Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation
What Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality developers are talking about
Study suggests mice react in the same way to stimulation in virtual environment as in real world
Whether exploring distant galaxies or dashing about a fantasy world, virtual reality has immersed humans in extraordinary places. Now, it seems, mice will be able to join us.
Researchers have developed a pair of virtual reality “goggles” that can plunge the rodents into various scenarios, from navigating mazes to experiencing the threat of a predator.
Continue reading...Musée d’Orsay adds AI and VR to display of artist’s last works, never previously seen together
For a man who died in 1890, Vincent van Gogh seemed remarkably au fait with 21st-century parlance.
Asked why he had cut off his left ear, the artist replied that this was a misconception and he had in fact only cut off “part of my earlobe”. So why did he shoot himself in the chest with a revolver, causing injuries from which he died two days later?
Continue reading...Technology is Hollywood’s current arch nemesis, but as exhibitors on Venice film festival’s ‘immersive island’ will tell you, AI, VR and XR could lead to a brighter future
One of the hottest tickets at the 80th Venice film festival isn’t a movie at all but a VR installation on the event’s self-styled “Immersive Island”. Each user sits at a computer and answers a series of personal questions, which the exhibit – in the space of a few seconds – converts into a bespoke portrait of their life. The project, Tulpamancer, is officially the work of Brooklyn-based artists Marc Da Costa and Matthew Niederhauser. In practice, though, it amounts to a creative collaboration between the user and AI.
Generative AI plays the role of Sleeping Beauty’s bad fairy at Venice. The ongoing writers and actors’ strike was largely prompted by fears over the new technology’s impact on film and TV production and has resulted in numerous star performers deciding to skip this year’s festival. But in the meantime, AI – unwelcome, uninvited and arguably misunderstood – has already joined the party. It’s hiding in the cracks of the films on the main programme and helping facilitate the creation of the XR (extended reality) pieces on the island.
Continue reading...On the Lazzaretto Vecchio, the small island home of Venice film festival’s Immersive section, I donned an XR headset and boldly went where most festivalgoers don’t
Traditional cinema hogs the limelight at the Venice film festival but there’s an array of wilder delights just behind the main site. Hang a right past the PalaBiennale theatre and a boat whisks you across to the Lazzaretto Vecchio, the small island home of the event’s Venice Immersive section. It’s a two-minute ride but it feels like light years away.
Venice’s self-styled “Immersion Island” is dedicated to showcasing emergent technologies – and by definition emergent storytelling. There are 28 XR (extended reality) productions in the main competition, together with 24 “world gallery” tours hosted by VRChat, and these run the gamut from interactive movies through 360-degree videos to the sort of imposing standalone installations you’d otherwise find in a modish art gallery. The medium is nascent and even the language around it is still bedding down. The works on the schedule aren’t quite films or games or art displays, although most will contain elements from all three disciplines. “We like to call them experiences,” says the woman on the desk with a shrug.
Continue reading...Company aims to allow those unable to go to the theatre, including neurodivergent people, the elderly and children, to enjoy its shows
A pioneering “virtual stage” launched by Birmingham Royal Ballet will use immersive technology to help neurodivergent audiences access their shows for the first time.
The project uses virtual and augmented reality to create performances and immersive experiences that can be seen by audiences who may otherwise be unable to go to the theatre.
Continue reading...Using VR and haptic vests to transport users to a sweaty club in 1980s Britain, In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats is so realistic that you might need a lie down afterwards
I’m not the kind of person who you’d normally find at an illegal rave at a regular raving time, let alone 9am on a Wednesday. But that’s where I found myself this week – virtually, anyway: with a haptic vest strapped on to my back, a controller in each hand and a virtual reality headset covering my eyes, I’m transported back to 1989, hooning through the suburbs with my friends to find a secret dancefloor.
Darren Emerson’s award-winning interactive VR film, In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats, tracks the acid-house movement and rave scene in Coventry, UK. It’s wholly transportive – I forget that I’m actually standing in the middle of an empty studio in metro Melbourne, because for half an hour I’m in the back of a car, in a friend’s poster-strewn bedroom, in a police station, hurtling down a freeway, bumping up against sweaty bodies in a club and walking through a forest hungover as the day breaks and the sun peeks through the trees.
Continue reading...Ben Joseph Andrews’ chronic vestibular condition leaves him with migraines and dizziness – which he’s transformed into a VR experience. Luke Buckmaster gives it a go
You would’ve heard of déjà vu: the surreal sensation of having previously experienced the present, or something like it. You may not have heard of jamais vu: the sensation of being unfamiliar with things that should be recognisable. Like your house, your desk, even your hands.
Guy Pearce’s protagonist in Christopher Nolan’s 2000 thriller Memento, who can’t create new memories, has a version of it. But the kind I got a taste of, in a fascinating “world-first mixed reality” experience featured at this year’s Melbourne international film festival, is jamais vu of a very different variety.
Continue reading...Plus Josh O’Connor as a grumpy archaeologist, Hugo Weaving as a scabby hermit, and a queer noir – all part of Miff’s 71st edition
Australia’s cinephiles have been well served by this year’s Melbourne international film festival, with a program that – as usual – sources an eclectic range of productions from around the globe. Announced on Tuesday, the festival’s 71st iteration runs in Melbourne cinemas from 3-20 August – and in regional cinemas from 11-13 and 18-20 August. An additional online version will run from 18-27 August.
Many of this year’s highlights have already played at Sydney film festival – so click here to read more about No Bears, Hello Dankness, Smoke Sauna Sisterhood, 20,000 Species of Bees and How to Blow up a Pipeline.
Continue reading...The new product is far ahead of its competition; however, it is not clear that there is a pressing need for it or that most people can afford it
As people begin to report on their hands-on time with Apple’s Vision Pro VR headset, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the company has produced an incredible piece of hardware.
Even in limited demonstrations, users have praised the company’s extraordinary work producing the two postage-stamp-sized screens that sit in each eyepiece and pack in more pixels than a 4K TV; they’ve been stunned by the quality of the “passthrough” video, which shows wearers what’s happening in the outside world in enough detail that they can even use their phones while wearing the headset; and they’ve been impressed by the casual ease with which the gesture controls on the new hardware work, with an array of infrared cameras letting users make small and subtle hand movements to select and scroll rather than relying on bulky controllers.
Continue reading...There’s a disconnect between the eye-watering price of Apple’s new ‘spatial computing’ gadget and the promise of it – but it has some genuinely novel features
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Yesterday, Apple finally confirmed the worst-kept secret in Silicon Valley, and announced the Vision Pro, its $3,499 virtual reality headset. From our story:
The headset allows users to interact with “apps and experiences”, the Apple vice-president of human interface design, Alan Dye, said, in an augmented reality (AR) version of their own surroundings or in a fully immersive virtual reality (VR) space.
“Apple Vision Pro relies solely on your eyes, hands and voice,” Dye said. “You browse the system simply by looking. App icons come to life when you look at them; simply tap your fingers together to select, and gently flick to scroll.”
EyeSight, which sounded so ridiculous, could actually … work? A curved, outward-facing OLED screen displays the wearer’s eyes to the outside world, giving the impression of the headset as a simple piece of translucent glass. The screen mists over if the wearer is in a fully immersive VR space, while allowing people to have (simulated, at least) eye contact when in AR mode.
An array of downward and outward-pointing IR cameras let the headset keep track of your position and gestures at all times, allowing the company to build a controller-free experience without requiring the wearer to hold their hands in their eye-line when using the headset.
An AI-powered “persona” (don’t call it an avatar) stands in for you when you make a video call using the Vision Pro. It’s a photorealistic attempt to animate a real picture of you, using the data the headset captures of your eye, mouth and hand movements while you talk. Even in the staged demos, it looked slightly uncanny, but it seems a far smaller hurdle to introduce into the world than trying to encourage people to have business meetings with their Memoji.
Should VR headsets have a bulky battery mounted on your head, or should they rely on a tethered cable to a separate PC? Apple thinks there’s a third option: slip the bulky battery in your back pocket, and run the cable up to a lighter, more comfortable set of goggles. It could work. Or it could be the worst of both worlds: a cable that still inhibits movement and comfort, with none of the power of a real tethered VR system. Hey, not all novelty is a slam-dunk.
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