Booster Space – Made with Love in Berlin

What we do at Booster Space

[boosterspace-blog]

A summit where VR meets Film & TV – during the Berlinale

EFM VR NOW Summit – about different kinds of moving image. Half a day conference where Virtual Reality meets film and television. Customized for the needs of entertainment professionals. With high profile speakers in packed sessions and networking. During the European Film Market at the Berlinale Film Festival. Early Bear tickets only 99 Euros.   

Learn how film, television and immersive media like Virtual Reality and 360 video are coming together. Get excited by fantastic stories and inspiring opinions of international VR figure heads about how entertainment advances today. 

Who is there? Matthew Collado (Littlstar), USA  Eddie Lou (Sandbox VR), China Anika Giese (Axel Springer SE), Germany  Ditti Bürgin-Brook (La Siala Entertainment), Switzerland Paul Bouchard (WIDE VR), France Oli Lane (VR Concept), UK

Soon we will be able to announce another highlight speaker, coming from a renowned Canadian immersive media production company. Stay tuned for more.  

Get your Early Bear ticket, for only 99 Euro.   

EFM VR NOW Summit 2018 - 18.02.2018

[boosterspace-blog]

Topics and speakers at Intel Buzz Workshop – a one day conference for free

Check out the Intel Buzz Workshop at Games Science Center in Berlin. Listen to international game developers from Ubisoft Blue Byte, Creative Assembly, Deadalic and more. Win awesome prizes, and showcase your own game. Saving the best for the last: it’s for free.   

The Intel Buzz Work is a free, one day long conference focussing on tech and content trends in the games industry. It is custom tailored for game developers and all those people who love games as much as we do aka very, very much. 

Until now we are proud to announce the following speaker line up:

Thomas Miller, Senior Build Engineer (Creative Assembly) Marc Braun, Producer (Ubisoft Blue Byte) Valentina Tamer, Game Designer & Writer (Daedalic Entertainment)  Oscar Clark, Game Evangelist (Unity 3D) Alexander Pieper, Technical Director (Studio Fizbin) Thomas Bidaux, Crowdfunding Expert (ico Partners) Adam Streck, Neurobiologist and VR developer (DZNE/neomento) Eric Jannot, CEO & Creative Director (waza! games)  There will be more. 

Pre-register for free: buzzworkshop.booster-space.com

Want to exhibit your game in our featured game expo? Fill out this submission form.

And stay tuned for the schedule. 

Intel Buzz Workshop Berlin - 02.02.2018

[boosterspace-blog]

International Local Heroes of VR

The VR NOW understands itself not only as a platform for the best international producers of VR, AR, MR and 360 video. It’s also about the people who drive the diverse local community in Berlin and Brandenburg, mostly smaller companies who work on an large and international level and want to showcase their latest successful work. 

Sara Lisa Vogel and Daan Kip (VR Base) started the session on our second stage. Daan explained how he managed to create a 50 Mio Dollar fund – the XR Base fund – to support great early VR and AR entrepreneurship. He and Sara then pointed out the creative and business potential of companies and upcoming talents from Europe.     

Pedro Lopes (Hasso Plattner Institute) showed the amazing latest research development in EMS wearables. With attached electric muscle stimulation gloves (and more wearable devices soon), objects and walls will be part of the haptical experience. 

Peter Hu (Auctoreal Inc.) explained what it means to live from VR development in the world’s probably most interesting (and hyped) market – China. Susanne Dickel is co-fonder of INTO.VR, specialized in 360 journalism. Their holistic approach on production and storytelling is fit for all major platforms for VR. 

Max Sacker and Iuolia Isserlis are the two heads of Anotherworld VR. Right before they came to speak on the VR NOW Con, they won the prize for Best Immersive Experience at the VR Core Awards in China for their Horror VR Experience Kobold. In 30 minutes they showed what it means to create suspense and horror without torturing the user.     

Find these and more exciting talks on YouTube. 

With: Sven Bliedung (SLICE), Marcus Ritter (Interlake), Sönke Kirchhoff (INVR.SPACE), Gayatri Parameswaran (NowHere Media), Greg Louden (3rd Eye Studios), Pawel Gajda (Carbon Studio), Christian Glessner (Hololux), Gerda Leopold and Sebastian Endler (both Amilux Filmproduktion), Lina Reinsbakken (Nornstudio) and of course the fabulous Thomas Bedenk (Exozet) and his friends.    

Photo by Shane Pilon

[boosterspace-blog]

What we gain (and divulge) in the new realities

In 2016 the VR NOW Con keynote of Alysha Naples was all about making VR for better human interaction. Make VR pro social, less commercial and anti-isolating, she said. Everybody was moved, everybody agreed. 

This year Ian Forester, CEO of VR Playhouse, hold a similar critical note. While we wonder what we in the new realities, with immersive video and another level of information that will guide us through the world, Ian asked what we divulge. 

The keywords here are: #Big Data, #Subconsciousness, #Depth. Scary, isn’t it? In real life that translates into make societies drift away even further apart, with social engineering, manipulated elections, Facebook bubbles and presidential fake news bullshit bingo (I hate the term “fake news”, we use it too often and help the guy who claims to be its inventor). 

But we also wanted to show off a little. What is VR capable of right now, why is VR such a great medium, how will it define our entertainment, gaming, storytelling, industry training and information in the near future.   

Max Salomon (Black Dot Films VR) and Maria Courtial (Faber Courtial) showed how to produce high quality immersive content for the old media e.g. National Geographic and ZDF. Laura Jeffords Greenberg told us what content is popular on the LittlStar platform. 

Dominik Kaeser is the inventor and team lead of Google Earth VR and gave an in depth look into the development process of one of the most popular and smoothest VR experiences you can get right now. 

Gabo Arora (Lightshed) talked about using VR for making people empathic, sharing also uncomfortable experiences about wars, crisis and the people suffering from it. 

Kristian Costa-Zahn (UFA LAB) and Oliver Schreer (Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute) shared how they are going to start with volumetric video, a major advancement in making films you can actually freely move in.  

Marcus Kühne is Audi’s head of VR and has set up more than 100 point of sale experiences for Audi customers who can compile their own cars from scratch, as well as making fun experiences like Audi sandbox.           

Our guests from China (Yiming Niu is president of the VRAR Association of China, Rebecca Liu is head of VR Core, China’s biggest association for VR creators) gave insights about the Chinese market, what content is wanted by the consumers, what content is produced by the creators. 

Two roundtable discussions concentrated on the American market, especially Hollywood (with Chris Sibley from Phenomenon Media, Andrew van Wyk from River Road Entertainment and, again, the amazing Laura Jeffords) and the trinity of markets in Europe, China and the USA (with Chris Sibley from Phenomenon Media, Drew van Wyk from River Road Entertainment, Sven Bliedung from SLICE and Yiming Niu from VRARA).              

Check out the VR NOW Con & Awards 2017 playlist on YouTube to see the talks you missed. 

Photo by Grzegorz Karkoszka  

[boosterspace-blog]

The best VR NOW Con in the history of Earth

At the closing event of each Olympic Games, the Head of the Olympic Committee traditionally claims: This is the end of the best games ever. Even if they were not. But he has to say it, as a matter of politeness towards the people of the hosting country, and because of self-preservation. 

As it also follows the unwritten rules of capitalism and press announcements: Either grow or die (or you have a very good excuse you’re still alive). 

Now I am wondering: Would we do the same? Would we say “Contrary to our better knowledge, this was the best VR NOW Con in history”?

Just to be clear: We are happy to announce that we don’t have to lie. The VR NOW CON & Awards were again successful, which means: more people, more partners, more press, more speakers and more exhibitors on a bigger area. 

We were able to welcome over 550 people, we expanded the exhibition area, we had a full pre-event at Audi City Berlin and two workshop a day after the conference. That's growth. So why do I come up with the Olympics?   

As you might have realized for yourself, the competition of conferences and other shows that concentrate on Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality is very high. Everybody wants a piece of the next big thing when it's still hot.   

And the core crowd that attends events not unlike the VR NOW Con is international and rather picky. Especially in times that are labelled as “trough of disillusionment”. 

Looks like we have survived the shallowing attention and excitement about XR for now. But to be honest: I was thinking about the other option as well, about what to say when things don't turn out too well. 

Maybe it’s a German thing, like Angst and Weltschmerz. But it helps with the grounding and, o boy, we are happy now. This is why we again like to thank everyone who was involved in this critical endeavor – foremost the VRBB association and the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg. 

It was the best VR NOW Con & Awards in its two year old history. We’re going to have another (and better) one in 2018.     

Photo by Grzegorz Karkoszka  

[boosterspace-blog]

A warm “Thank you” goes out to our partners and sponsors 

This event would not have been possible without your dedication. Thank you to

VRBB e.V.

Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg

SLICE

Audi City Berlin

XMG

Illusion Walk

INVR.SPACE

Europäischer Fonds für Regionale Entwicklung

Cluster IKT, Medien und Kreativwirtschaft Berlin Brandenburg

BerlinBalticNordic.net

MeetToMatch

Eventbrite

MediaTech Hub Potsdam

VR Base

realities.io

VR Lounge

VRAR Association

IHK Potsdam

Institut français Berlin

ARA China

Virtual & Augmented Reality Industry Association of Xiamen

media:net berlinbrandenburg

Berlin Valley

Gamesmarkt

VR World

Virtual Reality Reporter

Photos by Grzegorz Karkoszka  

[boosterspace-blog]

Our international keynote speakers... 

...on Stage 1, from China, the USA, and Germany, covering everything from 360 video production for television and big media brands to Hollywood strategies, in depth insights into the production of world class VR applications and Chinese market analysis. 

Photos by Grzegorz Karkoszka   

[boosterspace-blog]

This is how we celebrated the 2017 VR NOW Awards

Check out the winners: 

VR Grand Prize  Foren Method: The Vrain

VR Entertainment Award Exit VR: Huxley 

VR Impact Award Foren Method: The Vrain VR Industrie Award  Stoll von Gáti: LSIM – Simulator für Liebherr-Turmdrehkrane

VR Technology Award Holodeck VR: Holodeck VR

Photos by Grzegorz Karkoszka   

[boosterspace-blog]

Program of VR NOW Con is updated with awesome sauce!

Our program is online, check out the schedule. We have got news about amazing international speakers (Google, VR Playhouse, LittlStar) and free workshops at the VR NOW Con & Awards in Potsdam and Berlin. Purchase your conference ticket (prices begin at € 199) and get a free MeetToMatch business update.

DOMINIK KÄSER

(Google)

TALK The Making of Google Earth VR, 2pm, Main Stage

In 2014 Dominik started the Google Earth VR project with the goal of letting anyone travel anywhere in virtual reality. Google Earth VR launched in late 2016 to wide acclaim, and went on to win the Lumiere Century award by the Advanced Imaging Society (AIS). It is only the second time in history the AIS handed out a Century Award; the first award went to James Cameron for the movie Avatar.

IAN FORESTER

(VR Playhouse)

TALK Dream Hacking: Subconscious Metrics in the Age of Big Data, 10am, Main Stage

Ian is the CEO and Co-Founder of VR Playhouse and based in Los Angeles. Working in Chicago theater instilled in him a passion for creating transformational experiences. He developed, directed, and performed in dozens of plays and immersive events. After winning LA Weekly’s Award for Best Direction in 2008, he served as the Artistic Director of Needtheater in LA from 2011 until his first encounter with a VR headset in 2014.

LAURA JEFFORDS GREENBERG

(Littl Star)

TALK: A 360 Degree View of Content Performance, 12pm, Alternative Stage

Laura is the Senior VP of Business & Legal Affairs at Littlstar, the leading global platform dedicated to immersive virtual reality and 360° content. She manages and oversees the company’s legal department, advising the company on international content acquisitionand distribution, development and licensing of software and applications, and business operations. Before that she was Senior Legal Counsel at Red Bull Media House in Austria.

ALL SPEAKERS SO FAR

Gabo Arora (Lightshed), Melek Balgün (Moderator), Thomas Bedenk (Exozet), Sven Bliedung (Slice Studios), AC Coppens (The Marketing Catalyst), Kristian Costa-Zahn (Ufa Lab), Maria Courtial (FaberCourtial), Daan Kip (VRBase), Susanne Dickel (IntoVR), Sebastian Endler (Amilux FIlmproduktion), Ian Forester (VR Playhouse), Pawel Gajda (Carbon Studio), Christian Glessner (Hololux), Laura Jeffords Greenberg (LittlStar), Peter Hu (Auctoreal), Ioulia Isserlis (AnotherWorld VR), Dominik Käser (Google), Sönke Kirchhof (INVR), Marcus Kühne (Audi), Gerda Leopold (Amilux Filmproduktion), Pieter van Leugenhagen (Yondr), Rebecca Liu (VRCORE), Pedro Lopes (Hasso-Plattner-Institut), Greg Louden (3rd Eye Studios), Yiming Niu (VRARA China Chapter), Gayatri Parameswaran (NowHere Media), Lina Reinsbakken (Norn Studio), Max Sacker (AnotherWorld VR), Max Salomon (Blackdotfilms), Dr. Oliver Schreer (Fraunhofer Institut), Christopher Sibley (Phenomenon Media),  Daniel Sproll (realities.io), Sara Lisa Vogl (VRBAse), Sven Slazenger (Interlake) Andrew Van Wyk (River Road Entertainment) – and many more.

www.vrnowcon.io

[boosterspace-blog]

Helping Hands for Ca$h

You are interested in VR, AR, MR, and other forms of enhanced realities? You want to discover new trends and thoughts? Want to get insights in the industry and meet the makers and shakers of the future of VR? You are just curious and know you will make a good contribution to the event? Great! Fill out this form and we will come back to you! Please note: some jobs are paid, so its best you have a valid VAT number in Germany (not mandatory!). You get a small fee, a free tickets, catering and we make sure your work is also fun!

Please fill out this form to be part of the movement!

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeqMq97MyMyXtuo9eGrZzhOwAnhQhhD7ZujiL0BICxsW4u7yw/viewform

[boosterspace-blog]

Intel Buzz Workshop Poznan – how to make it in South America

We’re ready to go. Check out our speakers Intel Buzz Workshop at October 7 during the GIC in Poznan.

The Latin American market for video games is more different to the Western market than one thinks. With different platforms (last generation consoles are still very popular in the three biggest markets Brazil, Mexico and Argentina), business models, paying modalities and so on.    

André Faure is CEO of GamePlan, one of the main business influencers in the Latin Americas. André has launched over 100 products including software, hardware, media and services.  

His talk is called and will be about “Games in Latin America - Market, Trends, Tips and Tricks” (2.30-3 pm). 

[boosterspace-blog]

Intel Buzz Workshop Poznan –Valentina Tamer & the Pillars of Earth

We’re ready to go. Check out our speakers Intel Buzz Workshop at October 7 during the GIC in Poznan.

Carving a video game out of an existing franchise – is it easier or more difficult than creating everything from the scratch? How do you handle creative freedom and demands of the IP owners? And how do you turn a book into a video game? 

Valentina Tamer is working for Hamburg based developer/publisher Daedalic Entertainment. Her current project: the world famous Pillars of Earth which was originally written by Ken Follett. 

The Point’n Click adaption is already well received. In her talk (3-3.30 pm), Valentina explains the work on quest and story design.   

[boosterspace-blog]

Intel Buzz Workshop Poznan – Stefan Ljungqvist, maker of Biomutant

We’re ready to go. Check out our speakers Intel Buzz Workshop at October 7 during the GIC in Poznan. 

Stefan Ljungqvist, Head of Studio at Experiment 101. Maker of Biomutant. Breaker of Chains. Writer of children’s literature. He actually wrote books that were translated and sold in seven countries. His latest is called Monsterflickan 5 - Återföreningen, which can be translated with Monster Girl 5 – The Reunion.

Responsible for studio strategy, creative direction and product development at Experiment 101. His talk (10.15-11 am) is about balancing creativity and management for Biomutant, the recently announced and already awaited Action-RPG. 

[boosterspace-blog]

Intel Buzz Workshop Poznan – play DOOM with John Romero

We’re ready to go. Check out our speakers Intel Buzz Workshop at October 7 during the GIC in Poznan.

Yes, he’s coming. John Romero, father of DOOM and Quake and the whole flipping FPS genre. In a fireside chat with Michael Liebe (11.30-12.30) he’ll be talking about the good ole’ times when he got to ID Software, about level design and creativity management. Also: get the chance to play DOOM with him.

[boosterspace-blog]

Game Jam – Use Case No.3: Unraveling the anonymity paradox!

Unveil the Privacy Threat – that’s how we named the Game Jam (October 7, 2017) we’re going to host together with the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society – will be fun and serious. And we want you to be part of it.

We will present to you three different use cases with a direct connection to data security and privacy by design. We have invited prominent experts to talk about the importance of data privacy, advise and inspire the participants of the Game Jam. What are the use cases, who are the experts? This is use case No 3.

Use case 3: Unraveling the anonymity paradox!

What sounds like the title of a 60′s psycho thriller B-Movie for mathematicians is in fact a modern day horror story. Here’s why. 

If personal information were anonymized, all our privacy concerns would be gone! But what does “anonymized” mean?

This question is one of the hardest to resolve in the privacy debate. At present, privacy experts are grappling with the paradox that – in the big data era – there is no anonymous data anymore. 

All data can always be related to an individual  by means of data analysis technologies. The reason for this is that data is only considered “anonymized” if it cannot be related to an identified or even to an identifiable individual.

In order to understand this paradox, imagine this: 

More than three million Berlin citizens – and another million tourists – are carrying around their personal devices every single day. There’s a Berlin-wide wifi system, which is publicly available for all people who have switched on their devices’ wifi by default. This wifi system collects the movement data of all these devices over a longer period of time. 

Guess how useful this data would be for urban traffic management and many other innovations. But wouldn’t it be creepy if this data could also be misused against an individual later on? 

This data is thus anonymized in order to mitigate these risks. In the process all personal identifiers (i.e. the MAC address and IMEI) of the devices captured by the wifi system – which could in principle lead to an identification of the owner or even carrier of a device – are “hashed” (i.e. substituted by a specific hash value for each identifier). 

This hash value does not per se contain information referring to the owner or carrier of the device. However, it is still possible to capture the device’s movement pattern by referring to this hash. This movement pattern becomes more and more precise over time. 

A person who gets access to that movement pattern (e.g. an employee of the provider of the wifi system or another data-driven company) might suddenly discover that this device must be owned by somebody he knows very well. 

The reason for this is that this device “leaves” the building where he lives at the same time every morning and “moves” to an address where only lawyers work: In terms of probability, that person must be his wife!

This risk of re-identification of “anonymized” data exists generally, where it is combined with further information. 

It is hard to say which information will be added and hard to say what the consequences of an identification are. It is hard to say under which conditions this risk is low enough in order to be socially acceptable.

Assignment

The goal of this use case is to develop an engaging game concept that helps people to understand the anonymity paradox. One target group are people working in companies specifically dealing with anonymized data (e.g. such as the provider of the wifi system described).

Want to join the Unveil the Privacy Threat Game Jam on October 7, 2017 in Berlin? Register here for free.

The best game idea will be awarded by an expert jury with an exciting prize – a weekend trip to London for the whole winning team including a visit of The Crystal, the world’s largest museum on the future of (smart) cities – sponsored by Siemens. Furthermore, amongst all participants, we give away two one-year-memberships of Adobe Creative Cloud sponsored by Adobe.*

*without possibility of recourse to legal action

Text by Max von Grafenstein

[boosterspace-blog]

Game Jam – Use Case No.2: Oops… wrong recipient 😬

Unveil the Privacy Threat – that’s how we named the Game Jam (October 7, 2017) we’re going to host together with the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society. It will be fun and serious. And we want you to be part of it.

We will present to you three different use cases with a direct connection to data security and privacy by design. We have invited prominent experts to talk about the importance of data privacy, advise and inspire the participants of the Game Jam. What are the use cases, who are the experts? This is use case No 2.

Use Case 2: Oops… wrong recipient 😬

The most common privacy threat in companies arises when an employee accidentally sends personal information about somebody else to the wrong recipient. 

This may sound like a no-brainer, but in fact, it is one of the biggest challenges in implementing effective privacy protection policies within companies.

There are two typical constellations that give rise to slightly different challenges for companies trying to mitigate this threat: 

In the first constellation, an employee uses an email client, and in the second constellation, he/she grants access to a file depository. 

In both cases, an employee typically sends an email or grants access to a repository to the wrong recipient – because the email client or repository incorrectly autocompletes the address based on the first few letters. 

The employee forgets to double-check the name and… oops, the information is sent to the wrong recipient. 

But there are differences between the cases: They refer to how such an employee can react. If the employee has granted access to a file repository, in principle, he or she can still restrict access retrospectively. 

In contrast, if the employee has sent an email, the information is definitely “gone”, and he or she can only ask the recipient not to read and/or open the content. 

However, in both cases employees often do not react at all, or they do not appropriately, because they fear negative consequences if his or her colleagues or superior find out about it.

Assignment

The goal of this use case is to develop an engaging game concept that reduces the privacy threat as a result of sending personal information to the wrong recipient, in a playful manner. One target group of such a game are employees in companies dealing with personal data in general.

Want to join the Unveil the Privacy Threat Game Jam on October 7, 2017 in Berlin? Register here for free.

The best game idea will be awarded by an expert jury with an exciting prize – a weekend trip to London for the whole winning team including a visit of The Crystal, the world’s largest museum on the future of (smart) cities – sponsored by Siemens. Furthermore, amongst all participants, we give away two one-year-memberships of Adobe Creative Cloud sponsored by Adobe.*

*without possibility of recourse to legal action

Text by Max von Grafenstein

[boosterspace-blog]

Register to win a 1-year-membership of Adobe’s Creative Cloud

Maybe you’ve heard about it: We’re hosting a Game Jam with a dedicated topic. Unveil the Privacy Threat covers data privacy and privacy by design. We’re still looking for participants. And we’re giving away a 1-year-membership for Adobe’s Creative Cloud. The whole package, including stock photos and all the useful tools for digital creatives. How?

We will draw the winner of the Adobe Creative Cloud membership among every sincere registration for the Game Jam Unveil the Privacy Threat.* 

What you have to do? Simply follow THIS LINK and fill out the registration form on the website of the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society (HIIG). 

The institute is our partner and came up with the idea of hosting this Game Jam in the first place. 

Find out more about the details of the package worth more than 1000 Euros HERE.  

Again we would like to thank Adobe for the uncomplicated provision of this generous price.   

*without possibility of recourse to legal action