philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

UCLA Lecturer’s classes, presentation explore limits of virtual reality

A Nikon 360-degree camera stood on a tripod, unattended, in the middle of Bruin Plaza.

“We were really interested in playing with the idea of surveillance because we live in a time when cameras are everywhere, and we don’t even know they exist and are documenting our presence,” said the fourth-year Design | Media Arts student.

Projects like Bashiri’s, which use technology to tackle real-world issues like surveillance, are the norm in UCLA Game Lab lecturer Daniel Landau’s Design | Media Arts class, “Topics in Video and Animation: Art and Science of Virtual Reality,” this quarter.

Landau’s work focuses on how technology can affect the human race on an emotional level. His “Time-Body Study” performative experiment demonstrates the adaptability of the human mind in response to its technological environment.

At the presentation, participants will be chosen from the audience to demonstrate the effects that virtual reality technology can have on the mind.

Participants in Landau’s presentation cognitively believe they are in the body of a 7-, 40-and 80-year-old person by using a headpiece programmed with virtual reality technology.

The illusion is known as re-embodiment. The effect places the participant in a virtual world, which is also projected on a screen for the audience to see.

See the full story here: http://dailybruin.com/2017/02/26/lecturers-classes-presentation-explore-limits-of-virtual-reality/

Why Augmented Reality Will Be the Next Revolution in Retail

The New Table Stakes

Creating awareness

Growing engagement.

Converting attention to action.

Building enduring loyalty.

See the full story here: http://www.strategy-business.com/article/Why-Augmented-Reality-Will-Be-the-Next-Revolution-in-Retail?gko=dbc10

Kong: Skull Island raises the hype level with this VR trailer narrated by Samuel L. Jackson

See the trailer here; https://youtu.be/7KNxmqv5xdQ 

Kong: Skull Island is only a measly nine days from its premiere and what better way to get hyped from some monkey business than a full-blown VR trailer?

That's right, after Warner Bros. released their supposed "last" trailer they also decided to release a virtual reality trailer. This almost two-minute long trailer puts the viewer on a 360°helicopter ride while Lt. Colonel Packard, Samuel L. Jackson, reiterates the story of Icarus. As those who are familiar with the big ape, or other huge monsters, probably guessed things don't go according to plan.

The trailer itself was created by  Legendary VR, ILMxLabs, the same company who worked on the movie. It can be watched in a whole number of resolutions and works even without a VR headset, though watching it with a VR headset is recommended.

See the full story here: http://www.gamezone.com/news/watch-kong-skull-island-raises-the-hype-level-with-this-vr-trailer-narrated-by-samuel-l-jackson-3451276

India’s First Ever Virtual Reality Cinema In Mumbai Is Now Open For Bookings

...the first one ever in the world was established in Amsterdam in May last year, and in less than a year, India has got its own virtual reality cinema, thanks to Enlighten Film Society.

You can book for the Sunday shows on BookMyShow.com and experience being in a movie while watching it.

See the full story here: http://www.indiatimes.com/entertainment/celebs/good-news-india-s-first-ever-virtual-reality-cinema-in-mumbai-is-now-open-for-bookings-272326.html

Popularity of Sony’s PlayStation VR Surprises Even the Company

Even Andrew House, global chief executive of Sony Interactive Entertainment, the video game division of the Japanese electronics giant, had doubts about how quickly virtual reality would be embraced by the mass market.

It turns out Mr. House was too cautious. The headset, PlayStation VR, has been scarce in many stores, especially in Japan, since it went on sale in October. In an interview at his Silicon Valley office on Friday, Mr. House revealed PlayStation VR’s sales for the first time, saying consumers had purchased 915,000 of the headsets as of Feb. 19, roughly four months after it went on sale.

In contrast, during its first three months on the market in 2007, Apple sold nearly 1.4 million iPhones; a feat now considered among the most successful technology products of all time.

Last week at its offices, Sony provided a demonstration of a new gun-shaped device, the PlayStation VR Aim controller, that will allow players to more easily aim and shoot weapons within virtual reality games. The controller and first game that uses it, a space adventure called Farpoint, will come out May 16.

See the full story here; https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/26/business/sony-playstation-vr-sales.html?_r=0

Virtual-reality system for the elderly wins health care prize

At last night’s MIT Sloan Healthcare Innovations Prize pitch competition, Rendever earned the $25,000 grand prize for creating a virtual-reality platform that gives residents in assisted-living facilities the chance to explore the world virtually. The platform also provides cognitive therapy and tracks movement data to aid in early diagnosis of dementia.

“We’re using virtual reality to improve the way we age, so you don’t become isolated, don’t become depressed, and you can keep your mind happy and healthy,” said Rendever co-founder and CEO Dennis Lally, an MIT Sloan School of Management student who launched the startup with classmate Reed Hayes.

In the team’s winning pitch, Rendever said its system includes multiple virtual-reality headsets, custom software, and a tablet. The software syncs headsets together, so users can join together in a virtual world, visiting childhood homes, exotic locales, sports games, or a relative’s wedding across the world. The headsets can be controlled simultaneously by caregivers, using the tablet. All content is also custom-made by Rendever, based on 20 million gigabytes of content mined from the internet.

Apart from providing a socializing tool, the system can double as a form of reminiscence therapy, which involves discussing past experiences, with aid of photographs, familiar items, and music — or virtual cues, in the case of Rendever.

According to trial studies, Rendever’s system has increased overall resident happiness at the Brookdale Senior Living Community in Massachusetts by 40 percent, Lally said. The startup is currently working with the MIT AgeLab to validate those statistics.

Rendever also hopes to leverage virtual-reality data to aid in diagnosing dementia, which currently relies on qualitative studies and expert opinion. “We’re creating a data-driven [diagnostics] solution,” Lally said.

Users are asked to work through real-life simulations, such as making dinner, completing a series of tasks. In the process, Rendever’s software collects thousands of data points per minute on movement, reaction time, and executive function. All this can lead to earlier interventions for dementia patients and help measure the efficacy of treatments.

“We can track very precisely how someone moves through this space, and what they were doing,” Hayes, Rendever’s chief operations officer, told MIT News. “We also built a machine-learning model that’s currently being trained to help find patterns [characteristic of] someone who has early-stage dementia versus someone of healthy mind.”

Rendever’s prize money will help fund research and development, with a second trial study kicking off soon. Hayes attributes the team’s win to tapping into an underserved need. “Everyone has a parent or grandparent who’s getting older … and not much can be done when they can’t leave the house,” he said. “The solution we built is a fun way for them to re-experience the world again, to be explorers. We’re bringing that to a demographic that has lost the ability [to explore].”

Last year, Rendever entered the pitch competition — its first entrepreneurship contest ever — and made it to the semifinals round. By refining the business and technology through MIT classes at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship — under the watchful eye of managing director Bill Aulet — the team came out on top, Reed said. “It’s this awesome story for us to come back [to the competition] and win,” he said.

See the full story here: http://news.mit.edu/2017/virtual-reality-elderly-sloan-health-care-innovations-prize-0224

Interview: IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond Talks Virtual Reality

Mendelson: Of the games that you've launched so far, what are your favorites? I assume you've played them all.

Gelfond: I haven't played them all. The reason is I'm a 61-year-old male. They weren't all made for me. For example, one called The Wire, lets you walk out on a tightrope between the World Trade Centers. I'm not very fond of heights. You're never going to get me to do that. I think the John Wick game is really intriguing because it's based off a movie franchise. Also, it uses our Starbreeze VR glasses. It's called Star VR, which is a wider field of view. I think it's a little bit of a peek into the future.

We're just starting to toy with multi-player games. I did "Eagle Flight" with three on three. That was really intriguing. We've gotten a lot of positive feedback on " Tatooine,”, which is our Star Wars VR experience. They're all pretty good. I think we're at the beginning of the technology, not the end of it. I think they'll continue to get better and better.

See the full story here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2017/02/23/interview-imax-ceo-richard-gelfond-talks-virtual-reality/#66f6919a531e

Apple’s new patent might be a hint for future Augmented Reality apps on iPhone

[PhilNote: I can't believe something so obvious is approved for a patent!]

This week Apple has been granted a new patent for creating digital avatars on the iOS ecosystem.

Titled as ‘Avatar Editing Environment’ the new USPTO patent allows iPhoneand iPad owners to create a digital representation of themselves using their devices.

Starting with a blank face the user can add, rescale and position different elements on the blank face, including but not limited to different eyes, ears, mouth (including teeth and smile), nose, eyebrows, hair, beard, moustache, glasses, earrings, hats, and other elements that are associated with physical characteristics of humans and fashion. The user can also change the shape of the avatar’s face, the avatar’s skin color and the color of all the elements.

See the full story here: https://haptic.al/apples-new-patent-might-be-a-hint-for-future-augmented-reality-apps-on-iphone-e1449c2cb47c#.mseyepifu

PAYMENTS INNOVATION Does Commerce Have A Role To Play In Virtual Reality?

Matt Ozvat, head of developer integrations at Vantiv, and Josh Mather, technology evangelist at Vantiv, whose Vantiv O.N.E. developer experience includes a virtual reality and augmented reality community, both agreed that now is the time when the adoption of VR/AR is starting to gain traction as consumers begin to find new use cases for the technologies whose potential they didn’t fully realize before.

Ozvat is confident that the push toward invisible payments is one that will continue going forward as merchants seek to find more opportunities to provide fast and frictionless transactions to their consumers.

“Removing cards and wallets altogether from the [payment] experience is something to keep always on your horizon. These new concepts of eCommerce, AR/VR and whatever crazy technology comes next will all be focused around making it so easy to buy,” he said.

Conceptualizing and designing VR/AR consumer experience solutions are at the heart of the Virtual 2 Reality Challenge coming up at the Innovation Project next month.

See the full story here: http://www.pymnts.com/news/payments-innovation/2017/does-commerce-have-a-role-to-play-in-virtual-reality/

Zappar Goes from $84,000 Kickstarter to $3.75 Million Series A Funding for Mobile AR

ZapWorks, Zappar's primary product, is a development environment for using 3D models with animation and image tracking tools to create many types of experiences. The output of that development process is designed for augmented, mixed, and virtual reality uses on mobile devices and head-mounted displays.

The ZapBox, the augmented reality version of Google Cardboard, uses an external camera to project the outside view of the user to the phone being used. This is designed to simulate an augmented reality experience far less expensive than any of the standalone AR devices out on the market at the moment.

See the full story here; https://hololens.reality.news/news/zappar-goes-from-84-000-kickstarter-3-75-million-series-funding-for-mobile-ar-0176332/