Category Archives: Virtual Reality

The city plans to create the nations first publicly funded virtual reality lab. View Full Caption

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This hub is gettingcloser to reality.

The citys Economic Development Corporation and the Mayors Office of Media and Entertainment are planning to create the nations first publicly-funded virtual reality and augmented reality lab, announcing Monday a request for proposals for a space that will include $6 million in public and private funding.

The city is looking for bidders who will be able to provide space for VR and AR entrepreneurs with affordable, shared access to tools and technologies and gather academic, start-upand business communities to increase the talent pipeline and funding opportunities, as DNAinfo previously reported.

Proposals are due April 7.

VR and AR are fast-growing sectors in the media and entertainment space, and with this new facility we are positioning New York City to be a primary hub for new and growing VR/AR companies, MOME Commissioner Julie Menin said.

EDC President James Patchett said the lab would spur innovation.

By investing in growing companies with emerging technologies, we can create good-paying, 21st century jobs for New Yorkers, he said.

Theres been a recent uptick in virtual and augmented reality offerings across the city, from Samsungs flagship store in the Meatpacking District and the virtual reality arcade in the World Trade Center Oculus to the pop-up vr bar in Park Slope, occupying a small Union Street storefront for the winter months in a space normally run by the Peoples Pops in warmer weather.

There's also a virtual reality training lab coming to The Bronx's CUNY on the Concourse, a branch of Lehman College , which will offer an 11-month program starting in April to teach students about topics including 3D graphics, web design and animation.

The VR/AR industry has seen more than $50 million worth of investment and 125 percent increase in job demand over the past year, according to city officials. But the industry is still fragmented and funding still a challenge, they say, without a central hub to anchor it.

The focus on virtual and augmented reality is part of the de Blasio administrations pledge to foster 100,000 good jobs over the next 10 years in industries like tech, life sciences and high-end manufacturing.

Earlier this month, the administration released plans for a Union Square Tech Hub thats projected to create 600 jobs and includes awork and event space called Civic Hall for community organizations, tech companies, government agencies and entrepreneurs.

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City Seeks Space For Its Virtual Reality Hub - DNAinfo

LONDON, United Kingdom When Apples iPhone first appeared nearly 10 years ago, few could fathom the extent to which it would transform our daily lives. Today, much like mobile before it, a rising technology platform has the potential to create what Canadian media theorist Marshall McLuhan called new patterns of human association, unleashing a tsunami of innovation.

For years, Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) a view of the real world that has been augmented by layers of computer-generated content have been the stuff of science fiction. Both still have their fair share of sceptics. Yet, driven by Moores Law and the rapid advancement of processors, screens and other commodity components coming out of the smartphone supply chain, VR and AR are finally poised for mainstream adoption with some calling them nothing less than a new medium of human experience.

Back in 2014, early VR pioneer Chris Milk explained the profound power of VR: You read a book; your brain reads letters printed in ink on paper and transforms that into a world. You watch a movie; youre seeing imagery inside of a rectangle while youre sitting inside a room, and your brain translates that into a world. And you connect to this even though you know its not real, but because youre in the habit of suspending disbelief. With virtual reality, youre essentially hacking the visual-audio system of your brain and feeding it a set of stimuli thats close enough to the stimuli it expects that it sees it as truth. Instead of suspending your disbelief, you actually have to remind yourself not to believe.

So what does this mean for fashion?

In the past decade, the fashion industry has driven growth largely by tapping emerging markets, opening hundreds of new stores, particularly in China. But as Chinese demand has cooled, many have sought new growth online, which Luca Solca, head of luxury goods at BNP Exane Paribas, has called the new China.

A number of things have changed in the luxury industry. As you know, the luxury industry was growing 8 percent before now it is growing 2 to 4 or 5 percent in the next year and its going to stay there, said Olivier Abtan, a partner at the Boston Consulting Group. Now, in this slow growing market [brands are] considering digital very seriously, he added.

For some, virtual and augmented reality technologies offer a powerful new digital growth channel. When one thinks how engaging VR could be, I imagine that this will indeed be even more important than mobile in the grand scheme of things, said Solca. However, it took 20 years for e-commerce to reach an inflection point, he cautioned. Id imagine VR would need a similar amount of time to really shape our everyday experience in the same way as our mobile phones.

But momentum in the VR/AR space is building quickly. Late last year, HTC Vive announced a venture capital alliance for virtual reality technologies; comprising 27 firms, the initiative has amassed $10 billion dollars of deployable capital. Last October, digital distribution platform Steam reported adding 1,000 new VR users daily, with over 600 VR apps already on the platform. And technology heavyweights are doubling down in virtual and augmented reality. See Facebooks Oculus Rift to Snapchats Spectacles.

In this early stage of development, accurate projections of future market size are difficult. But according to Goldman Sachs, revenue from VR- and AR-related hardware and software is expected to reach from $80 billion to $182 billion by 2025.

Virtual reality and augmented reality could certainly become a powerful channel for brand-consumer interactions, much like mobile and social are today. But current pricing ($600 for an Oculus Rift headset, $800 for an HTC Vive) will slow mainstream consumer adoption for the moment, according to Goldman Sachs.

In the meantime, there are plenty of enterprise opportunities for fashion companies. The obvious first step in the apparel industry is designing and development tools, and we are working with a lot of brands and a lot of supply chain companies behind the scene on this, said Ari Bloom, CEO of Avametric, a San Francisco-based startup working in VR/AR. You think about the ability to have a more digital experiences: the amount of time and money you can save not having to sample thousands of garments to get to three or four hundred!

Virtual simulations of store environments could also be useful to retailers. In VR, specifically, you can [test] two different environments and that is really powerful, explained Bloom. ShopperMX, a virtual reality platform developed by Chicago-based firm InContext Solutions, allows retailers to experiment with signage, product display and layout without the time and resource commitment required to build and test these elements in the physical world.

But over the next decade, it is ultimately consumer adoption of VR/AR that will drive the most opportunity for fashion companies and already some brands are dipping their toes in the space. In October 2015, Tommy Hilfiger became the first major fashion retailer to deploy virtual reality headsets in its stores, inviting shoppers to immerse themselves in a 360-degree experience of the labels Autumn/Winter fashion show. This year, American accessible luxury brand Coach is following suite, installing VR headsets in stores in 10 malls across the US to provide consumers with full access to its latest runway show.

Gap, too, is experimenting. Last month, the retailer unveiled an augmented reality dressing room that allows consumers to try its ranges digitally. The experience, built with Bloom and Avametric in collaboration with Google, has its drawbacks. For a start, it only works with Google Tango smartphones, which have yet to be widely adopted by the market. But the specific limitations of the Gap experience aside, AR has lower barriers to adoption than VR, which is costly and comes with a steep learning curve for consumers. And in recent cycles, AR applications mostly geared towards trying on clothes have spread relatively quickly as fashion brands and retailers jump on the bandwagon.

Unsurprisingly, beauty brands have been early to AR. Within the last year, Sephora, Charlotte Tilbury and Rimmel have all launched AR applications that allow users to try on products via a filter on their phones.

But do these applications offer real value? Or are they just marketing gimmicks?

The number one difficulty has been that there are a lot of false prophets at this stage, said Tom Adeyoola, chief executive of London-based virtual fitting room company Metail, whose augmented reality try-before-you-buy solution aims to drive concrete business results. According to research conducted by Metail in conjuction with Tufts University and the Kellogg School of Management, the companys AR application can boost sales by 22 percent.

Its bigger potential lies in the power of data collection, however, illustrating how consumer-facing VR and AR applications can drive back-end benefits. Our big partner in India is using data that is coming through to re-cut their clothes to match the fact that India is not a one-size demographic people are taller in the North and shorter in the South. They are starting to rethink and recut clothes, said Adeyoola. For another retailer, for example, we saw that only 20 percent of their customers matched the clothes that were cut. By resourcing the garments, they could do a better job of matching that demographic.

For the moment theres little doubt that VR and AR remain in their infancy. And much like e-commerce 10 years ago, when fashion and luxury brands were reluctant to sell online, there are those who doubt the potential of these new technologies. But if the consumers are there, they have no choice, says Abten. If consumers complete their transition into VR/AR channels, brands even the luxury ones will have no choice but to embrace.

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Virtual Reality: Growth Engine for Fashion? - The Business of Fashion

BARCELONA, SpainGoogle has ambitions plans to broaden its virtual reality operations this year, as the company pushes deeper into both hardware and headsets.

Its only been a few months since Google began selling its ViewVR headset, but the company is hoping that 2017 is the year the emerging technology becomes more mainstream. In fact, the company is hoping to sell tens of millions of the device this year, according to Amit Singh, vp of business and operations of Googles VR unit.

Singh, speaking in Barcelona at Mobile World Congress, said the company already hashad some success with its most basic form of a VR hardware, the Google Cardboard. According to Singh, Google has already shipped 10 million of the inexpensive headsets. On the software side, the Cardboard app has been downloaded 160 million times.

For a lot of people, the first VR interaction might be that bite-sized chunk to get them excited about something, Singh said.

However, even while buzz and business continues to build (DigiCapital reports that $2 billion was invested in VR and augmented reality last year), the question remains, how many people are actually interested? According to a survey of 3,200 U.S. adults conducted by IBB Consulting, 71 percent said they werent interested in VR.

However, that doesnt mean nobodyis buying it. IBB found that of those who are interested, 30 percent already have their own VR equipment. And while 44 percent said they got it for free or as part of a bundle, another 30 percent paid up to $99about the same price as Viewor Samsungs Gear VR. Another 20 percent said they spent between $100 and $500.

Content will be key to driving interest, said JeffersonWang, a senior partnerat IBB.

Not surprisingly, gaming is still the most popular type of content, with 37 percent responding they are most interested in the genre. However, travel was also a key interest for 20 percent of those surveyed, while another 17 percent said theyre interested in movies, TV and news.

We think that brands have a great opportunity to use VR to sell or advertiser their products to consumers, saidArthur van Hoff, chief technology officer and founder ofJaunt, a VR app maker.

There are now more than 100 titlesincluding apps, movies, games and newson Daydream, Googles own VR platform that supports View. Singh said there are now more than 100 apps, with active users spending 40 minutes a week in VR.(Google says YouTube is itsmost popular VR app.)

People want that lean-back experience, they want immersive content, he said.

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Google Aims to Sell Tens of Millions of Virtual Reality Headsets This Year - Adweek

The 2017 NFL Draft is just a few months away, which means were getting close to discovering the next elite rookies and the cities in which theyll play. With the Senior Bowl behind us and the Scouting Combine up this week, the draft class is beginning to take shape.

One of the biggest prospects set to take the field in Indianapolis at the Combine is Alabama defensive lineman Jonathan Allen a unanimous All-American and winner of the Lombardi Award, which is given to the college football player who best demonstrates outstanding performance and skill in their position. It was the latest award on a long list of accolades for Allen, who also won the Bronko Nagurski Trophy, the Chuck Bednarik Award and the Ted Hendricks Award.

In his four years at Alabama, Allen racked up 152 tackles. He made a living in the backfields of every team he faced, recording a whopping 44.5 tackles for loss and 28 sacks 22.5 of which came in his final two seasons in Tuscaloosa.

Most people are familiar with his stellar play on the field which has made him a projected top-five pick but his interests off the field are lesser known.

Allen is a big-time gamer and has a huge passion for all things technology.

It started in high school, my freshman year. My dad was a big computer guy. So, at the time, I hadnt really gotten into it yet, but he was just showing me and I started to play some of the difficult games, Allen said in an interview with FOXSports.com last week. It grew in my freshman year of college when I got my first computer and my love for computer games just built up from there.

Allen, who stands at 6-foot-3, 291 pounds, doesnt look like atypical gamer. Hes not exactlya big nerd a phrase used by teammate Dalvin Tomlinson this season.

Allen isa physical specimen who became a human highlight reel this season after he Superman sacked Texas A&M quarterback Trevor Knight. His athleticism has been on display for the past few years at Alabama, and it certainly will be in Indianapolis at the Combine.

But outside of being a workout monster, Allen remains active in the next wave of video games: virtual reality.

Recently, the virtual reality thing came out so Ive been really interested in that, he said. Its still fairly new, so there arent a lot of games out for it yet. I have it for the PS4 and computer. I have cameras set up for the computer I mapped out the room so its fun, I really enjoy it.

PlayStation VR has taken off in terms of popularity sinceit was released to the public back in October. Like most virtual reality units, its still in its infancy. Games are being developed and produced at increasingly rapid rates, though VR is still not at the forefront of video game sales.

Allen mostly plays first-person shooters on his PlayStation VR, but the computer offers a slightly wider array of options with more to come in the near future.

Its still a pretty new thing, but Im expecting within the next couple of years thered be some more games to come out, he said.

Many hardcore gamers believe computers are best suited to handle the requirements of playing high-end games, typically boasting better processors and video cards than consoles like the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Allen has a PS4 for more mainstream games like Battlefield, but his computer allows him to play Total War and use three monitors in addition to the virtual reality cameras.

Its also portable, which lets him take it on the go when hes training outside his home in Alabama.

I have a triple monitor so I have three monitors all connected playing as one, he said. Then I have the cameras mounted on the walls to track your movements for the VR. So its a pretty cool setup.

Its at my house here in Alabama. But I bought my computer, so thats with me here in Florida right now.

Allen spent his time leading up to the Combine training in Orlando, Fla., with Tom Shaw a coach who spent time with the likes of quarterbacks Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Jevon Kearse and Simeon Rice, among many others.

While Allen has focused all of his attention on gearing up for the NFL Draft and getting his body in shape for the grind of an NFL offseason, he does believe he has a future in technology particularly with a focus on video games.

Its definitely something Im interested in, he said. After football, Im not really sure which path Im going to take. I feel like its such a wide-open field, and there are so many different angles I can approach it from. So Im not really sure, Ill have to do some more research, but its definitely something I could see myself getting into later down the line.

The unanimous All-American obviously has his entire NFL career ahead of him one that figures to be lengthy with many Pro Bowl appearances but developing video games and exploring the future of virtual reality is a passion Allen will always have.

Thats something Id definitely be interested in developing games, testing games, he added. Its all just a part of it. Anything I can get my hands on, Im definitely cool with. Then from there it can just grow and build. So Im interested in any way I can get involved because thats where my hearts at. I love it.

Allen currently projects to be one of the very top prospects in the2017 draft, with many mock drafts linking him to the Chicago Bearsat No. 3. Making it to the NFL is obviously a dream of Allens, and hes ready to make it happen:

This is what Ive been preparing for my whole life. Im excited. Im ready.

Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports | Soobum Im

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Top NFL Draft prospect Jonathan Allen has a passion for virtual reality gaming - FOXSports.com

Brasov, Transylvania, Romania-based ATi Studios, the creator of the Mondly language learning platform, has released a virtual reality app for language education.

The VR app uses Mondly's conversational voice chatbot, released by the company in August 2016 which has self-learning technology.

It combines voice chatbot technology with speech recognition in virtual reality to create a new way for users to learn a new language.

The Learn Languages VR by Mondly app allows people to experience lifelike conversations with virtual characters.

The company created the VR application based on what users need to effectively learn a new language - instant feedback and an "immersive, real-world experience to build their confidence".

The technology uses speech recognition that understands phrases and words in 28 different languages. It has learned millions of new phrases and responses since its release, due to its self-learning technology.

Its language learning platform has been downloaded over 15 million times. The VR application intends to realize virtual reality's promise of immersive and automated educational experiences.

It gives instant feedback on pronunciation, suggestions to add to a learner's vocabulary offers 'surprises' to turn learning a language into a fun experience.

The app aims to bridging the technologies behind chatbots, speech recognition, and VR with a new automatic voice detection system so that the speech interaction feels natural in a VR environment.

The system calibrates to the room's background noise, and ignores unintentional sounds.

The first version of the app offers three scenes across 28 languages such as a restaurant scenario where users can practice ordering food and drinks in a small bistro.

Other scenarios include the Eurotrain where users can have a conversation and make new friends on a train in Europe, or check into a boutique hotel and secure a room with a view.

Alexandru Iliescu, the CEO and co-founder of ATi Studios said: "Because VR is so immersive, we quickly realised that traditional speech interaction models that require a tap or a voice command to enable speech recognition would kill the flow of the experience.

So we developed our own automatic voice detection system. The result is amazing, the conversations with the virtual characters happen as naturally as real-life conversations - they just flow."

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Mondly launches virtual reality for learning languages, powered by chatbots. - ZDNet

2017 could be a good year for Imax (IMAX) .

The large-format theater company's core business is positioned for a strong rebound, while new initiatives enter their launch phase, said MKM Partners Managing Director Eric Handler. "We see a clearer path for IMAX shares to move higher over the next few quarters," he wrote in a recent note.While focus remains on the core business, the company is exploring other initiatives such as virtual reality to drive future growth.

Last month, Imax opened its firstvirtual reality hub in Los Angeles and is planning to debut five more VR pilot centers in the U.S., the U.K. and China by the year's end.

VR was a natural fit for Imax as its well-known brand is associated with immersive experiences, according to Rob Lister, the company's chief business development officer.

With the Los Angeles VR hub, Imax wanted to get a "first-mover advantage" and gauge whether consumers are really interested in it, he said in an interview with TheStreet. If the pilot period is successful, the company could roll out VR experiences globally.

The consumer proposition for VR has been a "difficult" one so far, Lister said. A VR headset from Oculus or HTC Vive costs upward of $600 and requires a PC with enough processing power to drive it. "That's a very expensive proposition," he said. "Our approach to this center was, let's give people an opportunity to have their first experience in VR without having to make that material investment."

The Los Angeles hub offers about 12 different VR experiences across 14 pods, costing between $7 and $15 and ranging from seven to 12 minutes. The offerings include options for multiple players, kids and sports and movie-themed games, such as its "Star Wars" experience.

In contrast, the five VR centers slated for this year in cities like New York and Shanghai will be at multiplex theaters rather than stand-alone hubs. The pods will either be in a retrofitted auditorium or located within the lobby.

VR podscould help attract consumers to movie theaters, especially Millennials.Millennials have had less movie theaterexperiences than previous generations because they have so many other options for content.Providing VR experiences and new digital and interactive content is a good way to keep movie theaters "vibrant," Lister said.

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Could Virtual Reality Capture Millennial Market and Be Imax's Ticket to Growth? - TheStreet.com

The physical properties of glass are invaluable and unequaled when it comes to the architects material palette. From the time of the cathedrals and the the brilliantly colored stained glass that served a functional and didactic purpose, to the modernist liberation of the floor plan and the exquisitely-framed horizontal views provided by ample windows, architects have turned to glass to achieve not only aesthetic but performative conditions in their projects.

Today, Architects face an increasing array of choices in specifying and designing with glass for building facades, as glass manufacturers propose a greater variety of colors, textures and patterns than ever before. A wider range of coatings and treatments has also been developed, allowing for a finer selection of glass panes with a combination of light transmittance, reflectance and absorption to meet the needs of outstanding architectural projects. These options affect the aesthetics and energy performance of the glass, and therefore of the overall building.

Thanks to advanced calculation tools, energy performance can now be anticipated accurately, but the graphic representation of glass is still a challenge, and yet a crucial need for architects.

http://www.archdaily.com/797724/how-physico-realistic-rendering-helps-architects-choose-the-right-glass-for-facades Sponsored Post

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Virtual Reality For Architects | Tag | ArchDaily

New York Times

Popularity of Sony's PlayStation VR Surprises Even the Company New York Times There are plenty of people who are skeptical about virtual reality, a technology some have heralded as the biggest thing to come along in years in games and entertainment. Even Andrew House, global chief executive of Sony Interactive Entertainment, the ... Sony surpasses expectations, selling 915000 PlayStation VR headsets in first four monthsTechCrunch PlayStation VR Soars Past 900000 Units Sold AlreadyCOGconnected (press release) PlayStation VR Is Doing Better Than Expected, Sony SaysKotaku Polygon all 43 news articles »

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Popularity of Sony's PlayStation VR Surprises Even the Company - New York Times

Virtual reality is often touted as the "next big thing" among tech companies. Goldman Sachs believes that the market could blossom into an $80 billion one by2025, and Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly called VRa next-gen "computing platform."

However, the aging bull market and hype regarding VR-related stocks have made it tough to find fundamentally cheap companies with meaningful exposure to the VR market.So today, we'll take a look at two stocks with meaningful exposure to the VR market that still trade at fairly low valuations -- Sony (NYSE:SNE) and HTC (NASDAQOTH:HTCKF).

Facebook's Oculus Rift. Image source: Oculus VR.

Sony's big bet on the VR market is the PlayStation VR, a high-end headset it released for the PS4 console last October. At $400, it cost much less than Facebook's (NASDAQ:FB) $600 Oculus Rift and HTC's $800 Vive headsets. A PS4 costs around $250 today -- which is much cheaper than the high-end PCs that power the Rift and Vive.

Those price tags make it the cheapest high-end VR experience on the market today. Since Sony hassold nearly 55 million PS4s, it already has a built-in customer base that doesn't need new hardware. Its existing relationships with game publishers also makes it easy to secure a steady stream of exclusive VR content for its games.

Sony's PSVR. Image source: Sony.

Research firm SuperData estimates that Sony sold750,000 PSVRs last year (compared to its older, overly bullish forecast of 2.6 million). That figure doesn't sound impressive relative to its PS4 user base, but it makes it the top-selling VR headset in the world. HTC's Vive came in second at 450,000 units, followed by Facebook's Oculus Rift at 355,000 units.

750,000 units would only generate about $300 million in revenue, which translates to just 6% of Sony's G&NS (Game and Network Services) revenue and 1% of its total revenue lastquarter. However, demand for the headset could soar this year as new VR-enabled PS4 games -- like Resident Evil 7, Star Wars: Battlefront X-Wing VR, and Star Trek: Bridge Crew -- make the PSVR an essential PS4 accessory for next-gen gaming.

If that happens, PSVR sales could surge well past SuperData's original estimate of 2.6 million and make the PSVR a major growth driver for the G&NS business. Higher-quality VR-enabled games will also encourage customers to upgrade to Sony's new PS4 Pro, which features 4K gaming and a smoother VR experience.

Sony's profitability has declined in recent quarters due to the weak performance of its mobile and movie making units. However, the stock trades with an EV/Sales ratio of 0.5 -- making it very cheap relative to peers like Samsung (NASDAQOTH:SSNLF), which has anEV/Sales ratio of 1.

Many investors overlook HTC as a potential VR play for two reasons. First, the early adoption of the Vive headset has been largely overshadowed by the weakness of its core smartphone business, which has been crushed between premium players like Samsung and lower-end Android rivals like Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi.That pressure caused HTC's revenue to fall14% annually last quarter, and its bottom line remains deep in the red.

Second, HTC's sponsored ADR shares only trade on the OTC market, which doesn't get as much attention as the major exchanges.

The HTC Vive. Image source: HTC.

HTC stock has declined nearly 90% over the past five years, but that drop has reduced its EV/Sales ratio to just 0.4. With an enterprise value of just NT $28.3 billion ($660 million), it remains a lucrative takeover target for tech companies that want to establish a presence in the smartphone and VR headset markets.

HTC wants to turn its smartphone business around by abandoning lower-end devices and focusing on the premium market. We've seen Sony try the same strategy before, but with very little success.

While HTC's smartphone business will likely keep struggling, the Vive might post better sales this year as more PC users upgrade their systems and more VR-enabled titles hit the market. The Vive costs more than the Rift, but its use of full-room motion sensors and software support from Valve, which co-designed the device, arguably make it a better premium VR device for hardcore gamers than the Rift.

If SuperData's figures are accurate, then HTC's Vive sales generated $360 million in revenues last year -- which would be equivalent to 14% of its 2016 sales. This means that if VR adoption picks up this year, we could see stronger sales of the Vive offset its weaker smartphone sales -- which could help HTC stage a big comeback.

Sony and HTC are fundamentally cheap and have growing VR businesses, but investors should also pay close attention to the challenges facing both companies' core businesses. I wouldn't rush to buy either stock now, but I would keep them in mind as alternative VR plays to pricier market favorites like Facebook and chipmaker AMD.

Leo Sun has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Facebook. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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These 2 Virtual Reality Stocks Are Ridiculously Cheap -- The Motley ... - Motley Fool

A good many people who follow Buffalo Rising are interested in this citys architecture, not just the buildings that exist, but the ones that we have lost along the way. Buffalo has managed to save a good chunk of its historic architecture in recent years, since the city took a turn for the better. Loft developments and restaurants have helped to revive downtown Buffalo, though there is still a long way to go with infill.

Much of the recent progress has happened via the old fashioned way through vision, determination and grit. That is how our city is being rebuilt. Unfortunately, we lost a lot along the way you can finda laundry list of buildingsright here. Who knows, someday some of these buildings might be rebuilt or reimagined in the real world. At least a couple of the very significant ones such as the Frank Lloyd Wright Administration Building (learn more).

For most of the lost buildings, we will simply have to preserve and share historic images, or maybe even follow the lead of virtual reality (VR) specialist William Capozzi.Capozzi feels that we can better relive these memories, by way of VR. Can you imagine an ongoing project that would visually piece together the streets and buildings of old Buffalo? Now that would really be something?

When historic preservation cant save a building, 3-D modeling and virtual reality may be able to help. William Capozzi shows how he has captured the soul of the grand theater of his youth in Olean, NY, and how we might do the same for other spaces whose time has run out.Capozzi is a digital and traditional artist, musician, and woodworker. He has worked professionally for over 20 years as a 3D Modeler and Animator. History and passing along stories are of great interest to him.

Newell Nussbaumer is 'queenseyes' - Eyes of the Queen City and Founder of Buffalo Rising. Co-founder Elmwood Avenue Festival of the Arts. Co-founder Powder Keg Festival that built the world's largest ice maze (Guinness Book of World Records). Instigator behind Emerald Beach at the Erie Basin Marina. Co-created Flurrious! winter festival. Co-creator of Rusty Chain Beer. Instigator behind Saturday Artisan Market (SAM) at Canalside. Founder of The Peddler retro and vintage market. Instigator behind Liberty Hound @ Canalside. Throws The Witches Ball at The Hotel @ The Lafayette, and the Madd Tiki Winter Luau. Other projects: Navigetter.

Contact Newell Nussbaumer | Newell@BuffaloRising.com

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Virtual Reality: Revisiting The Past | William Capozzi | TEDxBuffalo - Buffalo Rising