HTC headsets back in 2015, and now supports all major VR hardware including Daydream.
AltspaceVR, a social virtual reality platform, has launched a talk show focused on women in virtual reality that is taped before a live audience — well, live virtual audience.
The show was launched on March 8, in honor of International Women’s Day, to celebrate and capture some of the wonderful stories of women leading in virtual reality. The show’s first guest was virtual reality evangelist Eva Hoerth. She works at VReal, a Seattle-based startup working on helping users share their VR experiences.
The next episode is scheduled for April 19, and will start at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time and the guest will be Kristi Hansen Onkka, who recently launched HealthiAR. Her company helps connect virtual and augmented reality developers with the healthcare community. There will be a question-and-answer session at the event for the attendees.
“We were thinking of what we can do to celebrate women in VR,” said Lisa Kotecki, community manager at AltspaceVR. “There are so many amazing women doing incredible things in the industry, so I felt one day will not really do justice to these women.”
It is important to highlight the VR creators in the industry and give them an opportunity to share their stories, she said.
“Viewers should expect fun,” she said. “We have some elements of surprise and we are going to interview some people on the ground creating VR including some of the challenges they face in creating VR. For 2017, I am really excited to inspire other content creators to use VR as a platform to tell their stories and to create their content.”
AltspaceVR has been one of the major front runners in the social virtual reality (VR) scene, not only providing a place to meet up with friends, but also providing entertainment and events. Now the company has announced its latest venture, expanding head-mounted display (HMD) support to Google Daydream View as well as Android devices.
Launching this week, the free app brings to Daydream all the same functionality as its previous incarnations on Samsung Gear VR, HTC Vive and Oculus Rift. With cross-platform support it means even more people can get together to watch comedy shows from performers like Reggie Watts or play videogames such as Dungeons and Dragons, Boss Monster or Holograms Against Humanity.
The major inclusion in the launch is the support for non-VR users, allowing anyone with an Android device to use the app. They’ll be able to check what events are coming up, see if friends are online, or checkout the entertainment available, with or without a headset. Intern this may also attract more Android users to try VR.
“We are excited about serving Daydream customers, which could number in the tens of millions by the end of the year,” said Eric Romo, founder and CEO of AltspaceVR in a statement. “We are looking forward to providing them with the wide range of activities and events that are available in AltspaceVR, and connecting them with their friends on other platforms.”
There’s no update on if or when AltspaceVR might come to the last major headset, PlayStation VR, but when the company does reveal any further details VRFocus will report back.
In an email to UploadVR, AltspaceVR announced that it will be releasing a “new version of its software” that consists of a “mobile app that fully supports Google Daydream View and also provides access into AltspaceVR for compatible Android phones even without a virtual reality (VR) headset.”
AltspaceVR is a social, virtual reality experience in which you and your friends can meet, speak, play games and otherwise interact inside virtual reality. In the app, you are represented as one of a handful of different avatars. Your avatar’s head moves in response to yours and, depending on what hardware you have, you can even bring your hands into the experience as well to communicate using gestures and body language.
By bringing its software to the Daydream View and non-VR Android smartphones, AltspaceVR has become one of the most comprehensive, cross-platform VR programs on the market. The app is already available for the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Samsung GearVR. That left Daydream and PSVR as the last remaining device for AltspaceVR to conquer on VR’s Mt. Rushmore of notable headsets. Daydream is in the bag now, but in a Reddit post from last October, AltSpaceVR reps spoke to PSVR support saying: “being cross-platform, and available for as many people as possible, is hyper important to us at AltspaceVR. That said, we’ve got nothing to announce about PSVR.”
“We are excited about serving Daydream customers, which could number in the tens of millions by the end of the year,” Eric Romo, founder and CEO of AltspaceVR said in a statement. “We are looking forward to providing them with the wide range of activities and events that are available in AltspaceVR, and connecting them with their friends on other platforms.”
The most exciting part of this news, however, has to be the Android support. In a 2015 report on Android Central, Google claimed that there were over 1.4 billion Android enabled devices around the. With two more years of growth since then, that number could easily now be above 2 billion. Giving that many people a glimpse into a VR world, even if it’s a restricted experience, could provide a massive boost to VR’s adoption rate.
According to AltspaceVR, the updated app has a “mobile view feature,” which allows users to “enter AltspaceVR even without Daydream or any VR headset, using just the screen on their phone and audio headphones or earbuds.”
AltspaceVR also has a similar “two dimensional mode” available now for PC and Mac. AltspaceVR is available now on the Google Play Store for free.
In an email to UploadVR, AltspaceVR announced that it will be releasing a “new version of its software” that consists of a “mobile app that fully supports Google Daydream View and also provides access into AltspaceVR for compatible Android phones even without a virtual reality (VR) headset.”
AltspaceVR is a social, virtual reality experience in which you and your friends can meet, speak, play games and otherwise interact inside virtual reality. In the app, you are represented as one of a handful of different avatars. Your avatar’s head moves in response to yours and, depending on what hardware you have, you can even bring your hands into the experience as well to communicate using gestures and body language.
By bringing its software to the Daydream View and non-VR Android smartphones, AltspaceVR has become one of the most comprehensive, cross-platform VR programs on the market. The app is already available for the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Samsung GearVR. That left Daydream and PSVR as the last remaining device for AltspaceVR to conquer on VR’s Mt. Rushmore of notable headsets. Daydream is in the bag now, but in a Reddit post from last October, AltSpaceVR reps spoke to PSVR support saying: “being cross-platform, and available for as many people as possible, is hyper important to us at AltspaceVR. That said, we’ve got nothing to announce about PSVR.”
“We are excited about serving Daydream customers, which could number in the tens of millions by the end of the year,” Eric Romo, founder and CEO of AltspaceVR said in a statement. “We are looking forward to providing them with the wide range of activities and events that are available in AltspaceVR, and connecting them with their friends on other platforms.”
The most exciting part of this news, however, has to be the Android support. In a 2015 report on Android Central, Google claimed that there were over 1.4 billion Android enabled devices around the. With two more years of growth since then, that number could easily now be above 2 billion. Giving that many people a glimpse into a VR world, even if it’s a restricted experience, could provide a massive boost to VR’s adoption rate.
According to AltspaceVR, the updated app has a “mobile view feature,” which allows users to “enter AltspaceVR even without Daydream or any VR headset, using just the screen on their phone and audio headphones or earbuds.”
AltspaceVR also has a similar “two dimensional mode” available now for PC and Mac. AltspaceVR is available now on the Google Play Store for free.
On May 25th, 2017, bride and groom Elisa Evans and Martin Shervington will get together with friends and family at one of their favorite hangout spots: a quirky florist that doubles up as a bar in the Welsh city of Cardiff. They will then don their HMDs, and join the remainder of their guests scattered all around the globe for the world’s first official VR wedding ceremony of its kind.
“The value of VR is its ability to allow people to connect emotionally with one another,” says Gerald Gottheil from AltspaceVR, the social platform which is facilitating this. “What’s interesting about doing a wedding is that while other social VR events might bring people together, they’re focused on the event itself – we’re watching a film, a show, playing a game – in a wedding the whole purpose of having this event is to connect emotionally by showing support between friends and family for the couple who are making that commitment to each other. It’s the purest example of using VR to connect people.”
The ceremony will be officiated by AltSpaceVR’s Community Manager and Social VR Content Creator Lisa Kotecki, who will be 5,000 miles away on the other side of the world in San Francisco. She’s certified to lead civil ceremonies in America, but in the UK the marriage certificate must specify the physical location where the wedding took place, and this needs to be a certified wedding venue. This is why the bride and groom are in the process of registering their local florist-bar as such, and booking a registrar to “make it official” after the VR ceremony takes place. When I spoke to Shervington, he was relaxed about the arrangements, happy to do “whatever it takes for us to legally end the day married.”
While there are plenty of examples of people using VR to construct creative and rather moving ways of proposing to their loved ones, Kotecki believes that this is the first time that a Social VR platform will host a full-blown wedding ceremony and reception like this.
“It’s certainly a first for there to be VR guests, and for it to be a proper marriage and for it to be recorded in this way,” says Shervington, alluding to the way that guests will not only be able to share into the live event through VR, but also continue to revisit it afterwards. By employing an AltspaceVR feature called “encore” (which the company already uses for live events such as comedy shows) the ceremony will actually be filmed in VR. It’s entirely different from seeing a movie or watching a video, he says, because you’re enabling people to experience a special moment in time, as often as they like.
“As soon as I saw this I thought ‘crikey’ because this is something that people can keep revisiting,” says Shervington. “I can go back as an avatar, or as myself, and go live it all again. For something as personal as a wedding, that adds another very interesting psychological layer.”
Avatars can indeed help enhance the sense of presence in VR, and in this case – even though they were using standard, “off-the-shelf” avatars – they helped provide Shervington with another level of psychological connection with his wife-to-be when they first met in the virtual space where they were going to be married.
“You know, I quite like the idea of not being a humanoid,” explains Shervington. “She’s a pink and white robot and I’m a blue one. The psychological connection is not only the physicality and it’s not only environmental, it’s about subtle things like your voice and your tone, and you layer that familiar physical presence you know onto that avatar. It was different meeting her in VR to what I expected. I looked at her, with those big eyes, the way the head moves, and the lights go on and off as she speaks, and it’s cute! And it’s because she’s behind there. I love her, so why wouldn’t I love the representation of her?”
Shervington’s background in organizational psychology is what got him into VR initially, as he explored how the medium could facilitate better communication and social interaction. He then went on to work with Wearevr on a project and became an early adopter of AltspaceVR. Next month, he tells me, he will combine that interest in VR with a passion for stand-up comedy – and debut a show on the platform he describes as “comedy in VR about VR.”
So after him and his fiancée announced they were engaged, it seemed natural when a friend suggested they should do a VR wedding. “We’re not church-goers, and as far as I’m concerned marriage is in your heart, you make a decision, if you’re going to be with someone that’s what matters,” says Shervington, who approached AltspaceVR with the idea.
“It all unfolded very organically from there,” recalls Kotecki, who arranged for them to get special permission from the owner of an exclusive nightclub space in the platform called the Spire, which features, among other things, a lava lake. “You get an immediate psychological lift by being there,” says Shervington. “it’s great fun to be able to hang out in there and have a bit of an after party, we wanted to add something through the VR experience that we couldn’t get with a real-world venue,” he explains.
They’re not yet sure about the number of people that will attend the VR portion of the event, but there is “capacity” for about 150 guests, and the invites have started going out to the couple’s friends and family all over the world, including some who would not have been able to attend otherwise. Guests receive formal invitation and there’s a process in place to manage RSVP and registration to make sure it all comes together. The couple are also making a range of Samsung GearVR, HTC Vive and Oculus Rift headsets available to guests so that people in Cardiff can join the Spire party too.
“Maybe this is where the wedding planners of the future will work,” Gottheil speculates.
There will also inevitably be legal issues to sort out as more people choose to go down that route and express their love and commitment in this way. This is, after all, uncharted territory, and the law often takes a while to catch up with technology so we’ll eventually have to wrap our heads around how exactly this is going to change relationships in the virtual age. But in the meantime, platforms like AltspaceVR are content with providing a place for couples like Martin and Elisa to get together with their friends, and have an awesome party in the process.
Spannende Nachrichten für Tabletop-Begeisterte und Gamer – Wizards of the Coast, unter anderem verantwortlich für das Sammelkartenspiel Magic: The Gathering, haben vor einer Woche einen Blogpost veröffentlicht, der einiges an Spekulationsmaterial bietet. So spiele der Konzern mit dem Gedanken, ihre Klassiker wie Magic oder D&D auf eine neue Ebene zu bringen und mit Augmented Reality Technologie auszustatten. Es wurden bereits Mitarbeiter angeheuert und die ersten Pläne für eine Umsetzung scheinen festzustehen.
Von Altspace VR zur Augmented Reality
Wer die Begriffe Tabletop bzw. Pen & Paper hört, denkt schnell an atmosphärische Abende am Wohnzimmertisch mit guten Freunden, Snacks und endlosen Abenteuern. Leider stellt sich in vielen analogen Runden das Problem heraus, alle Spieler an einem Abend zusammenzubekommen. Die Lösung: Digitale Spielrunden mit anderen D&D-Fans.
Nachdem bereits eine erste Umsetzung des Dungeons & Dragons-Prinzips im Rahmen des Projekts Altspace VR über den Äther gegangen ist und Spieler aus der ganzen Welt an einem Tisch versammeln konnte, um ihr liebstes Hobby gemeinsam zu erleben, war es nur eine Frage der Zeit, bis der nächste Schritt der Entwicklung vor der Tür steht: Tabletop in der Augmented Reality.
In dem offiziellen Blogpost sorgt der Präsident der Spieleschmiede Chris Cocks mit folgenden Aussagen für Spekulationen:
„We will bring our characters and worlds to other games and experiences. What would it be like to throw fireballs as a Planeswalker in an MMO, or quest for treasure with your friends in a D&D augmented-reality game?“
Natürlich handelt es sich hierbei nicht um konkrete Daten und Fakten zu einer AR-Umsetzung von Dungeons & Dragons oder Ähnlichem, aber zieht man die Verbindung zu einem Interview des D&D Directors Nathan Stewart aus dem vergangenen Jahr, scheint die Marschrichtung für das beliebte Franchise vorgegeben: Augmented Reality als Zukunft des digitalen Rollenspiels.
Er zeigte sich über die Möglichkeiten der erweiterten Realität geradezu euphorisch. Vollständige Immersion entstehe durch die Tatsache, dass alle Statistiken und Mechaniken in Overlays komfortabel sichtbar sind und dadurch, dass es vor allem im Tabletop-Bereich deutlich simpler wäre, Objekte digital zu erstellen, die auf dem Spielbrett Anwendung finden als sie selbst in Handarbeit zu basteln.
Wir können weitere Informationen bezüglich einer AR-Umsetzung von D&D oder sogar Magic: The Gathering kaum erwarten, sind uns aber sicher, dass die Wizards of the Coast hinter verschlossenen Türen an einem Kracher arbeiten.
AltspaceVR held the first UK live comedy show in virtual reality, which marks a significant strategic move for the company as it tries to prove the case for enabling people to attend live events in virtual reality.
With mounting competition from platforms like Sansar and High Fidelity (both of which are in Beta at the moment but planning public releases for 2017), it seems like AltspaceVR’s strategy is increasingly focusing on live events as their unique selling proposition in the Social VR Space.
But why hold such a milestone event in London if the company is still firmly based in Redwood City, CA? It’s actually part of their broader European expansion plan, explains Head of International Market Development Debby Shepard, who has just relocated from San Francisco to London to spearhead that.
With around 30 percent of their current base made up of European users, AltspaceVR hopes to significantly grow that by providing greater support and expanded programming. That strategy of building on geographical clusters makes sense in the context of trying to grow a social-based product, since we’re much more likely to engage with those sort of experiences if our friends are already on board.
The live show featured two very well-known names in the vibrant comedy circuit, Ian Stone (ranked among the top ten stand-ups in Britain by The Independent and a member of the Comedy Store’s ‘Cutting Edge’ team) and Ben Norris (who apart from being the cousin of actor Martin Freeman, is a regular on popular UK television shows such as Mock the Week and Never Mind the Buzzcocks). I was told thousands saw the event, and an encore presentation should be available on Dec. 26 at 7 pm Pacific here.
AltspaceVR’s live event capture technology launched in November and can capture live events in full VR, so users can either watch a performance live or an encore after the event (or both). Previously they had tested some of this functionality in a partnership with SyFy for their show Halcyon, where they showed the first episode in VR and hosted a virtual reality international press junket on the platform. The benefits of that for a global audience are clear, as it transcends the need (and associated cost) of travel and lets them do so at a convenient time for them while keeping the social and interactive aspects you don’t get with simply watching a recorded show on TV.
“The demand for live events in VR is driven by the same desire that people have to attend festivals, concerts, comedy clubs—the shared live experience of performer and audience,” says Shepard. “VR uniquely brings the performer and audience into the same space, replicating the live performance experience. With AltspaceVR’s FrontRow, it’s now possible to deliver it to an unlimited number of people simultaneously from around the world.”
This FrontRow technology means that only a fraction of the attendees are visible in these images, explains Gerald Gottheil from AltspaceVR’s marketing team. The idea, presumably, is that no matter how many people sign up to participate in an event, you never get your view blocked by that annoying tall, hat-wearing person standing right in front of you.
During the course of 2016 virtual reality (VR) social network AltspaceVR has been building a repertoire of immersive live events featuring comedy, music, politics and more. While these events showcase what can be achieved using VR, they are mainly focused on the US market, generally starting at around 7 – 8pm PST. This means that UK/European viewers would have to stay awake (or wake up) at 3 – 4am. AltspaceVR is rectifying this with an expansion into Europe alongside its VR Capture technology, holding the first UK live comedy show in VR.
The live VR event ‘Best of British Comedy’ will take place on Wednesday, 21st December from 7pm to 7:45 pm GMT (11am PST), with owners of Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, or Samsung Gear VR able to download the AltspaceVR app. Taking to the VR stage will be Ian Stone, a famous British stand-up comedian, broadcaster and writer who’s appeared on Mock the Week, Never mind the Buzzcocks and The 11 O’clock Show. While Ben Morris has also appeared on Never Mind The Buzzcocks, They Think It’s All Over and Mock The Week.
Due to its expansion plans AltspaceVR has appointed Debby Shepard as the new Head of International Market Development, relocating to London to lead the effort to provide greater support and expanded programming for European VR users, which comprises 30 percent of AltspaceVR’s user base the company notes.
AltspaceVR has been improving its service over the last few months to provide a unique live VR service that anyone can attend. This began with the launch of FrontRow back in May, being put to the test with a live performance by acclaimed comedian, beatboxer and DJ, Reggie Watts. Then in November the company launched VR Capture, an integrated solution for the capture, distribution and playback of live VR performances and events. It works by recording performers in totally in VR, from their avatar and movements, to their voice and music. So if a performance is being held in California during the eveing for example, someone from the UK can watch it at a more suitable time.
With the European market gaining importance AltspaceVR is now working with local partners and artists to produce live VR events to meet the demands. For further AltspaceVR announcements, keep reading VRFocus.
AltspaceVR, a pioneering social virtual reality platform, announced today that it will be now offering virtual reality replays of live events. The full virtual reality environment is recorded, as well as the performances, so...
But now that the landlady has sold the house where it all started, CLR has turned to VR, or specifically, AltspaceVR, a social VR platform which established itself on early Samsung, Oculus, and HTC headsets back in 2015, and now supports all major VR hardware including Daydream.
Six performers hitting the virtual stage are:
