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.
Whilst VR was certainly a topic during 2014 and 2015 it was in 2016 that we first saw things begin to take off and VR became not just a talking point but became a feature of film festivals. Now in 2017 discussion about VR is common place and having it at said festivals is an expected part of its make-up. Be it 
Made by RYOT in conjunction with both Skybound Entertainment and Telexist, Dinner Party also acts for the pilot for a new series of VR shorts called The Incident, which charts true to life stories of strange occurrences and paranormal events.
Since the year is winding down we’re naturally more inclined to look back as well as forward; so a number of outlets are beginning to roll out their end of year analyses and market predictions for 2018 but beyond to 
Speaking on the convention’s official website, festival head Elena Malakhatka said: “Our goal was to create a unique meeting point for those who are passionate about their profession, no matter if it is science, cinema, VR, education or anything else and to share their passion with each other. That’s why we created VR Expo zone, series of workshops, lectures and discussions about the future of the technology, as well as Art zone and showcase of the world best artistic VR experiences as a part of Kaleidoscope VR World Tour”.