The new episode around the murder of Mrs. Armova’s has become the most incredible VR experience involving several users.

The content development for this second pilot takes into account the introduction of pictures in real time, live content and the participation of several users.

The process of content creation is one of the most wonderful tasks within the audiovisual field. This task is even better when we can enjoy new technologies to produce our work.

In this post we share all the details of the shooting, hoping that this will leave all the audience wanting to experience our VR multi-user experience and to discover the killer of Elena Armova!

This is how the content of our second episode was created

A year ago, we published on this website the shooting process of the first pilot of the VR-Together project. Beyond all the technological implications and capabilities, we do also want to transmit and to present to the audience a dramatic and award-worthy story to complement the scientific development done in the previous months and also shared within this website. In the last months, we have been sharing a variety of news regarding all of the achievements regarding the project, such as the positive feedback received at the IBC 2018, the winning demo presented at the MMM2019, and the (also) award received at NEM2019, just to name a few events. During the second year of the project we aim for keep achieving these victories, that’s the reason why we are constantly preparing and developing an interactive story, in which users can enjoy a new and avant-garde experience.

At the end of the first pilot, users needed to share knowledge and opinions about the mystery around Mrs. Armova’s death: who was the murdered? Did Zellar have something to do with her death? Was Christine Gerard trying to defend Mrs. Armova for something she did in the past?

The second experience regarding this story takes place days after the murder, and the police department is still investigating the crime. The experience shared between users will be the same for everybody, and all them will be part of the audience of a popular news TV show. In this TV show, the host will introduce the story of the murder to the public. He will also connect to the crime scene, where a reporter is covering the case. The reporter will try to get all the recent news about the case by talking to a police officer. The whole idea about solving the case is the use of a new software invention regarding artificial intelligence. This technological discover will allow police to represent potential situations, getting all video footage of the people involved in a case, or even be able to talk to the murdered person. Each user is not only receiving information within the TV show, but they can also ask the commanding officer. It seems, as well, that in future episodes they will be able to use, always under police supervision, this new technology!

The second pilot has been a new challenge in production, in terms of preparing filming and during the development of the content, the script, etc. We faced a complex structure, having to shoot with a 180 stereoscopic camera and wanting to avoid using multiple cameras.

We had to shoot a first part on set with chroma to be able to introduce the CGI scenario in post production. This part corresponds to the TV show which the users are, directed by a charismatic, smart and great showman. Through this character, the presenter (which was filmed and also recorded live) the narration of the second pilot and the interaction of the different users are articulated. A second part of the shooting includes the content that is happening outside Ms Armova’s apartment. This content enters our narration, as if it were a live story. Large screens on the TV show collect these images that nourish the story that users are living as new information.

The development of the script is a great job done by Kathryn Gould, who worked for weeks with Ignacio Lacosta and Ana Revilla, until a dynamic and intense story was achieved, reaching all the purposes that the content should have to successfully demonstrate the technological advances of this second project year.

Silence... rolling… and... action!

Two days were scheduled to shoot this part of the story: May 25th and June 23rd. On the first day, the shooting was divided into two locations to represent different parts of the plot. The morning was used to shoot the interior footage (every scene regarding the TV show from the inside). To represent the live coverage, it was decided to shoot from 7PM, since the position of the Sun was ideal to recreate a British exterior. The second day was reserved to recreate the exterior shooting, since a change on the actor crew was mandatory because of schedule issues.

Once the shooting was done, the post-production team started with the recreation process of the scene. The structure wanted for the TV set is oval-ish, where the TV host is located at the center of the stage. The audience is located around the host, recreating similar scenarios as the ones we normally see at TV nowadays (i.e., Who’s Still Standing? in the US, ¡Ahora Caigo! in Spain, Caduta libera in Italy, etc.). The following picture represent a first version of the scenario. The host (on the left, with the green background chroma) and a technology expert (on the right, with the yellow background chroma). Both of the actors talk directly to the audience who is standing in front of them.

We expect to finish soon the post-production process and to share with all of you the latests news about this second pilot!  Remember that if you want to keep up with updates about the project on social media, you can follow the hashtag #VRTogether_EU on every social website and the @VRTogether_EU official Twitter profile.

This project has been funded by the European Commission as part of the H2020 program, under the grant agreement 762111.

The post The big show <br><h5>Second pilot shooting in Madrid</h5> appeared first on VRTogether.

Virtual reality has, indeed, a great number of technological applications. However, technology not the only field where VR has a successful background. In the last years, virtual reality has been, not only a complement, but a great tool to create, experience and enjoy art. Artists have discovered a new way to express themselves (and to amplify the message sent with their creations) through technology and the development of augmented and virtual reality. Visual post-production is, usually, related only to movies and TV-shows, where art and virtual reality also collide.

Nonetheless, it is also a field related to the artistic expressions, as it can be seen in diverse and different projects created in the last few years. Art festivals have allowed content creators and artists to express their vision and share their creations. Virtual reality is already a trend, and the audience is willing to enjoy art on a different level. Entropy Studio has participated in the largest and most important festivals and artistic experiences, sharing and showing brand new virtual reality concepts, wowing the audience and surprising professionals as well.

The great promise of virtual reality consist of an experience that makes the audience feel like they are in a place where they are not and there is a plot in development in which they can participate and navigate freely within it, as well as to openly interact with any element that is located in that virtual world. One of our goals in our Xr Lab is to radically improve the experience through the dynamic reconfiguration of the physical environment, demonstrating a significant improvement in the feeling of immersion and offering experiences of greater quality in its contents. A revolution in immersive content is coming and is shaping a new form of telling stories and creating a totally new way to experience hyper realistic CGI in the representation in real time. The quality of the immersive content depends on the creation of CGI elements that match or overcome the visual component. In a virtual reality experience, the mandate for the real content and CGI is to create a panorama that makes the viewer feel that the experience is real.

Because of the International Museum Day, Entropy Studio and its XR Lab developed an immersive virtual reality experience pioneering and unique up to now. Art and technology were mixed together in the halls of Thyssen Bornemisza Museum, creating an unique experience, thanks to the sponsorship of Endesa and the collaboration of HP and the Innovation Lab of the IED Madrid, on May 18th, 19th and 20th, 2018. The idea of ​​consolidating this union between technology and art, led the Thyssen Bornemisza Museum and Endesa to program, during two years, a program of VR exhibitions traveling, as well, around Spain (during the following years 2019-2020). HP collaborates in this tour as well, sending this exceptional experience to Denver, Colorado (USA). For this experience, we looked for a strong team of professionals. The piece was directed by Ignacio Lacosta, under the executive production of Ana Revilla. Both of them created the general experience, the script and the design. A great team of graphic designers and 3D experts worked during several weeks in the realization of the CGI and the textures of each element that integrates each of the tables of experience. Hours of dedication and work have made this piece of Virtual Reality, a milestone within the immersive experiences for museums, not only for the incredible technical quality but for the uniqueness of the same. The XrLab by Entropy Studio develops specialized tools and software & hardware techniques. This allows us to understand the potential of the content in 3D, as well as the virtual reality cinema and the surrounding content. The possibilities are endless and the results will define the traditional ways of narrative writing. “Entrar en el cuadro” started the path of milestones and technological progress.

More than 3,000 people were able to enter several paintings of the permanent collection, visiting in first person a three-dimensional space. Thanks to immersion goggles, they were able to walk the meadows of Auvers painted by Van Gogh, the streets of New York that inspired Mondrian, New York City 03, or submerge among the flowers and insects of a Dutch still life, a marvelous painting from Balthasar van der Ast. You can watch part of these experience clicking on the following video:

This project has been funded by the European Commission as part of the H2020 program, under the grant agreement 762111.

The post Virtual reality and art: a world of possibilities appeared first on VRTogether.

Virtual reality is not anymore a fantasy or a sci-fi type of entertainment. Since the last years, numerous festivals have been recognizing virtual reality as a independent category in terms of awards and recognition, making it an art by itself. Today we are going to take a look at some festivals that have recognize virtual reality as one of their main categories.

1. Sundance Film Festival: program of the Sundance Institute. It is considered one of the largest independent film festival not only in the United States, but also in the whole world. Hosted in Park City (Utah, USA), it has become the new homeplace for independent filmmakers. Sundance Film Festival rewards 11 different programs, supporting the independent point of view in all of them (i.e., Creative Distribution Initiative, Film Music, Native Program…). There is an special category named New Frontier that “has provided the highest level of curation in the emerging field, incorporating fiction, non-fiction and hybrid projects to showcase emerging media storytelling, multimedia installations, performances and films”. This category is one of the most innovative ones of the festival and tries to engage new audiences with different narrative worlds created with new technologies, designs, visual aesthetics, etc. It has become a category for the unconventional and avantgarde art creations, and in the last years it has transformed the way that stories are being told. Numerous virtual reality pieces have been awarded or given a special mention within this category, as Hue (2016, http://www.sundance.org/blogs/artist-spotlight/a-vr-project-thats-all-about-getting-out-of-the-dumps), or IF NOT LOVE (2017, http://www.sundance.org/blogs/artist-spotlight/could-a-simple-act-of-love-change-the-course-of-violence). For more information about the Sundance Film Festival, click the following URL: http://www.sundance.org/festivals/sundance-film-festival
2. South by Southwest SxSW: The Sxsw festival is an annual conglomerate of diverse media projects (films, music festivals, conferences…) that take place in Austin, Texas. The festival is not only dedicated to the film industry, since it can be divided into three main categories: music, film and interactivity. The festival also holds several conferences with a variety of topics, such as Blockchain, MedTech or even Sports. Music creators can also be part of the festival, not only with their music, but also with the artistic constructs created around it (i.e., performances, shows or even videoclips). In terms of film storytelling, there are two categories that award virtual reality. The first one is the Film Festival Virtual Cinema, that “showcases outstanding VR cinema projects by talented international producers and lets SXSW attendees experience them”. The second one, is the Interactive Innovation Awards (specifically the VR, AR & MR category). This category recognizes “the most exciting tech developments in the connected world”. Penrose Studios (http://www.penrosestudios.com/) won last year award thanks to their storytelling transmission through social collaboration. For more information about the South by Southwest film festival, click the following URL: https://www.sxsw.com/
3. Tribeca Film Festival: The TFF exhibits different immersive projects, encouraging the use of new forms and media and highlighting innovation across categories and platforms (e.g., 360 films, multimedia installations, cross-platform firms, etc.). THe “Tribeca Immersive” category sums up not only great and diverse virtual reality pieces (i.e., the next TFF festival will showcase the documentary film Into The Now, https://www.tribecafilm.com/filmguide/into-the-now-2018, or even the interactive fim, https://www.tribecafilm.com/filmguide/meeting-a-monster-2018), but a plethora of different talks to discuss and disseminate news and goals for what is coming in the virtual reality world (i.e., The Future Of Film, Education and Advocacy in VR supported by IBM, or the Master class in VR by Jaron Lanier, pioneer in VR). The category itself presents artistic pieces into two categories: Virtual Arcade (for mobile and tethered VR projects) and Cinema360 (for mobile VR projects). For more information about the Tribeca Film Festival, click the following URL: https://www.tribecafilm.com/festival
4. Cannes Film Festival. The CFF is considered one of the most important events in the artistic and cinematographic industries. Held in Cannes, France, it has never hold a virtual reality category until the this year, when it was decided to include an extra category for this type of project and artistic pieces. The CFF is also one of the most publicized events of the world, and probably one of the most important film festivals “in terms of worldwide impact”. Among the usual categories (i.e., Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director…), there are also some special recognitions, most of them given by independent entities. NEXT (http://www.marchedufilm.com/en/next/home), the name of the category given to the virtual reality ceremony, is considered “the hub for creative business and visionary thinking”. For 6 days, this special category showcase dozens of artistic visual pieces and allow users to live and experiment the experience of virtual reality. For more information about the Cannes Film Festival, click the following URL: https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/
5. La Biennale di Venezia. La Biennale di Venezia is one of the largest and prestigious festivals in the world. It brings together music, cinema, theatre, dance and even architecture. Following the past editions in 2017 and 2018, which was the first-ever competition for Virtual Reality films in an international film festival, the competition titled Venice Virtual Reality returns to the Venice International Film Festival as what has already come to be known as the “VR Island”. In addition to the films from the Competition, VR projects from the Biennale College and Best Of sections, 15 VR projects seeking their financing will also be presented as part of the Venice Production Bridge. For more information about the La Biennale di Venezia, click the following URL: https://www.labiennale.org/en
6. Raindance Film Festival: Another independent film festival, but this one operates throughout different cities: New York, LA, London, Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Brussels, Berlin and Budapest. The festival showcases different artistic and visual pieces from filmmakers to a distinct group of viewers: journalists, buyers, art lovers and other filmmakers. Among the classical categories of a festival (e.g., narrative, documentary, short film, animation…), the Raindance Film Festival also rewards Virtual and Augmented Reality Experiences, looking for new audiovisual innovation and evolving each year the awards categories “to reflect the latest advancements” in the audiovisual market. Some of the immersive categories for the 2018 contest were: Best Interactive Narrative Experience, Best Animation Experience, Best Multi-Person Experience or Best Immersive Story, among others. For more information about the Raindance Film Festival and its different categories, click the following URL: https://www.raindance.org/

Remember that if you want to keep up with updates about the project on social media, you can follow the hashtag #VRTogether_EU on every social website and the @VRTogether_EU official Twitter profile.

Who we are

Entropy Studio is a post-production company recognized within the advertising and film community. Since its constitution in 2003, Entropy Studio has made some of the most award-winning spots, films and VR experiences in Spain, also achieving International awards.

More than fifteen years of quality and innovation have established Entropy Studio as a recognised Studio for visual effects, design, animation, VFX, mattepaint, steresoscopy, motion graphics creation and in general all services related to postproduction and visual effects for both film and advertising.

In 2008, the first feature made entirely in Digital Cinema, “Magic Journey to Africa”, takes Entropy Studio at the forefront of stereoscopic visual effects produced in Europe. With Entropy Studio Corp in Los Angeles the company grows, with stunning productions as ZERO, QUANTUM BREAK or Campfire Creepers.

Come and follow us in this VR journey with i2Cat, CWI, TNO, CERTH, Artanim, Viaccess Orca, Entropy Studio.

VRTogether: website, Twitter.

Text: Guillermo Calahorra – Entropy Studio

Pictures: Ana Revilla  – Entropy Studio

The post A roadmap for festivals appeared first on VRTogether.

After a short flight from Madrid to Geneva and meeting our lovely Artanim mates, the first step was to scan all the actors with more than 80 cameras, to capture every inch of their bodies. Steve Galache (known for his work on The Vampire in the Hole, 2010; El cosmonauta, 2013; and Muertos comunes, 2004) Jonathan David Mellor (known for The Wine of Summer, 2013; Refugiados, 2014; and [Rec]², 2009) and Almudena Calvo were the main characters of this first experience. The scanning process of the actors can be seen in the Image 1. They were dressed the same way as in the shooting scene.

While some actors were being scanned, the rest of them started to practice their texts supervised by Ignacio Lacosta, the director of this cinematography piece. Ignacio gave them some directions, recommendations, and pieces of advice to adapt “traditional acting” (like the ones on the stage of a theater) into an appropriate acting for this different environment, with all the virtual reality aspects, as seen in the Image 2.

In our second day of shooting in Geneva, the whole chroma background was set up. After a couple of rehearsals under the supervision of Ignacio, everything was prepared to start the shooting. An amazing team of cameras, electrical technicians, producer and stylist and other incredible workers were behind this experience making sure that the shooting was going perfectly. Not only that, the level of professionalism was incredibly huge, so we could record everything that we wanted sooner than it was planned.

The main point of the third day was the motion capture shooting, used to record the movement of the actors and the objects that they used in this scene. The Image 4 shows the capture of the movement with a special suit that allowed to track actors motion in the scene. Thus, all of the scenes of the pilot were repeated, but this time with no chroma background. Once again, there weren’t any problems during the shooting and the work was finished sooner than it was expected!

It was an incredible experience and we had a blast. That’s why we want to thank our Artanim mates for their hospitality and professionalism, as well as the actors and all the technical team that made possible this first pilot of the VR Together project.

Remember that if you want to keep up with updates about the project on social media, you can follow the hashtag #VRTogether_EU on every social website and the @VRTogether_EU official Twitter profile.

Who we are

Entropy Studio is a post-production company recognized within the advertising and film community. Since its constitution in 2003, Entropy Studio has made some of the most award-winning spots, films and VR experiences in Spain, also achieving International awards.

More than fifteen years of quality and innovation have established Entropy Studio as a recognised Studio for visual effects, design, animation, VFX, mattepaint, steresoscopy, motion graphics creation and in general all services related to postproduction and visual effects for both film and advertising.

In 2008, the first feature made entirely in Digital Cinema, “Magic Journey to Africa”, takes Entropy Studio at the forefront of stereoscopic visual effects produced in Europe. With Entropy Studio Corp in Los Angeles the company grows, with stunning productions as ZERO, QUANTUM BREAK or Campfire Creepers.

Come and follow us in this VR journey with i2Cat, CWI, TNO, Future Lighthouse, CERTH, Artanim, Viaccess Orca, Entropy Studio.

This project has been funded by the European Commission as part of the H2020 program, under the grant agreement 762111.

VRTogether: website, Twitter.

Text and pictures: Guillermo Calahorra – Entropy Studio

The post First shooting in Geneva: pilot 1 appeared first on VRTogether.

To represent visually the research work of the VR Together project, at the beginning of the project it was proposed the possibility of developing 3 pilots approaching 3 different production formats in a unified architecture.

The ideas of these initials pilots proposed were the following:

• A first offline pilot, simulating an acoustic music concert in which it is intended to offer, not only the feeling of being together, but also intimacy and closeness, all this through orchestrating clouds of points, 3DMesh models and multiple sources of videos.
• The second pilot was supposed to focus on live news, pretending to be a live production of immersive content from multiple sources that aimed to transfer the user to the center of the news to share the experience with other users.
• Finally, the third pilot intended to present a test to users to an interactive and totally immersive experience, with the background of a television series, a movie or simply a scene taken from them, where users can participate in the scene, interact between them, make conclusions, etc.

The pilots were planned the following way: the first one was planned for half 2018, the second one in 2019 and the last one in 2020. The structure and plot complexity of the pilots was linked to the technical and technological difficulty of each one, being the first pilot the simpler to produce and elaborate and the third the most complex. This way, the evolution and development of the project could be appreciated throughout the years.

The main objective of the pilot was not only to show a technological expansion, but to try to capture the attention of the consumer, making them a participant in the show thanks to an elaborated plot and interaction between players, helping sociological phenomena such as word of mouth or electronic word of mouth to play the role of communicators, attracting the interest of general public and media. However, the plot of the original proposed pilots felt kind of discontinued compared to the progression of the technology used, as represented in the following picture:

That’s why we proposed a possible general structure of the pilot, giving a strong storytelling that turned into a high quality experience. Having as inspiration movies like The Usual Suspects or Basic Instinct, we proposed a continuous plot theme for all the three pilots. This way, the viewer (who will have a say) can enjoy the experience not only during the pilot, but also after that, as we can see in the following figure:

The general ideas of each type of scene can be summarized with the following ideas:

• Murder scene: It was intended that both users were in the same room where a murder had been committed, and that both users were sufficiently separated from each other to have different viewing angles and, therefore, visual contact with different objects and tracks. The collaboration of both users (involving the feeling of togetherness) would be essential to make conclusions.
• Interrogatory room (one way mirror): The users would be behind a one-way mirror of an interrogation room. Although users would be next to each other, each user would see their own interrogation room, both being aware that the other user is having their own story.
• Interrogatory inside the prison: In this third version, both users are inside the prison in front of the accused. The interaction between both users within the scene is possible.

We will keep you informed about all the news coming from this experience!

WHO WE ARE

Entropy Studio is a post-production company recognized within the advertising and film community. Since its constitution in 2003, Entropy Studio has made some of the most award-winning spots, films and VR experiences in Spain, also achieving International awards.

More than fifteen years of quality and innovation have established Entropy Studio as a recognised Studio for visual effects, design, animation, VFX, mattepaint, steresoscopy, motion graphics creation and in general all services related to postproduction and visual effects for both film and advertising.

In 2008, The first feature made entirely in Digital Cinema, “Magic Journey to Africa”, takes Entropy Studio at the forefront of stereoscopic visual effects produced in Europe. With Entropy Studio Corp in Los Angeles the company grows, with stunning productions as ZERO, QUANTUM BREAK or Campfire Creepers.

Come and follow us in this VR journey with i2Cat, CWI, TNO, Future Lighthouse, CERTH, Artanim, Viaccess Orca, Entropy Studio.

This project has been funded by the European Commission as part of the H2020 program, under the grant agreement 762111.

VRTogether: website, Twitter.

Text and figures: Guillermo Calahorra – Entropy Studio

The post The pilot experience: A new direction appeared first on VRTogether.