As I write, I'm at work for Virtually Live in Eichenreid, Germany giving demos to people (mostly kids). I feel strongly that with VR you must don a headset to realize what it is.
The core idea I submitted for Oculus Launch Pad (here forth, OLP) was centered around powerpoint for VR. The effectiveness of immersive experiences for communicating future businesses/products*. I will not be pursuing the creation of such a tool yet, for reasons I'll touch on later.
Born out of this ambition to create a simple way of putting a presentation together in VR, my OLP project is called "Project Futures" a series of interactive experiences each one centered on a core idea, business, or product.
The first experience I am creating is centered around vertical, climate controlled farms. For now, I've rested on the name The Future of Farming for Gear VR.
This week I shot 360˚ video which I will loop for the setting in the background of the interactive grove containing vertical rows of shiso, chard, kale, basil, etc. Following Sarah Stumbo's awesome tutorial, I placed a shipping container shaped grove inside of this 360˚ video. I learned that the 360˚ video I shot was captured far too low to the ground and therefore it probably won't work and I need to reshoot. On a separate note, one of my obstacles with this project is designing user interactions with the crops (i.e. what will happen when a crop is selected?). One such answer is that a user may chop it, bite it, or so forth, and my ability to design models and permute models is beginner level. Further work included locking in a couple of mentors for the project, one works heavily with Houdini and can advise on workflow and the other is a talented 2D artist with a lot of helpful insight (worked on a hackathon project for Microsoft Hololens recently––which was based on Yu Gi Oh).
Coming back to the idea of a presentation experience creation tool, I thought two things. Chiefly, its scope is too large for a good proof of concept within the time constraints of OLP. Secondarily, it's probably not a very good fit into the defined categories currently hosted on the Oculus stores and the community is really looking for entertaining content right now. Therefore, I thought, well.... if I don't make the tool, then what would people maybe use this tool to create, to communicate, to share? Boiling things down, I realized a few tenets of virtual reality to highlight 1) is that one is cut off from the real world if settings are in accordance (i.e. no mobile phone notifications) and therefore undivided attention is made. 2) Immersion and presence can help us condense fact from the vapor of nuance. The nuance being all of the visual information you will automatically gather from looking around that you would otherwise not necessarily have with i.e. a textbook.
Therefore what I would make with such a tool is content that requires undivided attention and perhaps the communication of dense information. My world-view is that most people find it fun to learn.
* To further expound on drivers for such a tool as necessary. I want to claim that in any endeavor of learning about a subject, we first look for intrinsic motivation. We must first pique our interest and learning ensues automatically. A common alternative would be the powerpoint presentation which is linear in nature and defies its own exploration in any other way besides forward and backward. In an environment, one can walk/teleport around freely.
My blog: https://thelatentelement.com/
The core idea I submitted for Oculus Launch Pad (here forth, OLP) was centered around powerpoint for VR. The effectiveness of immersive experiences for communicating future businesses/products*. I will not be pursuing the creation of such a tool yet, for reasons I'll touch on later.
Born out of this ambition to create a simple way of putting a presentation together in VR, my OLP project is called "Project Futures" a series of interactive experiences each one centered on a core idea, business, or product.
The first experience I am creating is centered around vertical, climate controlled farms. For now, I've rested on the name The Future of Farming for Gear VR.
This week I shot 360˚ video which I will loop for the setting in the background of the interactive grove containing vertical rows of shiso, chard, kale, basil, etc. Following Sarah Stumbo's awesome tutorial, I placed a shipping container shaped grove inside of this 360˚ video. I learned that the 360˚ video I shot was captured far too low to the ground and therefore it probably won't work and I need to reshoot. On a separate note, one of my obstacles with this project is designing user interactions with the crops (i.e. what will happen when a crop is selected?). One such answer is that a user may chop it, bite it, or so forth, and my ability to design models and permute models is beginner level. Further work included locking in a couple of mentors for the project, one works heavily with Houdini and can advise on workflow and the other is a talented 2D artist with a lot of helpful insight (worked on a hackathon project for Microsoft Hololens recently––which was based on Yu Gi Oh).
Coming back to the idea of a presentation experience creation tool, I thought two things. Chiefly, its scope is too large for a good proof of concept within the time constraints of OLP. Secondarily, it's probably not a very good fit into the defined categories currently hosted on the Oculus stores and the community is really looking for entertaining content right now. Therefore, I thought, well.... if I don't make the tool, then what would people maybe use this tool to create, to communicate, to share? Boiling things down, I realized a few tenets of virtual reality to highlight 1) is that one is cut off from the real world if settings are in accordance (i.e. no mobile phone notifications) and therefore undivided attention is made. 2) Immersion and presence can help us condense fact from the vapor of nuance. The nuance being all of the visual information you will automatically gather from looking around that you would otherwise not necessarily have with i.e. a textbook.
Therefore what I would make with such a tool is content that requires undivided attention and perhaps the communication of dense information. My world-view is that most people find it fun to learn.
* To further expound on drivers for such a tool as necessary. I want to claim that in any endeavor of learning about a subject, we first look for intrinsic motivation. We must first pique our interest and learning ensues automatically. A common alternative would be the powerpoint presentation which is linear in nature and defies its own exploration in any other way besides forward and backward. In an environment, one can walk/teleport around freely.
My blog: https://thelatentelement.com/
Using remote profiling I see that my PostLateUpdate.FinishFrameRendering is very high.
I'm going to work on mesh renderers and change all lightmaps to static for alike materials to see if that makes a difference.
I'm going to work on mesh renderers and change all lightmaps to static for alike materials to see if that makes a difference.
Notes from OC4 Designing for Feeling - Robin Hunnicke
Philosophy of Exploration and Design
Robin opened with her concept of triple E content (a play on AAA, disambiguated below) and extolled the value of figuring out where you want to go first
- Elegant Expressive and Emotional content (EEE)
- She presented a 2x2 matrix with high impact, low cost as the quadrant where most content aims… the problem, she expressed, was that the matrix leaves out elegance as a focal point
Tips - Evolve concepts, tools, & solutions, to reduce cost & improve impact
- Evolve ux
- Expressive - Players Speak
Broad applicability of EEE
Axes include rational, eee, baroque, and scripted
- e.g. Sims, Black ops
- Test your concept like it isn’t yours
- Throw away ideas
- Find the feeling in your idea (lock in on it)
- This is your secret sauce
- Test the prototype like it isn’t yours
- the prototype is different than what is on paper
- the process is what helps
3. Repeat
Luna
Uncertainty is surpassed only by the effort that needs to go into it
For Luna she took inspiration for the design from a paper world feel, influenced by origami, and during the process she packed her mind with fairytales
Not everyone needs to get into hands-on design influences, but she
thought that making origami and the concepts and learning how the
tactile quality turned out were really informative I’ve definitely found with Project Futures: The Future of
Farming it’s really key to actually gain some influence from real world knowledge and folks that have built
constructs or structures that are going to lend to the look and feeling of the world space in the app. Namely
Infarm.
One important side note Robin dropped was that none of the characters in Luna have genders.
Other Random Notes
- Mood boards
- Luna started out as a PC and VR title from the beginning
- The demo and vision existed before the actual prototype (i.e. the hands
controlling the stars) - Tested prototype part 2 and threw it away
- Music is integrated into the testing process with feeling at the center, namely, “what kind of feeling is it communicating?”
Timeline
4 year process for Luna - started out as a drawing in a book
- They went through a massive phase where no VR was implemented, then in November 2016 it came to life in VR (7 person
team) - By 2017 the pieces are starting to become cohesive and informed by the feeling
Fail Forward was key, it takes a lot of work.
Have to lean into the idea of interesting different challenging titles
UPSHOT = Diverse and inclusive teams, failure is ok, and the belief that you’re
going to get there. Leads to the triple EEEs and successful titles.
Notes from OC4 Designing for Feeling - Robin Hunicke
Philosophy of Exploration and Design
Robin opened with her concept of triple E content (a play on AAA, disambiguated below) and extolled the value of figuring out where you want to go first
- Elegant Expressive and Emotional content (EEE)
- She presented a 2x2 matrix with high impact, low cost as the quadrant where most content aims… the problem, she expressed, was that the matrix leaves out elegance as a focal point
Tips - Evolve concepts, tools, & solutions, to reduce cost & improve impact
- Evolve ux
- Expressive - Players Speak
Process & the Broad Applicability of EEE
Axes in her slide graphic included rational, eee, baroque, and scripted (e.g. Sims, Black ops)- Test your concept like it isn’t your
- Throw away ideas
- Find the feeling in your idea (lock in on it)
- This is your secret sauce
- Test the prototype like it isn’t yours
- the prototype is different than what is on paper
- the process is what helps
- Repeat
Luna
Uncertainty is surpassed only by the effort that needs to go into it
For Luna she took inspiration for the design from a paper world feel, influenced by origami, and during the process she packed her mind with fairytales
Not everyone needs to get into hands-on design influences, but she
thought that making origami and the concepts and learning how the
tactile quality turned out were really informative I’ve definitely found with Project Futures: The Future of
Farming it’s really key to actually gain some influence from real world knowledge and folks that have built
constructs or structures that are going to lend to the look and feeling of the world space in the app. Namely
Infarm.
One important side note Robin dropped was that none of the characters in Luna have genders.
Other Random Notes
- Mood boards
- Luna started out as a PC and VR title from the beginning
- The demo and vision existed before the actual prototype (i.e. the hands
controlling the stars) - Tested prototype part 2 and threw it away
- Music is integrated into the testing process with feeling at the center, namely, “what kind of feeling is it communicating?”
Timeline
4 year process for Luna - started out as a drawing in a book
- They went through a massive phase where no VR was implemented, then in November 2016 it came to life in VR (7 person
team) - By 2017 the pieces are starting to become cohesive and informed by the feeling
Fail Forward was key, it takes a lot of work.
Have to lean into the idea of interesting different challenging titles
UPSHOT = Diverse and inclusive teams, failure is ok, and the belief that you’re
going to get there. Leads to the triple EEEs and successful titles.
