Daily Archives: July 22, 2017

July 21, 2017 1:10 PM BySam Coley Parade @samlcoley More by Sam

Virtual reality (VR) pro Filip Baba swears that a great VR experience is just like jumping into your favorite sci-fi novel.

Its what you used to read about in sci-fi books or watched on Star Trek. Its pretty close, Baba says.

A self-taught expert, Baba is the CEO and founder of the virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) agencyAnyworld, which creates VR and AR experiences for clients like real estate companies and artists.

Recently, Baba and Anyworld worked with R&B singer, Tangina Stone, on her latest music video. The virtual reality music video, called the Anxious 360 Experience, debuted at her album launch party in New York City.

Baba talked with Parade on how he created the VR music video, why people are fascinated by VR and what the future holds for the industry.

What was it like creating a virtual reality music video for Tangina Stone?

It was a really fun experience. The whole screenplay and story was all hers. It was about Tangina dealing with anxiety. So, we tried to put the user in the type of anxiety shed be feeling. We sat down with her and got her creative vision, and then we went ahead and technologically did it. We did all the 3-D environments and screenplayed the whole thing. She came up with the concept on that, so she had a lot of fun doing it, as well.

Tell us about the scenes of the music video and how you created those.

In the beginning, you see [a sign post that says] Canton and Brooklyn. Since the whole beginning scene is VR and 360, it forces you to look away. But [when] you look back, that spot isnt the sign post anymoreits actually a burning tree. The burning tree symbolizes the odd one out of the whole forest, and under it is an old TV playing a 2-D version of the music video. Then, theres a glitch effect. We use that to glitch into another scene. In VR, it takes you by surprise. Then in the second scene, youre in a room and it starts to grow big around you. You start to feel smaller, which is a lot more pronounced when youre in VR. All of a sudden, you start flying up. We very slowly start lifting the person up, and it gives you the sensation of flying, and youre getting pulled out of this room. The third and last scene is a mental ward. Around you are whiskey bottles, which is one of her things shes dealt withalcoholism. All of a sudden, the display breaks. When youre in VR, it seems like the glass shards are coming at your face. Then, you look down and the floor falls under you. Youre floating in darkness, and you see the room above you just fading away. It was a bit of a trip to create.

How would you say VR has grown through the years, and where do you see it going in the future?

The hardware has definitely gotten a lot more polished. Now, a lot of the mobile [devices] are becoming more affordable. Most of our smartphones can be used as VR headsets. Its all getting more mainstream. Now, its up to the content creators to create content and distribute it. I believe that in the futurenow, we have 2-D screens, monitors, phonesthings are going to meld and be more augmented. More and more consumers are going to demand these experiences. I think it will become as common as how people go to the movies or watch TV at home.

Why do you think theres a growing appeal for virtual realityexperiences?

When you try some good VR, its what you used to read about in sci-fi books or watched in Star Trek. Its pretty close, I would say. Im a gamer. I used to play classic PC games, but I play some VR games now. Theyre competitive, too. They get you up on your feet. Youre actually movingits got that Wii appeal. If you get someone in a VR experience, you could take full control over what theyre going to experience.

In what ways do you think virtual reality could be used in other forms of entertainment, like movies and TV?

Its already happening. I know some movies have VR experience booths. I dont think thats going to be the main thing. Itll probably start with artists and specific genres. Maybe the horror genreI can totally see them capitalizing on something like that. Events are going to play a large role. People love installations at events, and a VR installation gets a lot of attention. Sometimes at Anyworld, well do a tradeshow and people respond positively. They love coming up and trying something.

Do you have any other projects coming up?

Were starting to teach AR classes with the new Apple AR kit thats coming out. We also do things with real estate, so were going to have some AR and VR solutions for real estate coming soon. I think [AR] is going to be even bigger than VR is right now.

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Virtual Reality Expert Filip Baba Shares His Newest Project and How VR is Changing Entertainment - Parade

Almost 90 years ago, in October 1927, the art of storytelling took a dramatic turn when the first talking picture or sound film was released to audiences around the world. The Jazz Singer was a smash hit, earning more than $2.6 million as it captivated audiences with its Vitaphone technology, the eras leading sound-on-disc system that would forever change the standard for in-theater experiences. Within just a year, filmmakers encouraged by the success of The Jazz Singer were already developing ways to advance in-theater audio beyond the use of discs and turntables and began migrating to sound-on-film. Regardless, the new multi-media era had been launched. The introduction of sound on top of moving pictures took people to a new dimension.

Fast-forward to today and the art of storytelling in our modern, more virtual world is once again about to be disrupted by another seminal advancement in sound. Its the use of 3D audio to immerse people more deeply into virtual environments, taking them to a reality thats, well, much more real.

Binaural 3D audio is inherently more authentic to our ears than two-dimensional stereo. It is sound thats designed to replicate the way we hear spatially, leveraging how humans consume auditory information in our natural environment. 3D audio engages the listener by offering a spatial bearing that enables them to sense where they are relative to the noises around them. In a 3D soundscape, the origins of sounds can perceptibly move about the listener, locating the listener as if they were standing in a real life environment.

By inserting 3D audio, new spatial information is introduced to the virtual experience, enabling audiences to sense things happening behind them, or elsewhere in their virtual environment, completely independent of their eyes. Just imagine yourself at a museum, standing in front of a massive painting that despite being a two dimensional work of art has amazing depth and allure. Visually, it draws you in and creates a sense of rapture. Now fold 3D audio into the experience with carefully crafted sound that wraps itself around you and pulls you closer. Characters in the painting sneak up from behind and encourage you to look deeper. Meanwhile, others call for your attention on the right, and then on the left. Suddenly, youre a part of whats happening on the seemingly flat canvas. Manipulating this type of audible sensory perception has the potential to completely reshape the entire virtual experience.

While the creative industry has been exploring 3D audio for some time, these efforts have been difficult, expensive and time-consuming to engineer since its production requires a mannequin head equipped with microphones shaped like the human ear. Not exactly the type of stuff you have laying around in the garage.

However, a group of five companies called The BINCI Consortium short for binaural tools for the creative industries are working collaboratively to develop an integrated software and hardware solution that can be used by professional audio content creators and artists to ease the production, post-production and distribution of 3D audio content.As an active member of The BINCI consortium, I share the organizations vision that everybody will soon be able to create and listen to binaural audio with off-the- shelf devices and headphones. The Consortium, which includes my company, Antenna International, as well as Eurecat, HEAD acoustics GmbH, 3D Sound Labs and Voodoopop, aims to develop a solution that can support a variety of professional applications in the creative industries, such as music, video games, virtual reality and augmented reality.The new tools will cut production costs tremendously and therefore revolutionize the industry as well as all virtual experiences.

Virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality experiences as we know them today are still flat unless the audio sound doesnt create a similar three-dimensional reality as the visual effects do. Reflecting back to how Vitaphone technology changed the in-theater experience nearly a century ago, todays virtual experiences havent yet met the modern equivalent of The Jazz Singer but its coming soon.

BINCIs experimental production pilots are scheduled to be carried out over the next year in cultural and heritage sites that include Fondaci Joan Mir (Barcelona, Spain), Opra Garnier (Paris, France), and Alte Pinakothek BStGS (Munich, Germany). These pilots, also known as The BINCI Project, will offer visitors the worlds first encounter with 3D audio-guide productions and usher in a new era of immersive storytelling.

In the meantime, others in the VR, music, film and gaming industries are also attempting to drive 3Daudio forward. For example, Microsofts new Xbox One X supports 3D audio content and the headphone manufacturer Plantronics has developed 3D audio gaming headsets. And San Diego-based Comhear Inc., has recently developed a sound projection system that can deliver 3D audio without the use of headphones.

In less than five years, 3D spatial audio is expected to revolutionize our standard for multimedia listening. Similar to how high-definition television has enhanced the everyday viewing experience, binaural 3D sound is expected to reshape our listening experience and redefine the production of music, movies, radio, and television programming and yes, VR, AR and mixed reality content as well.

Theres currently no blueprint for piecing together the storytelling thats best suited for this new type of virtual medium. As far as content goes, there is consensus about only one thing: in a virtual world, its all about storydoing, not storytelling.

Eva Wesemann is the Director of Creative Strategy for Antenna International, a provider of technology, content, and managed services to the worlds artistic, historic, and cultural institutions. She is also an active member of the BINCI Consortium.

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Why 3D audio is the next big step for virtual reality - VentureBeat

AUSTIN (KXAN) With all the talk of virtual reality these days, you might have been wondering what all the fuss is about.

Downtown Austins technology startup accelerator Capital Factory wants to make it easier for Austinites to find out for themselves.

Virtual reality, or VR, is really an experience-it-to-believe-it technology; thats why Capital Factory recently opened its VR lab to the public. What started in December as a place for developers to test out ideas is now available for anyone to come in and try out various virtual reality applications.

The lab is set up with several different VR headsets and controllers, with monitors so others can watch whats happening. Users can shoot free throws, use a bow and arrow to defend their castle against invaders, and prepare virtual meals.

But the space is for more than just games.

A popular VR experience in the lab is using Google Earth to take virtual tours of anywhere in the world. The camera moves with your head movements and the controllers zoom down to street-level to explore.

Entrepreneurs are working to harness the technology to apply it to a wide range of industries and professions, including medicine and education.

The latter is where Kate Peilers interests lie. She set out to answer one question: How do you make books more interactive?

I was always a tactile and visual learner, Peiler, the founder and CEO of the educational technology company DisruptED, said.

Shes developing a series of books for pre-K and kindergartners that use augmented reality and virtual reality to engage kids.

I realized, oh my gosh, this is how visual learners like me can dive into a book, she said.

In the augmented reality, or AR, version, readers open up a physical book, then use the camera on their smartphones or tablets to enhance the pictures in real-time. Whats flat on the page turns into 3-D animations.

In the VR version, users are transported into the story and can look around as narration explains whats happening. So its bringing that story to life, Peiler said.

Shes developing several educational books, including one about shapes, one about letters, and one about colors.

Peiler got help developing her project at Capital Factorys VR lab.

Theres no excuse not to try VR, Brance Hudzietz, Capital Factorys ambassador or emerging technologies.

We noticed that in Austin theres this huge appetite for virtual reality, both on the entrepreneur side and the consumer side, Hudzietz said. But there wasnt this centralized place for it.

The VR lab, which now anyone can try out, is just the start of the companys investment in the new technology. Capital Factory conference rooms are now equipped with VR capabilities, Hudzietz said.

You can be showing off the innovations that are happening in healthcare and VR, he said. If its an education event, an edtech event, you can be showing off really interesting educational VR experiences as well.

They get it, Peiler said.

Shes working on a pilot to test out her book series with families and others in the tech space; thats thanks to the VR lab and the connections it brings, too. Without it, she said, she wouldnt be ready.

It would take me a lot longer, she said, and I just no I couldnt. I tried.

If youd like to try out the VR lab, you can take a tour of Capital Factory Tuesday through Thursday at 4 p.m. and play around in the lab for about an hour afterwards, or email cr@capitalfactory.com to set up an appointment to check it out.

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Virtual reality lab offers Austinites a chance to try out new tech ... - KXAN.com

Photo Credit: Aleksandra Suzi / Shutterstock

Albert Skip Rizzo is director for Medical Virtual Reality at the University of Southern California-Institute for Creative Technologies. Hes also known as a pioneer in the therapeutic use of virtual reality, using VR to treat PTSD, depression, addiction, anxiety disorders, pain, autism, sexual assault trauma, and fears of everything from public speaking to spiders.

Sound familiar? There are plenty of reports that psychedelics can treat a variety of these ailments, too.

So what makes VR different? Rizzo cautions that VR and psychedelics are very different: Its sort of really inaccurate to compare VR with the psychedelic experience. You wouldnt compare watching a movie to a psychedelic experience.

Yet there are similarities, especially in the therapeutic framework: Set and setting are so, so important, says Marcela Ot'alora, principal investigator for phase two clinical trials in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy. Otalora points out that when somebody says "this particular therapy saved my life," its the therapist who was able to support him or her through the process.

When it comes to treating PTSD, Rizzos work revolves around VR-based exposure therapy. VR has the capacity to create simulated worlds that allow a person to suspend disbelief, and put them into a manufactured scenario much like they experienced when the traumatic event occurred. A patient describes the traumatic experience to a clinician who can also control the VR worldthink changing time of day, or adding gunfire or a helicopter to a war scenarioand who also sees the experience on a screen while the patient is wearing a VR headset.

The VR environment is created by someone else, and the user experience is created intentionally to be emotionally evocative and stimulating, in order to help them review what they went through, and hopefully move past it. Were trying to activate anxiety in a safe place, so the fear of these stimuli extinguishes. So the therapist has to constantly monitor the patient to make sure theyre engaging with Iraq or Afghanistan or sexual trauma in a way that is healthy, not over the top, and not too provocative for them.

With, for example, MDMA for PTSD, the patient is taking a drug. Someone with PTSD, the trauma is there all the time. It might come up in a different way than you imagine. But it comes up, says Otalora. Therefore theres no need with MDMA psychotherapy to evoke the trauma.

In an MDMA psychotherapy session, the therapists work in a controlled, therapeutic environment, but trust that MDMA will bring up what needs to happen in that moment, so that the patient can then work towards healing themselves. The therapist is supportive, with no judgment, and fosters a place where the patient can experience and fully process the emotions of the experience.

Reliving the experience this way, in both VR and MDMA-assisted therapy, with a trained and ethical medical professional, can be incredibly therapeutic, especially over time. The same kinds of clinical skills and techniques can be applied in both types of therapies, Rizzo says.

And that is precisely the similarity: Altered states therapies, regardless of whether VR induced or drug induced, are reliant upon that trained medical professional.

And just as you wouldnt counsel your friend who has been through a rape or war trauma to go to a rave and take MDMA, Rizzo says VR should be respected the same way, and used therapeutically in a therapeutic environment with trained clinicians.

Im not so keen on self-help, and just having them self-diagnose and download some software, he says, pointing to the age-old saying, He who defends himself in court has a fool for a client and a fool for a lawyer, and notes, Self-treating is the same. Someone who self-treats, he says, is at risk.

Rizzo thinks the VR headset will be like a toaster: Every home will have one, but it wont be used every day. But he thinks it shouldnt be used to self-diagnose or treat mental health or any other medical issue.

As with psychedelics for therapeutic use, Its important, whenever youre doing therapy, someone has to be well trained, and know why they are doing it, and how to preserve the safety and integrity of the patient, he says.

Both stress that a well-trained clinician is able to handle different issues that come up.

With VR, its an emotionally evocative technology, and yes it can work for good because of that. Were doing a study now that mimics the locations where sexual assault is happening in the military. It is emotionally wrenching when people go in and navigate these spaces. I cant imagine that going in without a guide that this is gonna heal you from your rape.

Rizzo stresses the importance of safety protocols that are well defined in MDMA therapy as it works its way through the drug approval process.

But Rizzo sees the quest to self-treat as being potentially problematic in the unregulated world of VR. In some forms, fear of public speaking is a diagnosed thing. Most people have that until they do it a few times and practice. But there are a number of different companies selling different kinds of fear-of-public-speaking VR software.

Now that has happened, but no one is squawking about it. But once you start accepting things like that, it becomes, oh its just fear of flying, or oh its just fear of heights.

Yet with psychedelics, he points out, no one would say, "Oh, youre afraid? Why dont you go to a rave and try MDMA and see if that helps you?"

The power in these therapeutic experiences, whether VR or psychedelics, he says, is that with the right support, with an ethical clinician, and highly supervised and well-trained people, you can heal.

We need to make sure its ethically applied, he says, so as to protect both the safety of a person and their mental health.

And both psychedelic therapy research and VR therapy have rigorous screening processes that are requisite, as not every therapy is right for every person. For example, evidence suggests that a female who gets motion sickness and is ovulating is probably not a suitable candidate for VR therapy at that time. VR side effects may include temporary nausea, ocular strain, sleepiness, and disorientation. With MDMA, someone with a heart or liver condition probably wouldnt qualify for the therapy, and a side effect might include tightness in the jaw. And of course, there are therapists who dont support VR therapy or psychedelic therapies.

Another way VR differs from treatments like MDMA, for example, is that theres currently no oversight like the FDA and the DEA in research and use of pharmaceutical drugs or psychedelic therapy. That could change, says Rizzo, if software companies make ridiculous claims, and VR is looked at as a medical device.

A more pressing challenge to VR therapy, though, is that many people still dont know about it.

I think were a couple years away from common, mainstream use. However, there are hundreds of therapists around the world using it now, and there are companies like Virtually Better or Psious, that make exclusive VR software to treat fears and other pathologies for clinicians.

In addition to exposure therapy, like with PTSD, VR can also be used to distract the patient, such as when they are going through a painful procedure. While its not so effective for chronic painyou cant wear a headset all day, but, Maybe you can teach things in the VR context that are easier to teach in VR that can help with chronic pain.

VR can also motivateusing the game-based content to motivate people to do cognitive or rehabilitative activities. And VR lets clinicians measure progress and test ability as the patient evolves.

While Rizzo works to promote guidelines for the safe and ethical use of therapeutic virtual reality, Ot'alora is looking forward to starting phase three of the MDMA for PTSD clinical trial, and to multiplying their positive results across the country. We hope to start that in spring of 2018. That will be our last phase, and if all works well, we can apply for MDMA to become a prescription medication.

Valerie Vande Panne is an independent journalist whose work has appeared in theBoston Globe Sunday Magazine, Columbia Journalism Review, The Guardian, Politico, and many other publications.

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The Therapeutic Value of Virtual Reality - AlterNet