[This VR technology, easier than most for content producers to adopt, makes the user “[f]eel like you’re in a luxury box with friends at your favorite sporting event”; the story is from Road to VR and includes more images. –Matthew]

LiveLike Combines the Cameras of Today with the VR of Tomorrow

By Ben Lang – Apr 29, 2015

While other companies are busy building 360 degree camera rigs and hoping for consumer adoption, VR startup LiveLike has a unique approach which uses existing broadcast camera tech in a surprisingly effective way to make you feel like you’re in a luxury box with friends at your favorite sporting event.

Right after gaming, VR video (360 degree recording) is the next biggest platform for VR content production. But the market is still early and has yet to prove what will be the best way to direct, record, edit, produce, and distribute VR video content.… read more. “LiveLike VR puts you in the luxury box to watch your favorite sports events”

[A promising expansion of telepresence robotic technology is described in this article from IEEE Spectrum, which includes another image and two videos; for much more information see the DORA website. –Matthew]

DORA Telepresence Robot Gives You Fully Immersive Experience

By Evan Ackerman
Posted 28 Apr 2015

Remote presence robots, as the name implies, act as your stand-in at a distant location, letting you move around and see and hear through a robotic surrogate. Space agencies, researchers, and the military have developed high-end telepresence systems that offer an immersive experience, but these units can cost millions of dollars. Consumer telepresence robots (like the Double or Beam), on the other hand, cost much less but can’t create a sense of immersion—you’re staring at a video feed on a computer screen, after all.

Now a team of roboticists at the University of Pennsylvania is using affordable sensors and actuators and virtual reality technologies like Oculus Rift to build a platform that offers the same capabilities of a high-end telepresence system at a reasonable cost.… read more. “DORA Telepresence Robot gives you fully immersive experience”

[Perspectives on the future of VR in architecture and more generally from designer and visualizer Olivier Demangel (I especially like this from near the end: “[P]erhaps you could have an empty room in your future house dedicated to VR? You could choose a different interior every day, like the Star Trek holodeck”). The interview is from Dezeen, where it includes lots of pictures, most comparing ‘real’ photos of a specific house with virtual versions, along with 3 videos. –Matthew]

[Image: Ty Hedfan table, real (left) and virtual (right)]

Virtual-reality architecture will be “more powerful than cocaine”

Posted on Monday, April 27th, 2015 by Marcus Fairs.

Every architect will soon design using 3D goggles, according to designer and visualiser Olivier Demangel, who believes that virtual architecture will be as convincing as the real thing within five years.

Demangel, who works for London 3D imaging company IVR NATION, contacted Dezeen to show us a virtual reality model he’d created of a house featured on our website four years ago.… read more. “VR architecture will be “more powerful than cocaine””

[This raises all kinds of possibilities for presence experiences… it’s from The Creators Project, where the story includes more images and a 3:14 minute video. For more information see coverage in The Next Web and the xxArray Kickstarter page. –Matthew]

[Image: Donovan Leitch getting ready to be captured by the xxArray]

You Can Finally Become a Video Game Character Thanks to 3D Scanning

By Beckett Mufson — Apr 23 2015

When you boot up GTA V, do you play as Michael, Trevor, or Franklin? Soon that may not matter, thanks to Alexx Henry’s new “3D scanner for the masses,” the xxArray, which uses 90 DSLR cameras to create a hyperreal, 22 gigapixel digital model of a person in seconds. A few lines of code later, Henry suggests, and the new, digital you can be hustling through Los Santos or any number of famous digital locales, using your own hands, feet, and face, accurate to the very pore.… read more. “xxArray 3D scanning lets you become a video game character, and more”

[An interesting example of the use of presence to inform and persuade; this is from Road to VR, where the story includes more images and two videos; more details and previews are available from Western River Expeditions. –Matthew]

[Image: 360 Labs’ waterproof 360º GoPro array by partner Freedom360]

360 Film Aims to Save Majesty of Grand Canyon Using the Power of VR, Kickstarter Now Live

By Scott Hayden
Apr 20, 2015

The untouched beauty of the Grand Canyon has inspired poets, novelists, film makers, and more than 4 million recreational visitors per year to make their way to the dramatic cliffs that border the Colorado River basin. 360 Labs aims to preserve that legacy with a new 360 degree documentary that will go into the heart of the canyon that is currently in danger of being forever changed by a new construction project.… read more. “360 film aims to save majesty of Grand Canyon using the power of VR”