Oscar Raby playing with a Magic Leap & other Electric Dreams Festival Highlights

By Rachael Thompson

PHOTO: Oscar Raby playing a WETA game on the Magic Leap
 

I also had a go on this  spatial computing game from the WETA Games Workshop. It was like AR - there were 3D animated characters coming out of the walls and ceilings and you had to shoot them with a laser gun (that one of the characters handed to you in the game). I successfully stopped the alien invasion!

Apparently the next game the WETA Games Workshop are making on Magic Leap is multiplayer. I had a look at a preview - pretty cool!!

Also soon the objects in the room in which you are playing a Magic Leap game will be able to be recognised by the device - so rather than using simple geometiric occlusion, a table will be recognised as a table and a couch will be recognised as a couch - leading to exciting narrative possibilities in this medium.

Likewise, the new HTC Vive Cosmo XR will be able to do this, which was announced at the festival by the 'Product and Ecosystem' manager.

He said the Cosmos XR and Project Proton will 'operate between the real world and virtual world seamlessly. Featuring 'high definition pass-through cameras, developers can allow virtual objects to interact with the real-world environment'.

Exiting times!

Other highlights were:

Vassiliki Khonsara from iNK Stories talking about their incredible work including '1979 Revolution, Black Friday', 'Blindfold', 'Hero' (a verite VR experience) and 'Fire Esacpe' (which I saw in the VR cinema space).

Francesca Panetta, Creative Director in the MIT Centre for Advanced Virtuality - talking about various projects including the deepfake project 'In the Event of Moon Disaster' and 'Songbird'.

'Yabarra: Dreaming in Light' experience/installation - where 'ancient oral tradional storytelling and immersive technologies can come together in a respectful way to share and connect with contemporary audiences accross the generations'.

Fead Volhuer from Atlas V, Paris - talking about Spheres, Gloomy Eyes and Battlescar and their approach of identifying and fostering artists who are innovating the art and form of storytelling.

Barnaby  Steel from Marshmallow Laser Feast talking about their amazing 'scientific hallucination' projects.

Mads Damsbo from MAKROPOL showing and telling his Nordic Noir projects and some amazing new AI video editing software.

Sarah Ellis from the Royal Shakespeare Company sharing insights into integrating technology and live performance.

And more and more. It really was a brilliant experience, full of open and inspirational people, all coming together to share insights into innovating in new immersive mediums.

Here's a list of the speakers. I highly recommend going next year if it's on and you can afford it!