Augmented Reality Architects wraps house with courtyards to create private home
Augmented Reality Architects designed the house in Seoul, South Korea, so that it gives the owners an extremely high level of privacy.
"The family's request was very specific: privacy," explained the architecture studio. "The request went as far as to sacrifice basic requirements for a house, such as ventilation and ample sunlight."
See the full story here: https://www.dezeen.com/2019/08/04/augmented-reality-architects-w-house-south-korea-architecture/
Snapchat Turns Jack in the Box Augmented Reality Experience into a Build-a-Burger Contest
The object of BurgAR is for users to build a custom burger in their own physical space. Users can choose their own combination of bread/bun, sauce, and patty, and then up to five toppings from an array of ingredients. Add a dab of special sauce to a sourdough bun? Have it your way. Beef or chicken patty? It's up to you. Throw a freakin' taco and freshly cracked egg on it? Live your best life!
With their unholy sandwich prepared, users are then asked to save a picture, return to the Lens, and click "More" (thanks to Snap's Shoppable AR e-commerce platform) to navigate to the contest website. From there, users can then submit their concoction for a chance to not only win a $250 gift card, but also have their culinary creation featured on the chain's menu.
See the full story here: https://mobile-ar.reality.news/news/snapchat-turns-jack-box-augmented-reality-experience-into-build-burger-contest-0202470/
How Rude Virtual Humans Are Helping Veterans Re-enter the Job Market
The USC Institute for Creative Technologies developed lifelike interviewers to help prep veterans for what they might encounter in the real world
The hostile script, while written by a team at USC, isn’t unrealistic for an interviewing veteran. In fact, some of the most offensive questions—“Did you kill anybody?”—came from real stories veterans told the writers.
“There’s an under-the-radar stigma,” says Skip Rizzo, the director for medical virtual reality at ICT. “Everybody says thank you for your service and all that but when it comes to hiring it’s like, well, is he all right?”
So far, the angry interviewers have been effective. U.S. Vets, a nonprofit for at-risk veterans in Los Angeles, started using an earlier version of the technology in 2016. In early tests, they found of the 37 veterans who practiced interviewing with the virtual humans, 36 were able to find jobs.
The interviewers are programmed to do a lot of human things—walk out of the office in the middle of the interview, check their notes, even sneeze. They are not designed to convince veterans they are human, though. In fact, Rizzo says part of the reason the device works is precisely because people know they’re not real.
See the full story here: https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/virtual-reality-interviews-veterans/
Embodying taller avatars in VR can make us more confident in real life
Among many other findings, we now know that avatar embodiment experiences can be used to encourage pro-environmental attitudes and prosocial behavior or to decrease social phobia. These experiences can also help reduce negative stereotyping of the elderly or forms of racial bias.
Recent studies have looked not only at behavioral and attitudinal changes but also at cognitive modifications. They got surprising findings, such as the fact that avatar embodiment can even increase cognitive performance.
Note: The reader might be wondering whether avatar embodiment experiences could likewise negatively influence our behavior or lead to harmful consequences. In a previous article, we noted the existing gap of studies that examine the potential negative outcomes of avatar embodiment experiences and pointed out some ethical, moral, and legal issues that need to be promptly addressed.
See the full story here: https://thenextweb.com/insider/2019/08/01/embodying-taller-avatars-in-vr-can-make-us-more-confident-in-real-life/
The Future of Virtual Reality in the Workplace
See the original post here: https://www.hrtechnologist.com/articles/digital-transformation/the-future-of-virtual-reality-in-the-workplace/
Moth + Flame – Netflix – 13 Reasons Why
Using natural language processing, when you speak, the characters will answer, giving fans the experience of being able to live inside of their favorite story worlds and getting to feel what it's like when the characters care about what they have to say and think. On our journey to evolve the medium of conversational storytelling, it has been amazing to work with the Netflix team to bring this fan experience to life!
See the experience here: WhoKilledBryceWalker.com
20 COMPANIES MAKING GOOD ON THE PROMISE OF VIRTUAL REALITY
TALESPIN
Industry: Corporate Training, Workforce Development
Location: Culver City, California
What it does: Just because a world is virtual doesn't mean it’s necessarily fantastical. Talespin's newest technology, for instance, recreates one of the most commonplace environments imaginable: the office. The software deposits employees and managers into virtual sales cold calls, performance reviews, and other stressful on-the-job situations, so that they can handle them more adroitly IRL. One simulation, in which a user is tasked with firing “Barry,” a natural language processing-powered “employee,” proved so immersive for one manager that he reportedly cried during the mock-termination.
WEVR
Industry: Media, Entertainment
Location: Venice, Calif.
What it does: When looking at VR through the lens of leisure, we tend to first think gaming. But VR-as-entertainment might just achieve mass appeal in the shape of something more akin to traditional filmic storytelling. WEVR has been driving in that lane for nearly ten years, releasing projects with everyone from Reggie Watts to Run the Jewels to Deepak Chopra. Up soon: the long-awaited virtual-reality film helmed by technophile blockbuster director Jon Favreau (the Lion King reboot). Is it all still a bit niche? Seems that way. But the broader allure is built right in.
FRAMESTORE
Industry: Media, Film
Location: London, England
What it does: You've seen the digital handiwork of Oscar-winning visual-effects craftsmen Framestore in movies like Spider-Man: Far from Home and in TV shows like Black Mirror. The company brings that same visual pizzazz to VR, too, working on the Fantastic Beasts experience for Google's Daydream headset and building a virtual-reality tour of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
See the full story here: https://builtin.com/media-gaming/virtual-reality-companies
Universal is building a new theme park to challenge Disney’s dominance
“Our new park represents the single largest investment Comcast NBCUniversal has made in its theme park business and in Florida overall,” Comcast chief executive Brian Roberts said in a statement.
The addition of Epic Universe will bring Universal Orlando Resort’s total to three major theme parks and one water park. It already includes Universal Studios Florida, Islands of Adventure and Volcano Bay. The new park will be located on a larger 750-acre plot a few miles from the existing resort, according to a news release; Universal will provide transportation to link all the properties.
Details are still scarce about the latest Universal development; officials have not said when it will open, how large the park itself will be, or what types of rides and intellectual property it will feature.
See the full story here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/08/01/universal-is-building-new-theme-park-challenge-disneys-dominance/?utm_term=.0d66fa6a3005&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1
