Los Angeles-based creative studio Magnopus has a prestigious back catalogue, working on a multitude of XR experiences. When it comes to virtual reality (VR) content the company has created the likes of Disney Pixar Coco VR (2017) and more recently Elixir (2020), the magical experience designed to showcase Oculus Quest’s hand tracking. These have all been single-player experiences but a new job listing indicates the studios’ intention to get into multiplayer gaming.
Currently, Magnopus is looking for a “Senior Backend Server Multiplayer Engineer” to join its team in LA, someone who can “Design, develop, and maintain a highly distributed, scalable, low-latency multiplayer environment.” As is always the case when trying to glean new project details from job listings there’s very little to go on. However, it does note that it’ll bode well for applicants: “Past experience working with VR/AR content and understanding what makes these mysterious worlds so enticing.”
Co-founded in 2014, by Ben Grossmann, an Academy Award-winning visual effects supervisor, to date Magnopus has created over 80 immersive projects, some of which have made it to home VR headsets. The company recently made the news thanks to its acquisition of British XR specialist REWIND, which it has previously worked with on several projects.
REWIND built projects like Danny MacAskill’s VR Ride Out and Universal Monsters Presents: Bride of Frankenstein holoride. When talking about the announcement Grossmann did mention: “The team is brimming with talent so this acquisition has just given us a turbo boost on our journey toward big things we’ve been cooking up.” There’s always the possibility that with such a rich talent pool to draw from Magnopus is creating its own in-house experience which would be exciting.
As VRFocus learns more about Magnopus’ future VR plans we’ll let you know.
There are all kinds of awards out there – mainly because most everything has some organisation quantifying who are the best in what they do. Now we’re in the fourth quarter of the year it’s only natural that we end up seeing more awards ceremonies to reveal the high achievers of 2018.
Earlier this week VRFocus hit the red carpet for the VR Awards 2018, which once again celebrated the field of virtual reality (VR).
“The VR Awards is at the centre of recognition and celebration of outstanding achievement in VR.” Says the organisation, “Combined with year-round international initiatives, the VR Awards brings together a night of red carpet highlights, the celebration of excellence and unique access to the world’s most influential names in immersive technology.”
A media partner for the event, Nina Salomons and Kevin Joyce were both in attendance and even helped dish out the awards during the evening. You can find a list of the winners below, as well as some footage of the event and interviews with several of the victors.
“Pixar originally didn’t want to do the project [Coco VR] because they didn’t think we could hit the quality bar that they found acceptable,” said Ben Grossmann, Co-Founder of Magnopus. “We had to prove ourselves.”
And they did just that. Magnopus is an entertainment experience company founded by people that have decades of experience, awards, and creativity. The Google meta description for their website explains that they aim to “tell stories without borders” and the “What” page of the site states that they’re “creating the impossible by any means necessary.”
What better way to do that than with the immersive power of virtual reality?
Greatest Work
“All new employees at Magnopus are told that, regardless of the problem or how new they are, that they have the power to raise their hand and say that something isn’t good enough,” said Grossmann.
From what I’ve heard in talking to people from Disney and Pixar, that’s very much along the lines of the same ideas those companies preach. Walt Disney himself once famously said, “Whatever you do, do it well,” and that feels like it’s ingrained into the DNA of not only Pixar and Disney as companies, but Magnopus as well. They may not be the household name that Pixar is, but it doesn’t mean that their work isn’t of award-worthy quality already.
In fact, Magnopus has already earned three different Emmy award nominations for its projects in the VR arena (Mission: ISS, Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab, and Coco VR) and it’s only a matter of time before one of them takes home the prize.
“Our secret sauce is all the projects that you haven’t seen,” said Alex Henning, another Co-Founder of Magnopus in an interview. “Being willing to iterate a lot and to try a lot of things early, to fail fast as it were and build up our knowledge as quickly as possible by tackling real world challenges.”
During our chat Grossmann told me that “Magnopus” is a portmanteau of the Latin words for “greatest work” (Magnum Opus) and they’ve built their entire company around that mantra. And they’re focusing so heavily on VR because they see it as the future of entertainment — at least until something better comes along.
“We want to take people beyond the movie theater,” said Grossmann. “We founded Magnopus right around when Oculus was getting out of Kickstarter and started out very quietly. We’ve stayed quiet. All the time people spend talking at conferences is time not spent actually pushing things forward. You could just go build it.”
Each of Magnopus’ three major VR projects to date (listed above) have been about not just replicating things you can see elsewhere, but rather putting you inside of an experience that transports you. Instead of re-enacting or watching a scene from the recent Blade Runner film, the Memory Lab experience gives you total freedom. Instead of walking through the land of the dead as Coco, you actually become one of the skeletons with full customization in a multiplayer sandbox environment. And Mission: ISS is still one of the best, most visually impressive, and engaging space simulations out there. The fact that NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency were all involved in that collaboration is immediately apparent.
“The mindset for us has always been to look for areas that we feel like we can concentrate and create some sort of lasting impact,” said Henning. “As interesting as it is to create this type of content, that’s just scratching the surface of what all of the applications of this technology [VR and AR] might be.”
There’s still a long way to go though. What Magnopus straddles the line between game and movie in a way that few things have and it really feels like the idea of a “VR experience” is starting to become more defined. Compare Coco VR to something like the Beauty and the Beat VR dress rehearsal and it’s like night and day. This stuff is truly on another level.
“You have to build up a culture where quality is a critical bar,” said Grossmann. “This medium is still so young and still evolving and there is a lot of stuff out there that just doesn’t work well. Now is the time to figure all that stuff out before the spotlight turns on with tens of millions of consumers.”
Obviously for a collaboration with Pixar, using their own original IP, it’s going to be sticky. That’s a company that cherishes their attention to quality and detail. The fact that they originally turned down Grossmann, Henning, and the rest of Magnopus — despite their previously existing awards and work — speaks volumes.
“For Coco VR, we asked ourselves, since it is an interactive experience that puts the user at the center, how little story can we have and still have it be fun? How much narrative is too much narrative? What’s the balance between linear and non-linear? If you take two friends and put them somewhere with fun stuff to do, we found most people will create their own experiences.”
As a consumer and someone that spends a lot of time in VR, it’s easy to notice things that don’t work well. As much as I love Skyrim VR, even after dozens of hours, I still find myself unsure about which buttons bring up which menus while playing. But if I put someone in Job Simulator, even if they’ve never tried VR or even a video game in their life, it’s immediately intuitive.
“For good VR, the technology should be invisible and it should just feel like magic,” said Grossmann. What better way to create magic than to get Disney and Pixar involved?
The Pixar Touch
“A couple years ago as VR was hot in the industry there was conversation internally about ‘Should we do VR’ at Pixar,” said Marc Sondheimer, Producer on Coco VR. “Something like a short story we could tell. At the same time we started thinking that an existing property would make it more cost effective. We even had the Disney Technology and Innovation Group approach us to explore VR with one of our film projects.”
And then, enter Magnopus. Their collaboration pitch was initially turned down, but they were able to win over Pixar with their ideas and attention to detail. This isn’t Disney’s first foray into VR by any means, especially if you consider The Void’s Star Wars experience, all of the 360 video work they’ve done, and the one-off apps we’ve seen pop up on stores. ILMxLAB’s Trials on Tatooine is still a fan favorite as well.
But the Coco VR project was very different.
“Usually we start with a traditional movie script and iterate on that before production, but VR is a different beast than cinema,” said John Halstead, Supervising Technical Director at Pixar. “We did go through a few versions of something you’d maybe call a script but it read more like a list of potential outcomes than an actual script.”
It’s a fascinating process to think about. Since a VR experience is a space that you can exist in, rather than a rectangle you stare at, there are so many more variables. The viewer’s whims and interests are for more likely to derail what you have planned since you can’t force someone to look at something in VR.
“We do a lot of story boarding, so our version of story boarding for this was basically creating a rough build of the experience and going through and talking about goals and what works,” said Halstead. “Like a 3D story board.”
One can only hope that Pixar’s interest in VR continues. The main thing that VR needs right now is great, immersive content from the masters of their craft. On the gaming front studios like Sony, Bethesda, Ubisoft, and more are all pushing VR heavily in their projects, so if more Hollywood-caliber companies like Pixar continue to step up, we could see a lot more projects like Coco VR getting awards and nominations from companies like Magnopus and others.
“We are still exploring the medium, but there are no concrete plans to shift attention from film to VR or anything like that,” said Sondheimer. “We are still interested in it and exploring it, but it’s also playin an important role in film production too. We are putting sets inside game engines so directors can explore the spaces in a headset as they make the film. That’s already being used in both Toy Story 4 and another 2019 film.”
Okay so, Toy Story 4 VR…please? Now that Kingdom Hears 3 is getting a VR experience, anything is possible, right?
The 70th Annual Emmy Awards are nearly here, and the nomination list is out. Seven pieces of VR content have made the cut, including big names such as Rick And Morty: Virtual Rick-ality (2017),Coco VR (2017), Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab (2017), and Spider-Man Homecoming VR Experience(2017) to name a few.
VR games, experiences and 360 video have found their way into two categories in particular—’Outstanding Original Interactive Program’ and ‘Outstanding Creative Achievement In Interactive Media Within A Scripted Program’.
The list below highlights VR content represented in both categories. Check out the full list here, which includes all other nominees.
The Emmy Awards will air live on NBC Monday, September 17th at 8PM ET (local time here). Without further ado, here’s all the VR content in the running.
Outstanding Original Interactive Program
Back To The Moon (YouTube 360, Rift, Vive)
Created by: Google Spotlight Stories, Karen Dufilho (Executive Producer), Jan Pinkava (Executive Producer), Fx Goby (Director), Google, Nexus Studios
Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab (Rift, Go, Gear VR)
Created by: Magnopus, Alcon Interactive, LLC, Oculus
Coco VR (Rift)
Created by: Magnopus, Disney, Pixar, Oculus
NASA JPL: Cassini’s Grand Finale (YouTube 360)
Created by: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Spider-Man Homecoming VR Experience (PSVR)
Created by: Create VR, Sony Pictures Virtual Reality
Outstanding Creative Achievement In Interactive Media Within A Scripted Program
Rick And Morty: Virtual Rick-ality (Rift, Vive, PSVR)
Created by: Adult Swim Games, Owlchemy Labs, Other Ocean Interactive. Rick and Morty Creative Team
Silicon Valley: Interactive World: Not Hotdog, VR & Twitter-Powered Pizza Drones (VR on Rift, Vive)
Coco VR, Pixar’s first-ever VR experience, has a pretty specific goal in mind; getting you to see the film in theaters when it opens next week. That’s at least the mindset I had before putting on my Rift, a result of a malaise that comes from playing nearly every ‘brand engagement’ tie-in ever produced for VR (they’re free after all). Popping into the experience and putting me face-to-face with the main character Miguel, it became clear that Coco VR was going to be different.
Initially teased at Oculus Connect 4, Coco VR can be experienced in either single or multiplayer mode, the later of which lets you pick up to 3 other players from your Oculus friends list.
image courtesy Disney-Pixar
Entering the experience, you’re transported to the house of twelve year-old Miguel. Standing in front of the family’s ofrenda, Miguel explains the candle-lit altar commemorates his passed family members. Called away by his mom to help with dinner, you drift off into a dreamlike state, led by an infectiously cute alebrije, or a mythical creature central to Mexican folk art. This was the moment when it dawned on me that Pixar had effectively created one of the best-looking VR experiences to date, movie tie-in or otherwise.
Dropped in the Tienda de Ropa (clothing store) where Ceci, a motherly skeleton, gives you free rein to try on a few different outfits, I start customizing my avatar. Placing a pair of pants and a stripped shirt on a tiny mannequin, I see the clothes appear on me in the mirror.
image courtesy Disney-Pixar
Besides locomotion and object interaction, the game’s instructions aren’t thrown in your face, encouraging exploration instead of forcing you to complete objectives. Rustling through a random drawer, I find a small map and a checklist of things to do and explore.
The film’s otherworldly ‘Land of the Dead’, populated with a cast of skeleton characters decorated in the style of the traditional Mexican holiday Día de Muertos, is ridiculously charming.
Teleporting around the main Plaza, you can do a number of activities, probably the least interesting of which is to watch the movie’s trailer at the open-air cinema, a near-constant focal point in these sorts of experiences. The meat of the experience is in the other activities, all of them well refined exemplars. You can go on a Disney-style ride around the village, travel up an outdoor elevator, take selfies with silly hats and mustaches, listen to a skeleton band perform music, and even dance around on stage yourself – replete with a crowd of adoring fans that clap and mimic your movements. My favorite was the Estudio de Arte, an art studio jam-packed with concept art from the film as well as other works. Buttons placed in front of the studio’s sculptures, paintings and sketches activate an explanation behind each work, and even teach you a little about the tradition behind the calaca, the skeleton figures featured in Día de Muertos.
obligatory selfie
Pixar’s Coco VR could have easily been just a good-looking 5 minute experience, or even a 360 video (groan), but the company has clearly invested the time in understanding the medium for what it is: interactive, explorable, social, and shareable.
According to an Oculus blogpost, the team behind the actual film worked closely with their VR counterparts to create assets and animations that stayed true to the movie. Magnopus, the team behind Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab, brought the art to life in VR, adding social and interactive layers. Oculus collaborated with both teams, providing creative and technical feedback from early development through to completion.
image courtesy Disney-Pixar
And this likely isn’t the last we’ve seen from Pixar either. According to Disney-Pixar’s Coco VR Producer and Academy Award-winner Marc Sondheimer, “VR is the natural next step in our evolution, letting people experience these worlds in living color.” We can’t wait to see what’s next.
You can download Coco VR for Rift here. A version for Gear VR is slated to launch November 22nd.
And yes, you can also play in Spanish. ¡Qué suerte!
Wir kündigten bereits im Oktober den Eintritt des Animationsstudios Pixar in die VR-Branche an. Nun ist die Coco VR – die soziale VR-Erfahrung zum gleichnamigen Animationsfilm – offiziell für Oculus Rift im Oculus Store erschienen. Zeitgleich zum amerikanischen Kinostart von Coco – Lebendiger als das Leben! am 22. November folgt die Veröffentlichung der Mobile-Version für die Gear VR.
Coco VR für Oculus Rift veröffentlicht
Disney-Pixar arbeitete für Coco VR mit Oculus und Magnopus zusammen, um die soziale VR-Erfahrung zu entwickeln. Der Zusammenschluss von Disney und Oculus dient zwar hauptsächlich dazu, Promo-Aktionen zu großen Filmtiteln zu realisieren. Sie brachte jedoch ebenso interessante Entwicklungen wie die Marvel Powers United VR hervor.
Seit gestern ist die Erfahrung Coco VR im Oculus Store erhältlich und ermöglicht die gemeinsame Nutzung mit bis zu vier Spielern gleichzeitig. Mit euren Freunden oder alleine taucht ihr in das Reich der Toten ein, um an ikonischen Schauplätzen des Films auf bekannte Charaktere zu treffen und interaktive Spielelemente zu nutzen. So kann man beispielsweise in Cecis Kostümladen verschiedene Outfits anprobieren, mit euren Freunden in einem Fotoautomat Selfies schießen oder mit Hector eure eigene Musicalnummer vortragen.
Neben den interaktiven Elementen lassen sich zudem herausgeschnittene Szenen und weitere Extras zum Film betrachten. Spoiler soll es angeblich nicht geben. Die soziale Erfahrung ist Pixars erster Schritt innerhalb der VR-Branche und soll laut den Verantwortlichen einerseits Interesse für den Film wecken, andererseits das Eintauchen in die einzigartige Fantasiewelt ermöglichen.
In verschiedenen Disney-Läden wurden bereits vor dem offiziellen Kinostart Stationen mit einer Oculus Rift aufgebaut, um die VR-Erfahrung vor Ort auszutesten. Zudem wurde Coco VR bereits auf verschiedenen Veranstaltungen wie dem Día de los Muertos Festival in Amerika vorgeführt.
Coco VR für Oculus Riftist ab sofort kostenlos im Oculus Store erhältlich. Die Mobile-Version für Gear VRerscheint gleichzeitig zum amerikanischen Filmstart am 22. November. Der Film Coco – Lebendiger als das Leben! kommt am 30. November 2017 in die deutschen Kinos.
Pixar are one of the most respected animation studios in the world, widely credited with being pioneers in the world of CGI animation. The company is taking its first steps into virtual reality (VR) with a new VR experience created to tie-in to upcoming animated film Coco. Some places in the US will even be able to check out the experience early.
Coco is inspired y the vibrant colours and artwork used in the Dia de los Muertos celebrations in Mexico, Coco follows a boy called Miguel who dreams of being a brilliant musician. He faces obstacles along his way, though, and Miguel unravels the history of his family through a journey into the Land of the Dead.
Coco VR was announced as part of the Oculus Connect conference, and is due to be launched on Oculus Rift on 15th November, and Samsung Gear VR on 22nd November, which is also the date the film is due to be released in the USA.
For users who are not keen on waiting, however, as there will be certain events that will let people get a look at the Coco VR experience. The events and locations involved are as follows:
Día de los Muertos festivals in Los Angeles, New York City, Houston, Phoenix, Dallas, San Antonio, Oakland and Chicago beginning Oct. 28
Camp Flog Gnaw Music Festival in Los Angeles on Oct. 28-29
Select Disney Stores and movie theaters nationwide through Nov. 22.
A trailer for Coco VR can be viewed below.
VRFocus will bring you further information on Coco VR as it becomes available.
Revealed during the Oculus Connect 4 keynote today, Coco VR is Pixar Animation Studios’ first-ever VR project, coming to Oculus Rift and Gear VR. Timed with the launch of Disney-Pixar’s new animated film Coco in November, Coco VR is described as a “next level social virtual reality” experience.
The brief gameplay footage shown the trailer, which appears to run at an unusually low framerate, shows various scenes in which players appear as characters from the Land of the Dead, with plenty of interaction and customisation on offer.
According to this report on Oh My Disney, the app uses Facebook’s technology to enable social functionality, allowing users to explore the world of Coco with their Facebook friends. Animation World Network reports that the project is “a co-production from Disney-Pixar and Oculus, with VR creative development and execution by Magnopus.”
Coco VR will be available for preview at various Día de los Muertos festivals across the US and at Camp Flag Gnaw Music Festival in LA beginning October 28th, as well as in select Disney Stores and movie theatres through November 22nd. The app is due to launch on Oculus Rift on November 15th, followed by Gear VR on November 22nd.
In addition to the raft of other big announcements at the Oculus Connect event was the slightly lower-key reveal of some of the new and updated content that Oculus Rift users can expect to come to virtual reality (VR) from Disney, Pixar and Marvel.
Lots of comic books fans are already excited for the upcoming title Marvel Powers United VR, but now it has been revealed that players will be able to wield the mighty hammer of the gods, Mjolnir and play as Thor, the God of Thunder. The short trailer gives a brief demonstration of some of Thor’s abilities, including the power to zap foes with lightning and throw Mjolnir for the full smiting experience. Marvel Powers United VR has already revealed a few of the playable characters who will be available, including Captain Marvel and Rocket Raccoon. The title is expected to be released some time in 2018.
You can watch the trailer for the reveal of Thor below.
Also upcoming from Disney will be a VR tie-in to Pixar’s new animated film, a story called Coco, themed around the famous Mexican celebration the Day of the Dead. The VR experience is being designed to let users enter and explore the fantastic, stylistic world inspired by the art and decorations featured in the Dia de los Muertos festivals that take place in Mexico and various US cities such as Los Angeles, Houston and Dallas.
The Coco VR experience is being developed by Pixar in collaboration with Oculus, and will mark the first time the famous animation studio has ventured into VR. Coco VR is due to come to Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR on the 22nd November, 2017, the same date that the feature film is due for release.
VRFocus will bring you further news on new VR content from Disney as it becomes available.
“The VR Awards is at the centre of recognition and celebration of outstanding achievement in VR.” Says the organisation, “Combined with year-round international initiatives, the VR Awards brings together a night of red carpet highlights, the celebration of excellence and unique access to the world’s most influential names in immersive technology.”
