Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation
What Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality developers are talking about
EA has confirmed that the Star Wars Celebration event scheduled to take place in Orlando next month will play host to the official unveiling of the first footage from Star Wars Battlefront II.
The post First ‘Star Wars Battlefront II’ footage will air at Star Wars Celebration 2017 appeared first on Digital Trends.
Disney is one of the biggest names in entertainment and there’s a level of quality that comes with the Disney brand. From classic animated features to the relatively newer relationship with Marvel comics and Star Wars brands, the company puts its best foot forward and supplies young and old fans with visual feasts. Thee company’s many theme parks are no different, taking the fantastic characters off the screen and bringing them to life for visitors. One would think that immersive VR experiences would be at home in a Disney park. CEO Bob Iger reportedly thinks AR is better suited for the Disney treatment.
When it comes to the incredible work being done in Disney Parks, Iger feels putting on VR headsets would be an inferior substitute or “ersatz”, as quoted in a report from the LATimes. He’s apparently even told his team not to give VR any thought at all.
“What we create is an experience that is real,” he says. “When you walk into Cars Land, you feel you’re in Radiator Springs because of what we’ve built — not only the attention to the detail, but the scale.”
Plenty of theme parks are using VR to enhance their experiences either by promoting the park to far-flung potential visitors or adding headset options to existing rides like the Kraken at Seaworld, but Iger’s perspective is an interesting one. There’s no official reveal of Disney AR content, but the Times reporter noted that Iger spends Tuesday afternoons at one of their engineering labs wearing a headset that allows him to hold a lightsaber and fight a stormtrooper. With that, let your imagination run wild.
The visual effects team working for director Gareth Edwards have revealed that they used virtual reality (VR) technology in some critical scenes in Star Wars movie Rogue One. A virtual camera was utilised for several scenes were the background and landscape were entirely CGI.
In a video interview with BBC Click, the Visual Effects team showed off how the virtual camera set-up could work in environments that didn’t exist in real life to allow Director Gareth Edwards to get the perfect shot.
The virtual camera itself is essentially an iPad with a HTC Vive controller attached to it. This allows the user to maneuver around a virtual environment such as the Death Star or the space battle above the planet Scarif that forms the climax of the movie.
The visual effects team on Rogue One described Gareth’s Edwards approach as being very hand-on and physical, so he appreciated the opportunity to create more naturalistic and realistic shots in a virtual environment.
The full interview with BBC Click can be seen below. VRFocus will provide further information on VR use in movies and TV as we get it.
Star Wars films, new and old, are recognized regularly for incredible and grand filmography. The science fiction epic is larger than life and that demands a collection of practical effects and computer generated scenery to bring the many aliens, their worlds, and the massive battles to the big screen.
Rogue One Director Gareth Edwards, no stranger to massive feats in film considering he also directed the most recent Godzilla, had the honor of creating a prequel tale in the Star Wars universe and utilized VR get some of the shots just right.
Rogue One was an exciting visual feast that was well received by fans of the franchise and critics, even receiving a couple Oscar nominations. In addition to a nomination for sound mixing, it received one for best visual effects. On BBC Click, viewers were given an inside look into the visual effects and filmography of Rogue One and it was interesting to see the way VR was able to help Gareth Edwards and the production crew.
A staff member at Industrial Light and Magic, the George Lucas founded visual effects team, noted that Edwards has a very hands on approach when directing. He’s notorious for grabbing onto cameras himself and showing just how he wants the shot to be framed, but that isn’t something he can do when it comes to computer generated scenes typically.
For Rogue One the team developed a system where Gareth navigates those CG scenes via VR. With an iPad in hand that has an HTC Vive controller attached to it, the director moved around a room to find where he wanted scenes to start and end. As opposed to recreating his ideas from vague descriptions and having to potentially re-do them multiple times to even come close to his vision, the team was able to be create scenes that closely matches his desires and get drafts back to him relatively quickly.
Immersive storytelling in VR short film has been embraced heavily since VR headsets hit the consumer market. IMAX is investing in VR centers and major actors like Don Cheadle are getting involved in the medium, but it’s encouraging to see VR spread throughout Hollywood in other ways like what was done for the Rogue One film. Time will tell if other production crews embrace this idea or find even newer ways to get VR involved.
Das Star-Wars-Franchise gab im Jahr 2016 mit dem Titel Trials on Tatooine ihr Debüt in den weiten Welten der Virtual Reality. Lucasfilm hat auch nicht die Absicht, in nächster Zeit weniger High-End-Inhalte zu veröffentlichen. So ist es dann ziemlich überraschend, dass diese Star Wars-VR-Variante uns eigentlich am meisten begeistert – ein kleiner inoffizieller Ausflug in eine weit, weit entfernte Galaxie, die mehr daran interessiert ist, die technischen Möglichkeiten zu zeigen als ein tatsächliches Spiel zu bieten.
Been working on this VR RC-BB8 in my spare time :D#VR #gamedev #StarWars #gameart pic.twitter.com/XV8pdVYd7p
— Pat Vince (@pezmn) 8. Februar 2017
Was genau macht diese kleine Demo jetzt zum coolsten Virtual-Reality-Erlebnis, das auf dem berühmten Sci-Fi-Franchise basiert? Wie wäre es, wenn ihr euch mit dem allseits beliebten kugelförmigen Droiden BB-8 durch die Landschaft bewegen könntet?
In einem kurzen Video, das von dem Reddit-Benutzer pv_8, alias Pat Vince, gepostet wurde, kann der Spieler eine virtuelle RC-Version des frühreifen kleinen Roboters lenken, indem man die HTC Vive Steuerung in spezifische Richtungen bewegt. Das Ergebnis ist eine lustige, Physik-basierte Erfahrung, die potenziell ein sehr süchtig machendes Spiel ergeben könnte. Der Spieler im Video führt BB-8 durch eine Reihe von Hindernissen: So rast er im Slalom um Leitkegel, balanciert über eine Wippe und durchbricht eine Wand von Boxen.
Die ganze Zeit mussten wir darüber nachdenken, wie cool es wäre, ein Star Wars-Spiel mit der Mechanik von so etwas wie Super Monkey Ball zu spielen. Stellt euch ein virtuelles Spiel vor, das ihr aus der Sicht von BB-8 spielt, der die erste Ordnung infiltriert. Dabei müsst ihr euch sorgfältig einen Weg durch Luftkanäle bahnen, um nicht entdeckt zu werden. Das Zeug schreibt sich praktisch von selbst!
Leider ist dies, wie bereits erwähnt, ein inoffizielles Projekt, das wohl niemals einen Release erleben wird. Unabhängig davon sieht die Demo immer noch nach endlosem Spaß aus. Während momentan noch kein Download zur Verfügung steht, hat pv_8 erklärt, dass er nach einigen leichten Verbesserungen noch einen Download-Link freigeben wird.
Schaut euch die YouTube-Seite des Schöpfers an, um weitere Star Wars-Assets auszuwählen, die sich alle um Virtual Reality drehen.
(Quelle: VR Scout)
Der Beitrag BB-8 in cooler VR-Demo zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!
Admit it; at at least one point in the past year you’ve picked one of the HTC Vive’s wands and pretended it’s a lightsaber. You’re far from alone.
In fact, performing arts theater counterpulse is taking those imaginary battles one step further with the help of the position-tracked controllers. As you can see in the video below, taken by a friend of the studio, the group is currently rehearsing a performance that pairs the Vive wands with realtime projection mapping to create a spectacular on-stage fight sequence.
A second video of the performance was posted on Reddit.
As two performers move their wands, a screen behind them follows, mapping a lightsaber-like beam to where the top of the controller is in relation to the surface. The result is an immersive dueling experience where the two are able to act out a dramatic battle without the need for more elaborate props. In fact, you could feasibly use this technology to make the Vive controllers a replacement for multiple props.
The actors are apparently training for a full show that will be coming soon.
Okay, so it’s not VR, but it’s a great use of VR tech and, as Valve’s Chet Faliszek pointed out on Twitter, a an even better example of what can be done if you “open things up” like the company has done with its SteamVR tracking, employed by the Vive itself.
If you really want to feel like you’re within a true Star Wars sequence, though, you do have some options. On Vive, you can turn your controllers into a virtual lightsaber with the help of classic Star Wars characters in the free experience, Trials on Tatooine. On PlayStation VR, meanwhile, Star Wars: Battlefront owners can hop into the cockpit of an X-Wing and take part in a VR mission that ties into the recent movie, Rogue One. A narrative-driven VR experience based on Darth Vader is also in the works.
As for multiplayer VR lightsaber fights? We’re not quite there yet, but the second such a project is released we’ll be sure to throw money at it.
Tagged with: counterpulse, lightsaber, Star Wars
2016 was a bumper year for Star Wars fans. Not only did they get Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, DICE released several updates for Star Wars Battlefront, including a movie tie in. As an added bonus for PlayStation 4 owners this also included Rogue One: X-Wing VR Mission for PlayStation VR. Now it seems another virtual reality (VR) title could be in the pipeline as work begins on the next Star Wars video game.
While DICE developed Star Wars Battlefront, for the VR experience the studio brought Criterion Games on board. Better known for its racing franchises such as Burnout and Need for Speed, Criterion has been confirmed to still be working on Star Wars. A posting on EA’s Star Wars Battlefront website states: “While no future Skirmish content is planned, DICE isn’t done with Star Wars – the team has shifted its focus to creating the next great Star Wars game, a collaborative effort between three world-class studios: DICE, Criterion, and Motive. We look forward to sharing more with you later this year and thank you for being such a tremendous support of our work in a galaxy far, far away.”
In a further post – this time by Jade Raymond, Group General Manager, Motive Studios | Visceral Games – at present Motive Studios is working with DICE on the next instalment of Star Wars Battlefront, Visceral Games will be debuting a new action adventure game in 2018, while Respawn Entertainment are making their own 3rd person action adventure. A teasing line at the end says: “And we’re early in pre-production on some other projects we think you’re going to be excited about as well.”
Star Wars video games are always going to be popular – even if previous titles have been somewhat lackluster at points – and certainly another VR project would go down well with VR users, just look at the positive ratings Trials on Tatooine gets for HTC Vive on Steam.
If and when Criterion or DICE do confirm another Star Wars VR experience, VRFocus will let you know.
The Planet Coaster community is no stranger to wild and extravagant designs, but one ambitious Steam user has managed to create a roller coaster version of one of the most famous sequences in film history.
The post An ambitious Planet Coaster player has turned the Death Star into a killer roller coaster appeared first on Digital Trends.
Xbox Games With Gold for February include Monkey Island 2, Star Wars: Force Unleashed, and Project Cars. As with all recent games released through the program, all Xbox 360 games are also playable on Xbox One.
The post Race to the finish line with ‘Project Cars’ in February’s Xbox Games With Gold appeared first on Digital Trends.