There's something peculiar about watching everything around you - even yourself - in real time, 360 degree virtual reality image-stitching. There are the classmates (weirdly distorted), there's me (does the back of my head really look like that??), and there's the rest of the VR film festival - all through a lens that is reminiscent of glitch-art. It's reminded me of that prank where, when someone goes on vacation, you move everything in their house 5 inches to the left so that when they return everything is slightly off. I could reach out and try to touch something, but where my hand met what I was looking for in VR, I only met empty space. I could call out to a friend in the space that I saw them in, but their voice came to me in a different direction. On the other hand, Ken Perlin's wireless VR was fairly accurate in object tracking. I was only a few inches off from being able to touch Jason's arm when we put the headsets and trackers on. It's incredible that Ken's studio is the only one to have figured out wireless VR.
The second film I watched was a bear video that came from a wide selection of nature videos (I believe it was called Condition One?). As someone who has a deep love and appreciation for bears and their ridiculous and majestic movements, I thought this video was perfect. The scene changed a few times, but the video followed a brown bear walking through a woodsy area. I may or may not have been crying because I just love bears so much.
The third film I saw was Colosse - an incredible 5-minute animated experience in a universe of fantastical giant creatures and the people who lived among them. The colors and movement of the film were incredibly beautiful. Colosse reminded me of the Disney movie "Atlantis: The Lost Empire" and the Jak and Daxter video game franchise from Naughty Dog all at once.
Strangely enough, when I think back on the whole experience, I am reminded of that Disney Channel Original Movie "Smart House." The premise is that it's basically a house from the future, and there are a few scenes where the house turns one of the walls into what is essentially a virtual reality screen. The occupants of the house felt that they were in the scenes that they saw - they could smell the ocean and feel the spray of water on their faces. They felt real fear when they thought an animal was charging at them. In that movie, the VR screen was truly reality. That movie was made in 1999, and the technology they created for that movie was considered groundbreaking and futuristic. Today, we're not far off from that reality. When we visited Ken's lab, we talked about bringing all of the senses into a VR experience - candles? Fans to simulate wind? As cheesy and obvious as it sounds, there are just so many possibilities.