VR Experimentation, Storytelling in 2016

vr

I’ve heard it said from the mouths of many a speaker and exhibitor here at CES this week: 2016 will be a big year for virtual reality–in journalism, in film, in gaming, for high technology fiends down to the average smartphone user. A panel of pioneers experimenting with groundbreaking VR experiences convened on Thursday morning and shed some more light on how VR technology is changing the course of how people follow and engage with this type of entertainment and emerging storytelling platform.

What particularly stood out to me was the account from the leaders at the New York Times who just executed the media giant’s first VR journalism project. The New York Times came out with its first Virtual Reality Sunday subscription last Fall and released a short non-fiction film to tell the story of the global refugee crisis.

The idea came about, said President and CEO Mark Thompson, when New York Times employees put their heads together and said, “Let’s show what we can do with serious, deeply immersive journalism.” The question they asked themselves was, “How can we put this into the hands of as many people as possible?” And that’s where Google came in. Thompson credits the technology giant for the early support it gave in developing and distributing the Google cardboard glasses that enable readers to immerse themselves in the VR storytelling experience.

“We wanted to use VR to tell a story that we think is really important. We wanted to give readers a whole new insight into the global refugee crisis,” said Jake Silverstein, editor of the New York Times magazine. And what better way to ignite new insight than to let readers actually experience what it’s like to be someone displaced by war, and to see and hear a plane fly over your head and drop food supplies from the sky to the ground beneath your feet?

Silverstein also alluded to a few upcoming projects for the New York Times in the VR space, including covering the 2016 presidential campaign, sporting events, and the possibility of covering space exploration in a partnership with NASA. “We’re going to be experimenting. We’re still learning what stories work best in VR.”

But are these types of projects and stories really virtual reality? Ted Shilowitz, a futurist for 20th Century Fox, questioned this during his portion of the panel presentation, explaining that while what the New York Times has developed is certainly impressive and awe-inspiring, the technology is still not quite to the point where a user can’t see the pixels, or where he or she actually believes and feels like they’ve been transported to another place. No technology out there can do this, though what 20th Century Fox did with The Martian has come close, he asserted. Shilowitz was referring to the 20-minute interactive, VR experience that 20th Century Fox recently developed based on the high-grossing science fiction film The Martian which came out in theaters last year. (The Martian VR Experience made its debut at CES this week to a select group of journalists.) In this VR experience, viewers are “transported” to Mars, where the main character from the film has been stranded and struggles to survive. The experience starts with the viewer watching Mark Watney (played by Matt Damon) awaken from the initial accident on Mars, until the perspective changes and the viewer becomes Watney, and sees the red planet from inside the spacesuit. Sounds like a really advanced, high end video game to me.

“We’re taking you inside the world of an astronaut, where you forget you’re even wearing something on your face,” said Shilowitz, referring to the Samsung VR headset a user must wear to dive deep into the immersive experience.

Of course, users of the technology have to shell out money to get the experience, but Shilowitz says VR experiences that you have to pay for will still be in high demand despite the price tag. “The high end, ultra [VR] experiences are things people want to pay for, because they expect it will be freaking amazing,” explained Shilowitz.

And I couldn’t agree more. Even on the CES show floor, the difference between prices and the VR experience you got was noticeable. Take Homido, for example, a new VR headset that users can hook to their smartphones and gain access to a myriad of Google Cardboard apps. Homido is said to be a step above the Google Cardboard headset. Going for $76 for the headset, my Homido VR experience was perfectly fine. I defended myself against a few of the zombies who were trying to attack me in my VR space, but Shilowitz’s words kept ringing in my head. It definitely felt like I was still just a viewer of the experience, and not actually a character in the environment. But then again, the technology is meant to be universal. The compatibility with smartphones lets audiences get a small glimpse into the VR world which they wouldn’t normally be able to afford.

Then on the other hand you have the Oculus Rift, going for $600, and you realize then that you get what you pay for. I couldn’t even try out the Oculus Rift because the line snaked around the exhibit area several times. The benefit here is that you get a truly immersive experience. So immersive that I even witnessed a few people coming out of the demos looking rather nauseous. One attendee even mentioned he needed to go outside to get some air. This is a flaw and drawback in the technology that developers are hoping to correct in the near future.

But as Silverstein said, “It’s like the early days of cinema for VR right now.” Right now is the time for trial and error and experimentation, as media and gaming innovators look to thrill audiences by using VR in a whole new way.

And we can’t wait to see how those experiments pan out …