Industry

Get two in depth perspectives from two of WA's expert academics working in the areas of XR as to the enormous potential of the medium in creative & business and business terms and the role of academiaTalk 1: How Can Academics & Commercial Content Creators Benefit Each Other in in the Exciting Field of Immersive Media?It is an exciting time to be working in any and all forms of immersive media. Content creators are repeatedly told that the rules of screen communication are being rewritten or superseded, and that new storytelling techniques will need to be developed. Rigorously and systematically testing these claims is the purview of academia.At the outset of the exhilarating period of opportunity and potential in immersive media, it is important to ask: how can content creators benefit from academic research? And at the same time: how can creators provide benefit to academics interested in understanding how the medium works?This presentation will explore recent case studies in academic research into the limits and affordances of VR and will summarise how academics and industry can mutually benefit each other’s agenda, with an emphasis on improving the consumer experience of immersive media content. This will include a discussion of how we untangled common myths about audience attention and how to direct viewer gaze in Cinematic VR. I will also explore the findings from an experimental test in which we measured the excitement and fear responses of participants in a VR zombie shooting experience.Talk 2: Writing, development and project conceptualisation for short narrative cinematic virtual reality (CVR).Storytelling with Cinematic Virtual Reality (CVR) involves a medium-specific, user-focused, engagement with time and place. Unlike the passive viewer of classical narrative media (film or television), the CVR viewer is ‘present’ as an active agent who is involved in the unfolding drama as an observer or protagonist. This presents a number of challenges and opportunities for the creators of CVR, when considering user progression through an immersive narrative.This presentation unpacks and explores the notion of writing, development and project conceptualisation for CVR. While the form gathers steam as an increasingly popular storytelling medium for both makers and viewers, approaches to writing and production are diverse and lacking in convention. With reference to a number of recent projects, Kath Dooley will explore the way that makers are approaching the creation of their CVR work.