Positron – Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation

June 11, 2020

Cannes XR Virtual Will Showcase 55 Immersive Works

Cannes XR - Marche du Film Festival de Cannes

In a couple of weeks the Marché du Film – Festival de Cannes’ will be holding its online, five-day event. As part it will be Cannes XR Virtual, a three-day celebration of the virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) industry. Today, Marché du Film has announced that 55 works will be showcased.

MOR 1 Photo courtesy of Museum of Other Realities

As previously announced last month, Cannes XR Virtual will take place within the Museum of Other Realities in a dedicated area, teaming up with the Tribeca Film Festival, Kaleidoscope, Positron and VeeR VR to help present works as well as several awards.

For example, the Tribeca Virtual Arcade will present a lineup of 12 VR and MR experiences, 5 of which are world, international or European premieres. While Kaleidoscope has teamed up with Cannes XR to promote 23 projects from 14 countries in development, covering genres such as Documentary, Games, Animation and Arts installation.

“During this very peculiar time, the Marché du Film is more than determined to highlight the XR industry and to foster links between artists and potential investors to support creation in all its richness and diversity. We are very proud to partner with these leading partners in the XR sector,” said Jérôme Paillard, Executive director of the Marché du Film in a statement.

To be part of the Cannes XR experience you’ll need to download the Museum of Other Realities app which can be found on Steam, Viveport, or Oculus stores. The app retails for around £15 GBP but the actual event itself offers free and live access. If you don’t have a VR headset then Cannes XR Virtual will provide a 2D live video stream via Marché du Film Online platform as well as Kaleidoscope and Tribeca Film Festival websites.

Most big events like to have an opening night and Cannes XR Virtual is no different. Miro Shot in collaboration with Overview Ark and New-York DJ, Neil Armstrong will present a virtual concert allowing visitors to meet, network and simply enjoy the virtual experience.

The Cannes XR Virtual event takes place between 24th – 26th June 2020, with all the content available to watch until 3rd July. For further updates on the latest online events using VR, keep reading VRFocus.

February 22, 2020

Cannes XR 2020 Expands in Partnership With Positron, New Venue and Award Announced

The Cannes Film Festival is open of the most prestigious in the industry calendar, made up of several other events including The Marché du Film. Last year The Marché du Film held the inaugural Cannes XR, a growth accelerator for the XR entertainment ecosystem. Cannes XR is returning for 2020, adding a second venue and new awards to celebrate creators.

Cannes XR 2019 had a dedicated 700 sq. meter space in the Palais des Festivals and that will return for 2020. Additionally, because of interest and industry growth, the festival will also include a 1,600 sq. meter waterfront venue at the former Palm Beach Casino; offering views of the Lérins Islands and Cannes Bay.

The Marché du Film – Festival de Cannes has also partnered with Brogent Technologies Inc. and Positron for a new award. Called the Positron Visionary Award for Best Cinematic XR, finalists will be able to screen their work in the Positron XR Cinema at the new Palm Beach venue in Voyager VR chairs.

“At Cannes XR, we believe that the connection between the film industry and the XR industry is essential,” said Marché du Film Executive Director Jérôme Paillard in a statement. “This year, Cannes continues to pioneer in the XR cinema space by providing storytellers with an opportunity to showcase their work to international audiences. We’re thrilled to team up with Positron to continue our mission of celebrating the creativity and technical genius of the finest artists and developers in the world.”

“Positron is honoured to partner with Cannes XR and Brogent Technologies Inc. to showcase fresh, compelling, and imaginative work that demonstrates the power of storytelling in the VR medium,” said Jeffrey Travis, founder and CEO of Positron. “We believe in elevating immersive storytelling and bringing the best work of creators to all audiences. Through our turnkey XR Cinema package, we can offer an unrivalled premium experience for VR films, with a proven business model for location-based entertainment venues.”

Submissions for the Positron Visionary Award can be made here until midnight PST on 20th March 2020. The winner will be awarded a Voyager VR chair and complete Voyager package worth $60,000 USD.

The Cannes Film Festival runs from 12th – 23rd May with Cannes XR event held between 12th – 17th May. For further updates, keep reading VRFocus.

November 28, 2019

Virtual Arena: London Calling LBE – Into The Tomb! (Part 3.)

In the latest coverage of the immersive Out-of-Home entertainment scene for VRFocus, in his latest Virtual Arena column, Kevin Williams reports on an explosion of brand new LBE XR entertainment properties making the capital their home. In this third and final part of this series of reports, we look at the ‘TUTANKHAMUN: Enter The Tomb’ VR experience – and at the first ticketed Positron installation.

Not all applications of VR in LBE are associated with videogame playing – the technology is also making strides in new levels of storytelling, and narrative-driven experiences. One such example that also opened in London draws on the development of an immersive experience in the museum and heritage sphere of commercial entertainment.

Part of the popular ‘TUTANKHAMUN: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh’ exhibition taking place at the Saatchi Gallery in the capital, the organizers and supporters of the impressive collection of artefacts from the illustrious historical excavation have augmented with an independently produced experience called ‘TUTANKHAMUN: Enter The Tomb‘ – an immersive VR theater exhibition combined with the main ticket, owned and produced by immersive entertainment company, CityLights, (directed by Joel Newton, founder of the company).

Tutankhamun: Enter the Tomb — The long lines to experience the Tutankhamun traveling exhibition: Source: KWP

This VR theatre sees the deployment of some 18 of the latest Positron ‘Voyager’ cinematic VR chairs. These unique platforms described as a new kind of movie storytelling, the VR motion seat system having been deployed mainly in promotional marketing and a number of VR movie experiences – most recently deployed as part of the ‘How to Train Your Dragon: Hidden World’ promotional movie VR experience, in partnership with Dreamworks and Walmart.

Positron’s first ticketed immersive VR theatre, the systems deployed comprise a 6-DoF motion platform, with haptic feedback built into the pod seat. The audience using the Samsung Odyssey+, Windows MR headset to view the experience. All this to recreate ‘Enter The Tomb’, an immersive experience through the historic tomb, recreated by the producers at CityLights.

The guest traverses through the various chambers of the tombs immersed in the wonders and treasures – the cinematic VR adding to the storytelling of the experience – which lasts some 8-minutes. The narrative of the excavation and exploration of the tombs and their vast treasures is told by Downton Abbey’s Hugh Bonneville, giving a good representation of the historic site, employing the best of VR storytelling.

Positron - Voyager — The line-up of Positron ‘Voyager’ systems in operation. Source: KWP

Positron sees their VR system much more than an equivalent to the conventional 4DX cinema seating or the once-popular 9D Chinese egg shape VR ride seats. Offering a nuanced motion system with haptic effects, this has been a tool for virtual storytelling, a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer. Producers CityLights working with Positron to create a library of “Edutainment” experiences.

The experience has been so popular that IMG has added more sessions to meet demand. The travelling exhibition has already seen over a million tickets sold when in Paris. Producers at CityLights plan to create a library of Edutainment experiences.

The influence of VR storytelling narrative in commercial entertainment was seen at the momentous VR Awards 2019, held in the heart of the capital during November. An event that saw ‘War Remains’, by MWM Immersive & Flight School Studio – winning Out-of-Home VR Entertainment of the Year. This VR experience transports the audience to the trenches and battlefield of World War I. The separation of ‘interactive’ VR experiences and ‘passive’ VR storytelling presentations – sees more galleries, museums and educational centres, looking at immersive presentations to achieve a new level of audience engagement.

VR Awards 2019 - KWP — VR Award 2019 winners on stage at the star-studded event. Source: KWP

That concludes our latest three-part coverage, but the next major developments from the Out-of-Home Entertainment VR arena will be coming in the next few days.

October 4, 2018

Journey to the Moon With the First Man VR Experience

You’ve been to Mars thanks to movie tie-in The Martian: VR Experience so it makes sense that a film about the moon might get a virtual reality (VR) addition as well. Ryan Gosling’s latest feature First Man is due to hit cinemas next week, and for US fans certain AMC cinema’s the First Man: VR Experience to lucky guests.

First Man

Following the story behind the first manned mission to the moon, focusing on Neil Armstrong and the decade leading to the historic Apollo 11 flight, First Man sees Oscar-winning director Damien Chazelle and star Ryan Gosling reteam for this visceral account based on the book by James R. Hansen.

Guests attending AMC Theatre lobbies in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City and Washington, D.C. will find the First Man: VR Experience. Created by RYOT and CreateVR in collaboration with Universal Pictures, the VR experience uses the full motion Positron Voyager chair which has been specifically designed for cinematic VR.

The experience works as follows:

You begin our journey in NASA’s Mission Control, where you can explore and see exclusive video of First Man, including interviews with Oscar-winning director Damien Chazelle (La La Land), and stars Ryan Gosling and Claire Foy about the courage and daring of the Apollo 11 mission.
You are then placed in Armstrong’s shoes — and in his seat — inside the Apollo 11 Command Module, seconds before launch. The interior of the spacecraft is historically accurate and finely detailed in the placement and appearance of every switch, knob, dial and window.
You feel the immense, barely contained power of the Saturn V rocket as it lifts you out of Earth’s orbit and into zero-gravity.
Then, you will arrive at Day 4 of the mission, in lunar orbit, and will begin the descent to the surface of the moon.
You will pilot the Lunar Module, The Eagle, next to fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin (Corey Stoll), as you experience, firsthand, Armstrong’s grit, determination and nerves of steel as you land safely on the lunar surface. Both the Earth and the moon are built to scale, so the veracity and authenticity of the experience is as close to reality as possible.

“The First Man: VR Experience has been specially designed and customized for Voyager,” says Positron CEO Jeffrey Travis. “The unique motion and haptics in the chair, combined with a true volumetric environment, recreates an unmatched, spine-tingling experience of journeying inside the Apollo 11 from take-off to the first lunar landing. In addition, First Man is the first VR experience for Voyager that brings 6DOF (6 degrees of freedom) and interactivity to the Voyager platform. We can’t wait for audiences to experience this new level of immersion, and we are proud to partner with Universal on this historic project.”

For further updates on First Man: VR Experience, keep reading VRFocus.

WHERE:	Universal Cinema AMC at CityWalk Hollywood, Los Angeles
	AMC Metreon 16, San Francisco
	AMC Georgetown 14, Washington, D.C.
	AMC Lincoln Square, New York City

WHEN:	Friday, October 5 – Sunday, October 14 in LA, San Francisco, Washington, D.C.
	Saturday, October 6 – Sunday, October 14 in New York City

May 9, 2018

Positron’s Voyager VR Chair Coming to Europe via mk2 Distribution Deal

During the Cannes Film Festival this week LA-based virtual reality (VR) studio Positron announced that its Voyager VR chair will be coming to Europe thanks to a new distribution deal with location-based VR company mk2.

The deal will allow Positron to offer premium cinematic VR experiences to European audiences through its Voyager full-motion VR chair and Voyager Network distribution platform. mk2 has become the first official distributor of Voyager and will represent the territories of France and Spain exclusively.

“Our exciting partnership with mk2 marks a major step forward for location-based entertainment and demonstrates Positron’s blueprint for bringing a premium, seated VR solution to global audiences through our Voyager distribution network of motion-synchronized theaters,” said Jeffrey Travis, CEO, Positron, in a statement.

Positron debuted Voyager during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival as part of its New Frontier programme. For public, location-based use multiple chairs can be configured as a VR cinema, with synchronized or separate content screenings. While the Voyager Network allows for premium VR content to be delivered to Voyagers anywhere in the world, and has been used by studios such as Universal Pictures (The Mummy Zero Gravity VR Experience), and Warner Bros. (Save Every Breath: The Dunkirk VR Experience).

Positron Voyager

“We’re thrilled to partner with Positron to deliver the future of cinematic VR to European audiences,” said Elisha Karmitz, CEO at mk2. “In Voyager, we’ve discovered an unprecedented motion and distribution platform that offers creators a deeper level of immersion that cinematic VR experiences, and their audiences, deserve. We’re delighted to add Voyager to our diverse suite of turnkey VR solutions.”

Over the past year or so mk2 has expanded its operations, opening a dedicated VR facility at its Paris multiplex, mk2 Bibliothèque in 2016 with Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and PlayStation VR headsets on offer. Much more recently the company unveiled a VR plug-and-play solution for VR out-of-home centres called the Mk2 VR Pod. This is designed for use in places such as cinemas, museums, institutions and other locations, offering twelve VR pod configurations using HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and PlayStation VR. For further details on Positron and mk2, keep reading VRFocus.

February 15, 2018

VR Theatre Experience Incorporating Voyager VR Chair

Last year, Positron unveiled its VR Chair, Voyager, at the Sundance Film Festival, offering immersive enhancement to several virtual reality (VR) films shown at the festival. Continuing this idea, Positron have teamed up with Ace Hotel, RYOT and Skybound to offer a week of VR Theatre.

The Voyager is a fully integrated VR theatre unit which offers motorised rotation, pitch and haptic feedback that synchs with the VR experience played through the attached VR headset to provide a deeply immersive cinema experience by complementing the existing visuals and soundtrack.

This week-long event will mark the first time that the Voyager VR chair has been made available outside of special events and private festivals. The Ace Hotel at Segovia Hall in Los Angeles will be delivering a carefully curated program of VR films from Monday 19th to 26th February, 2018.

The announced program so far features Dinner Party, a VR experience based upon the true story of Betty and Barney Hill, an interracial couple who reported the first alien abduction in the USA in 1961. Dinner Party is directed by Angel Manuel Soto and produced by RYOT and Skybound.

Also on the program is Melita, a sci-fi story about Anaaya, an Inuit scientist who is striving to find a new world for human kind to inhabit as Earth is facing encroaching catastrophe. Helping Anaaya is Melita, an advanced AI who is trying to help save humanity from extinction. Melita is directed by Nicholas Alcala and produced by Future Lighthouse.

A third VR film is also planned to be added to the bill, but no details on what this will be have been released yet. Further information and tickets for the event can be found on the Ace Hotel website. Tickets cost $35 (USD).

As always, VRFocus will keep you updated will the latest now on VR-related events.

January 30, 2018

Positron Closes $1.4 Seed Funding to Develop Next Generation of Its VR Motion Chair

Positron, a Los Angeles-based VR technology studio, announced at Sundance that it closed a $1.4 million seed funding deal to further develop the next generation of the company’s VR motion chair, Voyager. Funding was provided by Lazar Ventures co-founders Cathleen Ihasz and Nicole Ihasz, and OWC.

Voyager was used at Sundance 2018 to debut the world premiere of Felix & Paul Studios’ space-themed VR experience made in collaboration with NASA, Space Explorers: A New Dawn. An earlier prototype of the chair premiered at last year’s Sundance, and was later used in The Mummy Zero Gravity Stunt Experience with Tom Cruise.

the 2017 prototype of Voyager, image courtesy Positron

Positron says on their website that the Voyager VR chair platform has a full range of yaw motion (360 degree turning) with 35 degrees of pitch motion (reclining). The chair also contains a built-in PC with GTX 1070 GPU to drive the experience. As seen at Sundance, the viewing experience can be synchronized across a number of Voyager chairs for ‘communal’ viewing.

Jennifer Rundell, Positron COO and co-founder, says the investment will allow the company to further develop their Voyager platform “to include state-of-the-art features such as interactivity, 6 DoF tracking, scent, wind, and AI motion tracking.”

The company says Voyager VR chairs will be coming to cinemas, VR centers, hotels, museums and airports later this year as part of the launch of the Voyager Network, an out-of-home distribution network for premium VR.

The post Positron Closes $1.4 Seed Funding to Develop Next Generation of Its VR Motion Chair appeared first on Road to VR.

May 23, 2017

The Mummy Zero Gravity VR Experience Coming to The Shop at NBC Studios in NYC

During the recent South By Southwest (SXSW) conference in Austin, Texas, Universal Pictures, IMAX and engineering firm Positron premiered a virtual reality (VR) experience based on the new Tom Cruise movie The Mummy. Now The Mummy Zero Gravity Stunt VR Experience is getting a much more public outing, coming to The Shop at NBC Studios in New York City this month.

The experience allows the public to go behind-the-scenes with The Mummy stars Cruise and Annabelle Wallis whilst they perform one of the stunts from the film, an intense zero-g segment involving a plane crash. Visitors will be strapped into Positron’s Voyager platform, a full-motion chair designed for cinematic VR. Combining unique software and hardware technology, Voyager guides the viewers’ attention to points of interest in the experience by incorporating gentle motorized yaw and pitch motion and haptic feedback.

Voyager - image 1

There’s an added bonus for those going to see the VR experience. Alongside photo-ops with actual props from The Mummy they’ll be able to play a new title from Starbreeze Studios, The Mummy Prodigium Strike on StarVR.

Players are cast in the role of a Prodigium Agent and are tasked with capturing the ancient Princess Ahmanet—while battling hordes of ravens, spiders and the undead. From ground battles to fighting out of a helicopter, players must protect their fellow agents as The Mummy grows in power, battling to the finish to capture her, or be her slave for eternity. The videogames’ exact availability dates are to be announced soon.

The Mummy Zero Gravity Stunt VR Experience will arrive at The Shop at NBC Studios (30 Rockefeller Plaza, NYC) on Saturday, 27th May, and run through to Sunday, 11th June 2017, from 9am to 6pm daily. Limited reservations will be taken daily, and walk-ins are also welcome.

VRFocus will continue its coverage of The Mummy Zero Gravity Stunt VR Experience, reporting back with any further updates.

April 30, 2017

Intel Let NABShow Attendees Try Out Immersive Movie Pods

Attendees at the NABShow event in Las Vegas had the opportunity to try out the immersive virtual reality (VR) pods supplied by Intel and Positron, which were showing how VR can be enhanced by involving senses other than sight in the process.

The Positron Voyager pods resembled a half egg shape, in which the user sits with their feet dangling in the air. The pod can move through 360 degrees and pitch forward or side to side in response to the action occurring during the experience. The pod is also equipped with headphones for immersive sound and haptic feedback so users can feel every vibration. In addition, there are scent pods, so even the smell of the surroundings are conveyed to the user.

The movie experience that attendees viewed during the NABShow was a short film called Le Mask, which opens with a child trapped within a straw basket, the distinct musk of the basket is all around, along with the sights and sounds of the room that would be expected from a standard VR experience. Later on, a perfume seller in a scene in a market fills the scene with exotic scents.

“We think there’s really a place to have a greater experience by adding other sensory integration,” said Jeffrey Travis of Positron. “It’s not just what you see in the headsets, it’s how you feel when it moves you, how the director can guide you through different points of the story. It’s the sound and feeling the haptic sensations in your back. You really lose yourself in the story.”

Ravi Velhal, a developer with Intel described the project as: “A full fledged cinema experience. I think what you’re seeing here is the world’s first cinema VR experience and how the future of theater in cinema VR should be,” Velhal said.

It remains to be seen if and when these pods will be deployed commercially. VRFocus will be there to report on it if it happens.