Tag Archives: VR

A look back at IDFA DocLab R&D Summit 2024

There was an irony at the core of IDFA’s DocLab programme this year. Distribution, which has long been a topic of conversation in the community, was front and center at its day-long DocLab R&D Summit. A difficult discussion for any art form, but as technologies are rapidly changing – both in the software used to create and produce, and the hardware to watch an exhibit – the issue at hand for XR is even more challenging.

DocLab is always experimenting with form (and function) – pushing the boundaries of new media, XR and live performance – so it’s not surprising that the work exhibited reflects creativity and experimentation and ranged from singular to collective experiences. While there was a lot of AI – and technology-influenced work, there were also in-person encounters, architectural installations and many multi-formed pieces. There were less VR-headset based works in the curatorial programme, or being pitched in the DocLab Forum. Which was ironic to me in reflection of the distribution challenges the industry faces. 

But DocLab’s curation gave us opportunities to embrace and ponder those questions.

continue…

originally published on XR Must

Audio is no longer an afterthought

Spatial Sound panel, moderated by Dr. Markus Zaunschirm, with Anan Fries, Shervin Saremi and Oliver Kadel, Photo: Susann Bargas Gomez

In 1989, speaking of virtual reality, Jonathan Carey wrote that “spectacular power cannot be reduced to an optical model but is inseparable from a larger organization of perceptual consumption…The full coincidence of sound with image, of voice with figure, not only was a crucial new way of organizing space, time and narrative, but it instituted a more commanding authority over the observer, enforcing a new kind of attention.

In the last decades, the visual often dominates the conversations around virtual reality, but other senses play a big role in emplacing the experiencer. John Berger might have pushed the ways of seeing, but unconsciously we also we see with our ears.

In XR experiences, we are trying to get as close to putting people in a specific place or situation as possibleThis means either directly recording a scenario/location, or layers the recordings to rebuild a soundscape that reflects “what we hear”. With the emergence of spatial sound recording and other technologies, we now have the ability to capture reality’s sound more closely and to compose soundscapes that are richer, deeper and more complex. In virtual reality and immersive installations, this more advanced audio experience is what can truly make someone feel connected.

Audio is no longer an afterthought, but something to be built into all stages of development and production, and this year’s DOK Exchange XR conference put spatial audio front and center. Here’s a chat with coordinator Weronika Lewandowska about the inspiration, and a reflection on some of the discussions.

continue…

originally published on XR Must

Reality is not a simulation – IDFA DocLab 2024

The DocLab section of the IDFA is a key event for digital creation, in the broadest sense of the term, and returns this year with a new program of excellence, and a professional Forum showcasing future projects in the sector. Caspar Sonnen, programmer since 2007, talks to us about this essential event.

Karen Cirillo – So let’s start with the theme: This Is Not a Simulation.

Caspar Sonnen – DocLab is turning 18 this year, which is a reality check and a great provocation to look around and explore the relationship between art and technology. Technology has allowed us to create unbelievable and truly personalized versions of reality. But having digital access to everything everywhere at once has taken reality out of context, obscuring our perceptions and making it harder to connect with things that we don’t want to see.

Over the years new media, AI and VR have enabled us to step into astonishing new worlds, so much so that some people seriously believe reality might actually be a simulation itself. Something to play with, disrupt and walk away from if we don’t like it anymore.  

But for everyone else, reality is not a game, It is not something we can walk away from. Reality is a shared experience, and in many ways, it is that collective experience of reality that feels increasingly broken.

continue…

originally published on XR Must

A look into Alternate Realities: Sheffield Docfest 2024

Perinatal Dreaming. Understanding Country, by Marianne Wobcke / Big Anxiety Research Centre, Volker Kuchelmeister, Lucia Barrera


The Alternate Realities programme at this year’s just-concluded Sheffield DocFest is pared back, featuring a VR competition, an exhibition and summit in collaboration with the International Documentary Association (IDA). I spoke with Artistic Director Raul Niño Zambrano and co-curators Abby Sun and Keisha Knight about the vision and thoughts behind this year’s immersive experience and its spirit of collaboration.

Raul Niño Zambrano – With Alternate Realities, it has always been a thing asking how do we define it and what do we want? For us, it’s important to see it as an extension. Just as we do for films, we are not looking for one specific type or style. Our responsibility is to show the whole spectrum. We pick up what we think is really worth highlighting. And I think that’s happening also in the XR field, their possibilities are endless. You see how an installation starts as virtual reality, but then becomes an installation, or the other way around. We’re looking at the intersection of art, technology and documentary, and trying to give a message – What are all these pieces saying all together?

For this year’s Alternate Realities programme, you are collaborating with IDA and the programme is co-curated by Keisha Knight and Abby Sun.

Raul – Yes, everything started because of Experimental Realities, a workshop they did in the USA asking a group of emerging artists about the future of immersive. When we talked, we thought it resonated a lot and was a good match.

One of the big questions was how do we see immersive media in the future? What does immersive really mean? Of course it has to do with technology and media, but what happened when we tried to distance a bit from that, we found that you come more to embodiment and to the senses and to haptic. I also felt that that was resonating with our film program; our tagline this year is Reflections on Realities.

continue…

originally published on XR Must

Back from IDFA DocLab: 30 pieces of Phenomenal Friction

Phenomenal friction. When the New Media team at IDFA came up with this title, they knew it would reflect a recognition of tensions around the world, but the team had no idea that it would land in the midst of a war and public outcries that stirred up the festival, leading to several filmmakers – including immersive makers – pulling their work from showcase.

Phenomenal friction, as described by Caspar Sonnen, head of New Media, reflects a landscape where emerging technologies are changing how we see the world around us, but also one where we are still encountering and challenging each other’s identities and mindsets in the physical space.

This year’s DocLab and immersive exhibition brought together over 30 pieces from the most diverse set of artists and makers thus far, allowing the audience to encounter worlds not just different from their own, but also created by those living in the other worlds.

continue…

originally published on XR Must

In the midst of advanced old-school technologies, old-school tech interactives can still pack a punch

An AI-generated trans drag show, a dystopian game about digital “security” and an almost pornographic immersive VR piece about gay saunas in Taiwan. These were some of the pieces at the recent CPH:DOX interactive program, where vulnerability and marginalized narratives emerged as a theme.

There were experiments with the latest technologies, like using Minecraft to catalog and release invisible archives from behind the walls of authoritative regimes. But three of the narrative pieces that had the most power to channel vulnerability and bring the viewer in a “dialogue” with other voices were actually the pieces leaning more old-school in their technologies.

HE FUCKED THE GIRL OUT OF ME, Blacktransarchive.com/WE ARE HERE BECAUSE OF THOSE THAT ARE NOT and AS MINE EXACTLY were three pieces that use older technologies and in-the-room interactivity to engage on one-on-one levels.

Old can be just as good…

continue…

originally published on XR Must

Virtual reality brought me into the world of a strong Roma woman

What did I know about Roma? Like many people, my assumptions came from films. Beautiful ones, like the documentaries Toto and his Sisters and Spartacus and Cassandra. Both films take you into a world of Roma through adolescents and those trying to help them move out of their stifling situation. These stories show Roma as poor and “gypsies”, who live among drug use and petty crime or wear colorful clothes and perform in circuses.

When we started to think about making a virtual reality film about Roma, it was with the idea to transcend these clichés. Roma face tremendous discrimination across Europe. Could we make people feel a connection to Roma, to transcend their perceptions and engage on a personal level? And without resorting to stereotypes?

continue…

…originally published for UNDP Eurasia