hulu – Page 2 – Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation

September 16, 2017

VR Short Film I Philip Comes To Google Daydream

A virtual reality (VR) short film called I Phillip created by French filmmaker Pierre Zandrowicz is exploring what it is like to be a robot, putting the viewer in the head of an android and giving a glimpse of the world as seen through electronic eyes.

I Philip tells the story of an android created by American robotics expert David Hanson in 2005. The sophisticated android called Philip, and designed and built to be a copy of famous science fiction author Philip K. Dick, who wrote memorably on the topic of the line between human and machine in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? A story that was later adapted into seminal cyberpunk film Blade Runner.

Phil the android quickly gained fame around science fiction fans and on the internet. The android was presented at various scientific and engineering conferences before its head went missing during transit on a flight to a Google Tech Talk, and the project went dormant for several years after.

The VR film presents an interpretation of the life of Phil the android, offering a view from his perspective, with memories of the android itself along with ideas of the author.

Though the premise is somewhat fantastic, the event presented were ones that occurred in real life, given an interpretation by the filmmaker.

Google Daydream users can now experience I Philip through the Hulu VR app. Users will need a Hulu subscription in order to view the film.

VRFocus will bring you news on new content and applications for VR.

February 9, 2017

Hulu Beats Netflix to Social Viewing in VR on Gear VR

Finally, one of the two major video streaming services available in VR will let you watch with your friends. Hulu has broken ground on social video viewing in VR with an update to their Gear VR app which lets up to three people watch regular and 360 videos together.

Although it was promised way back back that Netflix would see social/multiplayer viewing in VR, it’s Hulu who is taken the first step. With the latest version of the Hulu app on Gear VR, users can watch content together online.

The app is now fully integrated with Oculus Rooms, Gear VR’s hub for social VR activities. You can bring friends into the Hulu VR app by bringing a party together in Oculus Rooms first, then launching the app from the launcher table. This will transport up to three players into the app, sitting them on a virtual couch in front of a giant screen. Users can switch between several surrounding virtual environments.

hulu-vr-social-multiplayer-viewing-integration

Through the Hulu VR app, the company makes available both their standard streaming content (for subscribers) and a collection of 360 degree content (which is free to watch even without a subscription).

The app respects each player’s avatar as built in Oculus Rooms, and also supports voice chat through the same mechanism.

The Hulu VR app itself isn’t the best looking Gear VR app we’ve seen, exhibiting quite a bit of aliasing in the surrounding environment. Fortunately, the app’s core function (video playback) seems to work well and at high quality.

At the moment the app seems to be available only in limited territories. I was able to find and install it fine in the US, but colleagues in Canada and Italy both were barred from even finding the app on the Gear VR store.

On the Rift front, the Hulu app has recently received an update that adds rudimentary Touch support (just the ability to browse menus). Unfortunately the Rift version of Hulu lacks the social/multiplayer of the Gear VR version, which is a little odd given that the Rift is powered by significantly more capable hardware. Our guess, however, is that Oculus Rooms (not yet available on the Rift) is the holdup, as it provides important social functions that makes Hulu social viewing possible on the platform.

And while Hulu VR is also available on Google’s Android Daydream and PSVR platforms, those versions do not yet support social viewing.

We hope that Hulu’s move into the social viewing space will compel other streaming services in VR to up their game and offer the same feature, as it feels like a critical and overdue capability.

The post Hulu Beats Netflix to Social Viewing in VR on Gear VR appeared first on Road to VR.

February 8, 2017

You Can Now Watch Hulu With Far Away Friends On Gear VR

Watching streaming apps inside VR is great, but it’s missing one vital component: your friends. With the help of Oculus, Hulu is looking to change that.

The streaming service just announced it is updating its support for the Gear VR headset today with integration added for Oculus Rooms. That means the personalized avatar you create in Oculus Home can now be brought into shared Rooms spaces, and you’ll be able to meet up with other friends to watch Hulu content together, be it the 360 videos offered for free, or the entire library of films and TV shows featured in a Hulu subscription.

That’s a pretty big step forward for the app; imagine watching VR content with friends who are physically far away from the comfort of your own sofa. We’ve already seen this concept with third-party apps like Bigscreen, which works by mirroring your computer screen in a virtual world and not through official integration.

That’s not the only update to Oculus’ versions of the Hulu app. On Rift, the app now also supports the Oculus Touch controllers, giving you another way to navigate its interface. You can also bring your Rift avatars into the experience, presumably so that they are there and ready for when Rooms launches on the PC-based headset later this year.

The app is also available on PlayStation VR and Google Daydream, but doesn’t support these features there just yet. If they were to get social support, then they likely wouldn’t be using Oculus’ own features.

As far as we know, Hulu is the first VR streaming app to feature this option. Netflix was the first streaming app to get VR, launching alongside the consumer Gear VR in late 2015, but that only allows you to watch content by yourself. We’ve yet to test out Hulu’s Rooms integration for ourselves, but assuming it works well then this is a feature we’d likely start to see pop up more and more.

Tagged with: hulu, Oculus Rooms

February 8, 2017

Hulu Adds Support for Avatars and Rooms in Latest Update

At Oculus Connect 3 last year the company revealed several new social initiatives for Gear VR and Oculus Rift, namely Avatars and Rooms. Today Hulu has announced support for both features.

At present Rooms has only been made available for Gear VR while Avatars can be used on both systems. Oculus created Rooms for users to hangout with friends, where they can watch TV like Hulu, listen to music and play mini-games with up to eight people. Another feature of Rooms is that users can gather round the app launcher and jump into another social app such as Dragon Front, Casino VR Poker, Ascension VR, Wands, Fusion Wars and more.

So Gear VR users can now jump into the Hulu app in Rooms with their friends and watch Hulu’s content together, including the entire library of premium 360 videos – for free and without a Hulu subscription. Those with Hulu subscriptions can also enjoy Hulu’s entire 2D library together in VR.

Hulu Gear VR - Rooms and Avatars

While Oculus Avatars are all about personal identity in its VR world. The feature enables users to customise their identities with a myriad of permutations, from textures and clothing, to accessories and more. The Hulu app also supports the Oculus Touch controllers so that users can use their virtual avatar hands to control the app and play with objects in the Hulu virtual environments while enjoying Hulu’s entire 2D library.

For any further Hulu updates, keep reading VRFocus.