Week 6 : Oculus Launch Pad 2018 - Due Aug 13 @ 11am PST

[Anonymous]

Looking forward to seeing those updates! 

[ung]

I’ve been working through what feels like a more natural interaction with text in VR. I’ve been unsure if it should be in the form of aiming with the controller and pulling the trigger button, selection through gaze, or “grasping” and manipulation with the trigger button. Each of these have appeared in different games and experiences to some capacity, whether in menu selection (like Space Pirate Trainer) or editing mode (like in Quill VR).

While trying to think of real world interactions, I found myself playing around with those magnetic poetry kits. This interaction doesn’t quite translate the way I would like for this project, but has so far been the closest real world interaction I can think of that is tangible and relates in some way.

[MarlonCreative]

Marlon Fuentes 
OLP18: Week 6
Project Title: Tropical Reality 
Type: VR Experience 
Genre: Comedy/Adventure 

Our team has been hard at work using ProBuilder to create the Mexico City Metro station that opens the experience for our user. Shout out to our VRTK warrior, @"francis.chen.585" for really trudging through the documentation and helping us define some of the technical constraints we must embrace in order to get to our prototype. Is anyone else using VRTK? Would love to hear your experience. We are looking to create a minimum viable experience using the skills we currently have. Our story is taking some great turns and our imagination is really vivid as we mix latin american short story forms, folklore, relatable moments and identity beats (The BuzzFeed in me! lmao). 

Here's a peek at our completed Tlaculolokos 360 video. 

This week!

• Complete budget for mid-point check-in
• Finish building our opening scene 
• Script for Alebrije
• Musical selections

[meredithwilson]

Dev Blog 6
Working title: Retreat

We're starting to build out the environment for our game using Gaia!
It has a setting that optimizes the terrain for VR and I'm really excited to see how it turns out. We're aiming for alien world red wood forrest but we'll see what our concept artist/environmental artist (Mike Fowler) comes up with. I'm open to surprises :-:smile:
This week I have a lot on my plate namely: finalize movement and weapons mechanics (eep), and start implementing AI. It's a lot but with a little luck I'll get most of it done by Saturday. 

We're also starting to texture our character models. I don't have pics to show you this time but the clothing our concept artists and modelers (Mike Fowler and Robert Bowen) have come up with look amazing! 


I've got to get back to it, so until next time!

[ladykillmonger]

Experience Name: facadeVR
Team: Jasmine Roberts, Katherine Mimnaugh, Kanu Jason Kanu
Platform: Oculus Go (and Santa Cruz)

We purchased the domain for facadevr.com (the website is still under construction) 

All three of us are in different areas of the country and adjusting to our new lives, jobs, academic programs. Time is extremely precious and for the next 4 weeks we need to allocate time more appropriately to getting everything completed by the deadline.

Additionally, since this is ultimately a socialVR experience we need to set up time for people in the community to user test.

One of the benefits of my work is that I have early access to certain technologies. On Wednesday, I previewed the dynamics of the Oculus Santa Cruz. Although the Go is the target platform for submission, in early September I will make the app 6 DoF compatible. 

The scenes have been textured and optimized for mobile. The Proton multiplayer integration has also been implemented. Now the simple game mechanics need to be tested. (I will say that the limited interaction with the 3DoF controller makes the game mechanic development less of a pain point) 

A lot of our rationalization is in the MidPoint Check-In Doc. I will post pictures later in response to this post. 

Goals for this upcoming week:

Finish website
Set up user testing 

Best,
Jasmine

[azra_isakovic]

Hi! 

This past week was super busy in preparation for Midpoint Check in along with everything else. 

I met with Nir and we worked on the document. I am super excited for my own project and #Murder and feel really grateful for Nir to be on my team. 

For my project (which is yet to have an official title as I go back between Potluck and Dinner with Immigrants) I was working on creating more community partnerships (Across our Kitchen Tables, League of Kitchens) for subjects to interview and the activation stage down the line with potential community oriented VR pop ups. So far I have a couple of interviews lined up but I need to keep searching. What Nathalie said about finding charismatic subjects is so true. One of the interviews coming up is with the inventor of Tuna Tartar, a Japanese immigrant. I have also been working on solving the narrative problem. Since each vignette begins with us sitting at the dinner table across the immigrant, I wasn't sure how to incorporate the teleportation segments into their country of origin or flashbacks. Is it part of the linear narrative or are there gazing points within the room. Like pictures on the wall of their home country that then teleport you into a 360 view of where they are from. I am still working on the specifics and will reach out to Nathalie to speak with her more about that actually. 

In addition, the Bosnian short film I produced wrapped shooting and I was able to bring the 360 ProFusion on set to shoot some scenes, stage set ups and interviews with a Bosnian immigrant. It allowed me to play with the camera and angles. I will be editing the footage to create a mini experience that leads from the interview to the "flashbacks" and "home country" 360 views and really see what works best for my own project. 

Hope everyone's week is lovely!

-Azra

[PlumCantaloupe]

This week has been a period of reflection and project clarity. This week our team has accomplished the following:

• further refinement of the “fire hub world” so that there are fewer artificial boundaries. “Invisible walls” are not fun in games and are also not fun in VR.


• The front-end team has started refining the front-end administration side with better development tools/libraries such as PUG templating and SASS styling.


• The back-end team has created a janus service on our AWS server so that we do not have start/restart the Janus WebRTC server whenever our terminal windows close.


• The story team has been working on documenting the areas pertaining to their story by writing it out, and capturing photos and sketches of the locations we are going to recreate in VR.


• Have further fleshed out our “project/business plan” for the mid-point checkin and feedback Oculus offers for the Launchpad program. 


• I have spent some time in nature this week with my family bouncing ideas on the project to non-technical family members and getting some interesting feedback. They have also tried the OculusGO and it has been interesting to gauge their reactions to it. Being in nature has also allowed me to further reflect on socialVR and our take on it from a “socio-environmental connectivism” foundations.

[jordan_jonesbre]

There was some great progress this week. After switching gears toward a different project, the team has come up with some of the environments for the levels in the experience. The levels are based off of safe spaces gathered from interviews, ranging from photo realistic to surrealistic.





Otherwise, until this point most of the work went into the ideation and creative phases, but with the Midpoint Check in imminent, The other efforts were put into planning out the development and getting a financial plan started.

[JamesRL]

Oculus Launch Pad 2018 - Week #6 Update
Project Title:  Smoke & Mirrors VR
Project Contact:  Founder@ImmersiveMarketVR.com 

Hello all, some exciting updates for Smoke & Mirrors VR this last week.
1.  We have fixed multiple bugs in our VR program.
2.  Added our first animation/magic with sparks coming out of a wand (working on the effect and UX now).
3.  Added a magic 8 ball, ask it a question give it a little shake and get your answer! 
4.  Added card and knife throwing practice, working on smoothness in animation
5.  Added voice over instructions, magic video you can play in the back stage room, adding elevator to switch between back stage magicians room and other 3 magicians stages from different time periods.
6.  Magician tricks being developed with animations.

7.  In talks Ron Ishimaru current President of S.A.M. with and potentially partnering with "The Society of American Magicians" to get their support/endorsement for "Smoke & Mirrors VR" - Past members/presidents include Harry Houdini, Harry Blackstone, Jr., Siegfried & Roy, Lance Burton and David Copperfield.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad93XvoxtjI&t=44s 
8.  Also in Talks with and potentially partnering with "Magicians without borders" to get their endorsement and connect players with them through our VR magic program "Smoke & Mirrors VR".  We will also be donating 5% of all proceeds to "Magicians without borders".
https://youtu.be/WUQ7wIFVDZA
9. I have been member of the Society of American Magicians for some time now, but I can proudly announce that I have also been accepted as a member of "FISM" The International Federation of Magic Societies (Federation Internationale des Societes Magiques).

10.  Creating our website for "Smoke & Mirrors VR"!
Exciting times indeed!  

[thatmiddlechild]

So a lot of changes this week. In reviewing the project again, I realized I needed to incorporate some more interactivity. The interactivity adds a whole new dimension to the project, but after long sessiions of ideation and tons of sound boards, I came to a solid idea. I then vetted another creative to help design that aspect of the project. All in all, I need someone who is more comprehensive in Unity than I am. I am now in the search for that magical individual to be the glue for all of these components. Looking forward to shooting in a 2 weeks and putting this pilot together.

[drue_kataoka]

This week has been focused on working on progressing on my
prototype, and writing up the mid-point checkin, timeline and budget proposal.   I feel the experience I am building fills a
real need and is unique, so I’d like to bring the v1 into the world as soon as
possible.  This week I’ve reflected on
what the fullest version of this experience would be and how to launch it this
year.  Since the format of the mid-point
check-in is very detailed, I am going to keep this blog post short so as not to
be redundant.  And I’d like to turn my
attention back to the final details on the midpoint checkin today.

Time is of the essence and organization is key.  I’ll also be preparing to do a short trip to
Oslo to give a talk about art and VR -- and to the Arctic on a boat with 100 leaders where I’ll represent art
and VR.   A great gathering of futurists, entrepreneurs and creators.    Trying to figure out how I can post my blog
post that week from the boat as connectivity will be an issue.

This week a lot of progress was made on the different
environments that users will experience in the several modes of the product.   Turning back to midpoint checkin.  See you next week!