June is a busy time in the VR industry, largely thanks to the behemoth that is E3. But while gamer’s eyes are on Los Angeles, a group of filmmakers and enthusiasts gather in the UK city of Sheffield to celebrate a very different medium, the documentary, and VR is becoming an increasingly vital part of that.
Sheffield Doc/Fest returns from 9th – 14th June 2017 and, along with a series of worldwide premieres and special screenings, the Alternate Realities installation is back too. This unique exhibit showcases how people are getting to grips with making VR content that audiences can relate to like never before, last year hosting incredible experiences like Easter Rising: The Voice of a Rebel, and a range of pieces that tackled the immigrant crisis.
Since last year Doc/Fest has appointed Dan Tucker to Curate the 2017 Alternate Realities line-up. Tucker himself was at the show last year, having worked on Easter Rising with the BBC, but he’s thrilled to be bringing other people’s work into the spotlight this year. He tells me this year’s installation will be bigger than ever, with 17 VR projects, more venues showing VR, and some big new experiences being revealed.
The theme of this year’s show, Tucker tells me, is “human identity and human connection.”
“In a world that seems to be increasingly defined by division this showcase and the summit focus on what makes us human and what connects us to each other,” he says. “To this end we have experiences that push empathy, intimacy, bonds of family and the value of community.”
To that end, Tucker has some choice selections from this year’s showcase. He describes Blindfold from iNK Studios as “very moving and uses simple nodding and shaking of the head to shape the story.” The piece focuses on human rights issues against journalists and shows a distressing interrogation.
Doom Room Trailer (NSFW)
In My Shoes: Intimacy, meanwhile, is a piece from artist Jane Gauntlett that “takes two people through increasing situations of intimacy and touch” as you’re guided by strangers.
Doc/Fest itself has also commissioned its own piece, Future Aleppo, which uses a paper model of the Syrian city of Aleppo “not only as an installation alongside the VR experience but also as companion device that you can interact with by touching buildings covered in conductive paint to trigger audio and visual media.”
Tucker also flags up another hugely interesting experience, DOOM ROOM, which is set to combine interactive theater with VR. He describes it as “psychedelic mediation of life and death” but also adds that it’s “not for the faint hearted.” The trailer above gives you a good explanation as to why that is.
These experiences will mix traditional full VR with 360 video in a way that few other exhibits can do. “I think it is vital to mix both 360 and full VR experiences and I think the lines of division that are drawn between the two are false, unhelpful to audiences and forget the most vital ingredient: story,” Tucker says. “The story is why people put on the headset, not the technology.”
Tucker isn’t a fan of dividing these two types of experiences. “So, as these two side of the coin evolve and produce inspiring content, please lets stop creating division and start to work together and learn from each other,” he says.
Then there’s the Alternate Realities summit on Sunday June 11th, which will gather many of the creators behind this year’s selection to talk about their projects and the technologies behind them.
Alternate Realities won’t just be about VR this year, though. There are also some augmented reality experiences, like Where The Universe sings, which uses phones and tablets to “bring the paintings of Lawren Harris to life with original archive audio of the painter talking about the works and his life philosophy.” More traditional games and interactive experiences are being brought into the fold too.
All-in-all it’s looking like a packed year for Doc/Fest and Alternate Realities.
