Voices of VR

The Khronos Group is working on a new open standard tentatively called the glTF External Reference Format (or glTFx for short), which will allow users to add multiple glTF assets to a single scene. This used to be called the "glTF Experience Format (glXF)," and the final name is still being finalized. This will enable new capabilities that are not possible by using glTF itself to contain other glTF assets, which includes is level-of-detail (LoD) management, asset-based lighting Management, and billboarding. The Khronos Group continues to translate the core functionality of game engines into various open standards, and are also working towards finalizing glTF extensions for interactivity as well as for physics. I did a deep dive with Khronos 3D Formats Working Group Chairman Alexey Medvedev (AR Tech Lead at Meta/Facebook), and 3D Formats Working Group Vice Chairman Dan Frith (Chief Creative Officer at London Dynamics) to unpack all of the latest news about glTF and glTF External Reference Format. . This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I dig into my archives to unpack the one-on-one, immersive theatre piece that I saw online back in 2021 called TM that used a Socratic dialectic to interrogate you as you're going through a process of joining an imaginary cult. I spoke with Ontroerend Goed's artistic director Alexander Devriendt to get a lot more context for how he designs immersive theatre productions for folks who typically don't like immersive theatre. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

VR filmmakers Joe Hunting and Max Willson are premiering their short documentary film The Reality of Hope at the Sundance film festival this week (online tickets are still available here from Jan 30 to Feb 2 and it'll also be available later this year on Documentary+). Hunting's previous film We Met in Virtual Reality also premiered at Sundance in 2022 and got picked up by HBO, and he's continuing to document very human stories that are rooted within the context of virtual culture. The Reality of Hope is shot both in VRChat and physical reality as it tells the beautiful and inspiring story of Photographotter traveling across the world to donate a kidney to his friend Hiyu, who he met within the furry community in VR. Hiyu is a world builder and avatar creator who has been a part of the team that has created some truly spectacular worlds as a part of the Furality conference (See the full list of worlds listed down below). Facing kidney failure, Hiyu turned to social media asking for help seeking a donor, which caught Photographotter's attention who then privately reached out. Photographotter documented the ups and downs of his inner journey in a VTuber video blog series, and The Reality of Hope fills in a lot of the gaps for the broader Furality community, the worlds that Hiyu has built, and the nuances of their friendship in hospitals of Stockholm, Sweden as the organ donor process requires a three-month commitment. The Reality of Hope is a beautifully-told story that shows the power of VR to forge deep and meaningful connections that proved to be literally life-saving. VRChat Worlds featured in The Reality of Hope Furality Aqua: The Oceans of Luma by Furality Sylva: Treehouse Village at Night by Furality Luma: Crystal Forest by Furality Sylva: Lahaina Springs by Furality Umbra: Village of Umbra by Furality (video) Furality˸ F․Y․N․N․'s Gym by Furality VR Yoga by Castiel先生 Exoplanet Journey by Niko* Tanuki Tunesǃ - タヌキトゥーンズ by Juno Tanuki Photographotters House V2 - by Photographotter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVMSZ30_FMY This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

If it were up to Agnes Callard, she would be having a lot more philosophical encounters in her life. But conversational norms lean towards agreeability, surface-level interactions, and, in some contexts, a polarizing battlefield of ideologies that is near impossible to penetrate. Her preference is for the Socratic Method of inquiry that requires participants to embody specific roles (believing truths vs avoiding falsehoods), with specific rules to follow, and committing to the possibility of having one's beliefs or skepticism radically transformed. This allows for the prospect of overcoming blind spots and co-creating knowledge in a collaborative fashion where one thinks with someone rather than thinking for someone. Socratic inquiry doesn't just happen, so Callard wrote a book called Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life explaining the process in great detail. She even created an entirely new ethical framework arguing that striving for knowledge is a moral imperative per Socrates' aphorism "the unexamined life is not worth living." Callard argues in her book that while achieving knowledge requires following the two rules of believing truths and avoiding falsehoods, it's impossible for one person to follow both rules simultaneously. To do so requires a collaborative and dialectical process like the Socratic Method. She cites William James' 1896 The Will to Believe as the source of the insight that believing truths and avoiding falsehoods are apparently two different mutually-exclusive algorithms: We must know the truth; and we must avoiderror,—these are our first and great commandments as would-be knowers; but they are not two ways of stating an identical commandment, they are two separable laws. James, W. (1907). The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy. page 17. Longmans Green and Co. For a quick 5-minute overview on why believing truths and avoiding falsehoods are two separate algorithms requiring a dialectical process, check out this short 5-minute video where Callard explains the crux of the Socratic Method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yjjYq-Z-z0 It's not immediately obvious to me that the path towards knowledge requires believing truths and avoiding falsehoods, or that it would be impossible for one person to commit to both. If Callard is right, the path towards knowledge requires a collaborative and deliberative process similar to the path towards justice where the prosecution prosecutes the guilty and the defense acquits the innocent. Once again, a lawyer cannot represent both sides, however, in this instance, the debate is mediated by a judge with an independent jury deciding the verdict. Callard contends that pure Socratic Inquiry needs no moderator as long as both parties are open-minded enough to have their blind spots challenged and potentially be radically transformed. What it does require is a good faith commitment to work collaboratively with a certain amount of epistemic humility. This underlying dialectical nature of knowledge applies in many and varied contexts, especially around conversations focusing on "What is Truth?" or "What is Reality?" Close listeners to the Voices of VR podcast have heard me mention this tension between "believing truths" vs "avoiding falsehoods" in at least a dozen podcasts going back to November 2019 (#846, 860, 912, 927, 932, 959, 971, 1055, 1092, 1144, 1147, & 1353). Dialectical polarities are a core pillar of my experiential design framework, and I've been seeing more immersive stories and experiences use the principles of the Socratic Method as a core mechanic. See my interviews about Horizon (one-on-one Socratic dialogue with an immersive theatre actor within a speculative futures context), Mandala (group Socratic dialectic about philosophical ideas), and The Collider (asymmetrical two-person experience about power and boundaries where one person embodies power-over dynamics with the other embodying power-unde...

I interviewed producer Dan Tucker at IDFA DocLab 2024 about the lessons learned from touring In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats across 20 different venues over the past couple of years. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation." See more context in the rough transcript below. This is the last episode from my series of interviews from IDFA DocLab 2024. You can see all of the interviews in the list below: #1492: IDFA DocLab Curators Preview 2024 Slate of AI & XR Immersive Documentaries #1493: "About a Hero" IDFA Opening Night Doc Blends Realities, Written by AI Trained on Werner Herzog Corpus #1495: Getting Roasted by Unfiltered "AI & Me" Photobooth Installation #1496: Using GenAI to Recreate Erased Family Photos with "Burn From Absence" 4-Channel Video #1497: Experimental VR Doc "Rapture II: Portal" Blends Hypnotic Audio with Spatial Scan of War-Abandoned Home #1498: Immersive Installation Frames Provocative "Töngö Sondi" Animation on Langauge, Censorship, & Identity #1499: From Interactive Biohacking Lecture to Speakeasy with "Drinking Brecht: An Automated Laboratory Performance" #1500: Sharing Indigenous Knowledge with AR on 360 Video and Embodied Rituals in "Ancestral Secrets VR" #1501: Roaming as Resistance: "Entropic Fields of Displacement" wins DocLab Digital Storytelling Award #1502: Candid Audio Clips Juxtaposed with Poetic GenAI Video in "Sincerely Victor Pike" #1503: "The Liminal" Spatial Audio Installation Blends Audio Doc with Specualtive Arab Futurism #1504: Open World, GenAI Podcast "Drift" Reflects on Climate Change from 500 Years in the Future #1505: Immersive Journalist Features Volumetric Sexual Harrassment Testimonies in "Walking Alone, Text You When I'm Home" #1506: Going on a Virtual Date in "ROAMance" that Generates Novel Encounters with Defamiliarization #1507: From Selfies to Virtual Offspring, "Ancestors" Turns Strangers into Family and Intergenerational Speculative Futures #1508: Virtual Architecture Vibes Part 1: "Limbotopia" VR & Dome at Film Gate Interactive #1509: Virtual Architecture Vibes Part 2: "Limbophobia" VR & Dome at IDFA DocLab #1510: Poetic VR Exploration of Iranian Protest Blindings in "Speechless Witness of a Wandering Tree" #1511: Cultivating Virtual LGBTQIA+ Safe Spaces in VRChat with "Dollhouse for Queer Imaginaries" #1512: DocLab Immersive Non-Fiction Winner "Me, A Depiction" Performance Installation Confronts Objectifying Gaze #1513: From Daily News to GenAI Irish Sean-nós Songs in "You Can Sing Me on My Way" Audio Installation #1514: Creating GenAI Flower Ecosystem with "Future Botanica" AR App #1515: VR Researcher Julia Scott-Stevenson on Embodiment in Story & Why Docs are Perfect to Explore AI #1516: Myriam Achard on Phi Studio's Expansion into LBE Distribution & the Fusion of Immersive Art at Phi Contemporary #1517: LBE Lessons Learned from 20-Venue Tour of "In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats" with Producer Dan Tucker This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I interviewed Myriam Achard about the new distribution arm of Phi Studio (as of now there is still no official name yet) as well as the exciting new Phi Contemporary set to open in 2028 that will be fusing together the contemporary art world with the immersive art, storytelling, and technology worlds that the Phi Centre have been curating. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I interviewed VR researcher Julia Scott Stevenson at IDFA DocLab 2024 about her research into embodiment and AI within the context of immersive stories as well as her work around climate change. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I interviewed co-directors Marcel van Brakel and Hazal Ertürkan about Future Botanica that showed at IDFA DocLab 2024. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I interviewed director Seán Hannan about You Can Sing Me on My Way that showed at IDFA DocLab 2024. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality

I interviewed director Lisa Schamlé about Me, A Depiction that showed at IDFA DocLab 2024. See the transcript down below for more context on our conversation. This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon. Music: Fatality