By Caspar Thykier, Co-founder and CEO of Zappar

It’s been a week now since the end of AWE, which is enough time to reflect and get a healthy sense of perspective after the euphoria of the first large in-person gathering for the XR community in some time. And I have to say that the afterglow still lingers and the cynicism hasn’t kicked in!

Now I should say that the folks in and around XR are an endlessly positive bunch which you would expect for people pioneering a new computing platform: panhandling for digital gold comes with a degree of optimism generally, but with that comes a sense of camaraderie and a collegiate approach to problem solving where, although we might be competitive, the amount of blue ocean is so vast that in our group endeavour the tide rises for all (to continue the water-based analogy).

Folks in and around XR are an endlessly positive bunch which you would expect for people pioneering a new computing platform: panhandling for digital gold comes with a degree of optimism generally @ZapparApp
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An Open Forum

This means that AWE is an incredibly open forum for discussion around new product developments and software solutions, best practice, creating standards from every aspect of the ecosystem from top to bottom.

The tone is undoubtedly set up by the ever ebullient personality of Ori Inbar who always kicks off AWE with his special brand of positive energy and off-beat humour. It immediately takes the shackles off and opens up the room and event to informal discussion.

John Hanke’s keynote from Niantic and launch of Lightship brought so many important themes together of how AR can play a positive benefit in our lives and deliver those missing elements for immersion from accurate location mapping, occlusion, and collaboration to deliver heightened experiences. His words about the time for AR being now certainly resonated with our sense at Zappar of where the market is for mobile AR after ten years of foundation building.

What crystallised in my mind during the event and countless conversations with both old and new voices across the industry, was a sense that we are at a point where the stars have somewhat aligned for AR @ZapparApp
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In many ways what crystallised in my mind over the two and a half days of the event and countless conversations with both old and new voices across the industry, was a sense that we are at a point where the stars have somewhat aligned for AR: when it comes to the performance of devices; the speed of networks; the capability of the software and developer tools; and the greater understanding, amongst the business and brand community, of the power of AR to drive positive results for different use cases.

AR Coming of Age

There are of course many exciting new developments still to come but we’re now at a level of maturity in AR with enough data points to see that spatial computing really delivers a level of engagement, positive brand experience, and conversion to sale that many other media cannot provide. Sure, buy your usual digital media if you want reach, but what is reach without engagement? And how real are those impressions? Spatial computing and AR deliver a digital content experience that is active, lean-in, and commands attention with levels of engagement that other channels can only dream of. Looking at the level of creativity on display at the Auggie Awards you can see why. (And OK, yes we did win the Best Campaign Award for our work with Countdown in New Zealand alongside their shopper marketing agency Craze so I might be a bit biased!).

Spatial computing and AR deliver a digital content experience that is active, lean-in, and commands attention with levels of engagement that other channels can only dream of @ZapparApp
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Now it would be hard to write a piece on AWE without mentioning the Metaverse given how soon after the Facebook (sorry, Meta!) announcement the event fell. I can’t speak for everyone but my sense was that overall people see the ambition of Meta as being positive in terms of the firepower it will put behind the exploration of the next computing platform but probably don’t thank it for the level of confusion and misunderstanding it now brings.

Déjà Vu?

The late noughties and early teens saw a lot of work trying to explain what AR isn’t as much as what is and its potential benefits for brands, businesses, and end-users. Back then, as now with the Metaverse, there was a fairly clear consensus on the direction of travel required for AR to become more everyday and useful to people, and over time that came to pass (from tech to tool). The Metaverse is in a similar position of becoming a reality in time, as long as we don’t confuse people, make it overly complex and ensure the community works together to deliver the right safeguards, security, interoperability and standards that everyone will benefit from and learn the lessons and mistakes from the web. I think Tony Parisi’s Seven Rules is a pretty great start point if you want to get into the weeds of it. I look forward to seeing how it all lands at AWE in 2030.

My sense was that overall, people appreciate the ambition of Meta as being positive in terms of the firepower it will put behind the exploration of the next computing platform but not the confusion and misunderstanding it brings
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Raising the Bar

Finally, I must also give the bar at the Hyatt a special mention. The hotel is pretty unassuming and the bar is too but for two days and nights, it becomes its own microcosm. If you happened to be passing through and not attending AWE as a guest, the array of headsets people were wearing and the snippets of conversation you’d pick up would make you feel as if you’d landed on another planet! But it’s here, as always with events, that the real connections get made and new opportunities germinate and partnerships formed.

What the bar at the Hyatt Santa Clara lacks in character and color it provides as a blank canvas that is painted on in glorious technicolour by this wonderfully eclectic assortment of coders, creatives and clients at AWE 2021
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There is no Zoom call or virtual lobby that can get you down these weird and wonderful rabbit holes created by organised serendipity and unconstructed conversations. What the bar itself lacks in character and color it provides as a blank canvas that is painted on in glorious technicolour by this wonderfully eclectic assortment of coders, creatives and clients at AWE. It’s a rare thing but luckily we will be back again before we know it in June ‘22 as AWE hopefully returns to its original slot in our calendars.

A big thank you to the organisers and all the attendees for making AWE a singularly special event.

The post Building the Metaverse Community appeared first on Tech Trends.

The world’s biggest brands are now consistently embracing AR technology to enhance their products and engage users with truly interactive experiences. One interesting example of this was Samsung’s recent launch of its new Galaxy Z Fold3 5G, Galaxy Z Flip3 5G, and the new Watch4 series.

Brands like @SamsungMobile are embracing AR technology to enhance their products and engage users with truly interactive experiences
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The global telecoms giant chose to leverage these important product launches with in-store AR experiences, where scannable QR codes let customers experience these new devices and what they have to offer while they are making their purchasing decision.

Key to the success of this campaign is a shift away from focusing on the device’s features and onto the experiences and advantages they offer. With the average time spent in the AR clocked at 3.5 minutes, it’s clear customers are really engaging with these Samsung product experiences.

WebAR and the Future of Retail

Belgian Content Marketing agency HeadOffice partnered with AR studio PLAYAR and UK-based Augmented Reality experts Zappar, which ran the experience in its WebAR ZapWorks platform. All this immersive tech expertise converged to create an experience that truly puts the user front-and-centre in the discovery of the new foldables.

This is a revolutionary use of @ZapparApp WebAR technology, which leverages Augmented Reality storytelling to bring these new @SamsungMobile foldables to life. #GalaxyZFold3 #GalaxyZFlip3 #GalaxyWatch
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This is a revolutionary use of Zappar’s WebAR technology, which leverages Augmented Reality storytelling to bring these new Samsung foldables to life. They were created with the company’s AR platform, ZapWorks which actively helps customers visualize how these devices will enhance their lives. And the resulting engagement figures speak for themselves:

“We’re really excited with the in-store responses we’ve gotten,” says Nathan Grotard, retail marketeer at Samsung Belgium. “The average time spent in the experience is over 3 minutes, which means customers really get into the AR experience.”

With the average time spent in the AR clocked at 3.5 minutes, it’s clear customers are really engaging with these @SamsungMobile product experiences #GalaxyZFold3 #GalaxyZFlip3 #GalaxyWatch
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The scannable QR codes were communicated through screens, wobblers, and spec cards, new in 850 stores spread out over Belgium, Luxemburg, and the Netherlands, as well as newsletters, print advertising, and out-of-home advertising near bus stops.

“The Samsung experience clearly demonstrates how innovative brands are getting ahead in the new retail revolution, driving a more seamless and engaging product experience online and in-store,” says Max Dawes, Managing Director at Zappar.

A Spectrum of Augmented Reality Experiences

The Galaxy Z Fold3 5G, the multitasking productivity powerhouse, focuses on a seamless unrivalled performance. HeadOffice created three user experiences that show that device owners can watch, work and play in any situation. From the location where the QR code is scanned, they are being transported to a beach, a hotel lounge and their living room.

As for the Galaxy Z Flip3 5G, the agency embraces the lifestyle of the trendsetter target audience. Capturing their lives on the go, it showcases the advantages of a pocket-size stand-alone smartphone by telling small stories by the pool or in the park with 3D objects.

Last but not least, for the Galaxy Watch4 series (Watch4 and Watch4 Classic), they transport the users to a tennis court or on a bicycle, and demonstrate how the Galaxy Watch4 can check your body composition and blood pressure.

The #GalaxyZFold3 AR experience shows that device owners can watch, work and play in any situation, transporting @SamsungMobile customers to a beach, a hotel lounge and their own living room using @ZapparApp WebAR technology
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Bas Gezelle, strategy lead at PLAYAR Studio, commented that “The design and user experience of both foldables are excellent and that is brought to life in the AR experience. A seamless high-end experience where the product is discovered through interactive storytelling.”

@ZapparApp created a @SamsungMobile seamless high-end WebAR experience where the product is discovered through interactive storytelling
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Alice Bonasio is a technology journalist, communications consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio and @techtrends_tech on Twitter.

The post Revolutionizing Retail with Augmented Reality appeared first on Tech Trends.

Technologies such as Virtual, Augmented, and Mixed reality – referred to as XR – have long been collectively touted as an “Empathy Machine,” and for very good reason. They enable us to easily change our perspective and experience what it’s like to “walk a mile in someone else’s shoes,” which makes them particularly well-suited for soft skills training.

VR pioneers such as Nonny de la Peña explored these empathy-building possibilities in works such as “Across the Line” and there is a growing body of research looking at the impact of virtual embodiment on behavior. Some of the most salient examples of this include a study which indicated that convicted domestic abusers embodying a woman in an assault scenario will improve their faculty to recognize fear in a woman’s face, or that people embodying a man becoming homeless would be more likely to sign a petition to build social housing sent to them weeks later.

Researchers have long been interested in the way we relate with avatars, and how these digital representations of ourselves affect our identity and perceptions of one another
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Do virtual lives matter?

Christophe Mallet, co-founder of BODYSWAPS – an immersive technologies innovation agency based in London – points to a study which showed that people who embodied a Black man in virtual reality were less likely to pronounce a guilty verdict in mock legal scenarios involving Black defendants and a limited body of evidence.

“You can only ever be yourself. That’s part of the human condition. That means we have a natural tendency to dehumanise the ‘other’, to diminish their suffering, to negate their complexity. And that’s how we often justify the unbelievable amount of cruelty we inflict upon each other as a species,” Mallet adds.

In the face of the important debates currently taking place following the tragic killing of George Floyd and the growing momentum behind the Black Lives Matter movement in the U.S. and around the world, this begs the question of what role technology can play in helping to address the monumental challenge of tackling systemic racism in society.

“Everyone, including those in the technology industry, has a moral obligation to help tackle the problem of systemic marginalization and racism,” says Wendy Morgan, CEO and founder of Shift, which uses VR and AI-based training to allow people to recognize their own biases and gain tools to address it and track lasting change and progress.

She says many people who have taken their virtual courses report that the experience has changed their lives and views. Yet although the technology industry has an opportunity to create unique and powerful tools that affect change, Morgan stresses that lasting change can only stem from long-term engagement with the subject through a variety of learning experiences and systemic change within organizations, including hiring practices, operating procedures and a careful examination of how each person is treated.

Does the ability to control the image we project to others during social interactions present an opportunity to bypass bias altogether?
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A matter of perception

In the notorious “Heidi vs Howard” case study, students at Columbia Business School were asked to rate their perception of the profile of a successful Silicon Valley venture capitalist. Half of the class received the profile with the name Heidi at the top, and the other half received a copy with the name Howard. The students rated the VC with the male name as more likeable, even though their professional qualifications were the same. This is a classic example of how even knowing a candidate’s name can dramatically bias processes such as recruitment.

Technologies such as Virtual, Augmented, and Mixed reality – referred to as XR – are collectively touted as an Empathy Machine
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Many companies have now adopted a system where people charged with selecting and evaluating applications and resumes do not actually see the applicant’s name, but once those same candidates reach the interview stage, those biases surely reassert themselves.

Could virtual recruitment practices be the solution? Imagine a world where, instead of meeting in person, applicants are represented by an avatar that levels the playing field and helps tackle and change enduring racist institutions and procedures.

“With Bodyswaps, the VR soft skills training platform I co-founded, we allow people in embodied simulations to speak to virtual characters using their own voice then swap bodies to watch themselves back, effectively sitting across from themselves and learn by experience how they impact others. This creates unprecedented self-awareness and, with practice, builds the confidence to change one’s behavior,” says Mallet.

Apart from sounding like quite an attractive option in these times of social distancing and remote working dictated by the global COVID-19 pandemic, this presents an opportunity to either bypass such issues of bias – be it gender, race, age, disability or sexual orientation – or at the very least highlight these in order to force us to confront them head-on, much as the Columbia University study did.

Hacking unconscious bias

Researchers have long been interested in the way we relate with avatars, and how these digital representations of ourselves affect our identity and perceptions of one another. So as we start spending more and more time in ever-more-realistic virtual worlds, does the ability to control the image we project to others during social interactions present an opportunity to bypass bias altogether?

“VR is a fascinating medium because it allows you to embody someone else, to experience being this ‘other’. In VR, you step into a virtual body and evolve in a simulated world in a naturalistic way, it’s a machine to create lived-in experiences. And that new body of yours can be of any gender, race, age or type of disability,” explains Mallet.

Morgan adds that her company has seen demand surge for their virtual training solutions, but this in itself can be a double-edged sword. “It makes me unbelievably sad that the continued loss of lives and the violent backlash is what has caused this demand to go up, however, now that there is a greater awareness of the problems that have plagued our world throughout all of history, it gives me hope that everyone is becoming aware of this issue and are reaching out for help and solutions. We must at all costs avoid racial tokenism and not just give lip service or check a box on this. People and organizations must be willing to do what it takes to make a lasting impact and change, and that takes time and help.”

This article was originally published on Futurithmic

“VR creates previously impossible ways of generating empathy and self-awareness,” says @BODYSWAPS_VR CEO Christophe Mallet https://t.co/wBCF7izy1u

— Futurithmic (@futurithmic) August 5, 2020

The post Hacking Unconscious Bias appeared first on Tech Trends.

By Ela Darling, co-founder of Gamelodge

The process of building an indie video game, especially for Virtual Reality, can be an arduous years-long endeavor. Becoming a professional game developer takes years of specialized study, building connections, and mastering emerging technology, with the reward of working in an exciting creative field. Like any industry, it takes focus and dedication to become a pro. But this barrier of entry can be a limitation on new, diverse game concepts.

For an aspiring game developer without a background in tech, the path to creating a game can be long and daunting, especially for VR. Between navigating the esoteric nuances of a game engine and learning complex coding languages, it can take months to even approach the starting point of development. Identifying bugs and merging branches with a co-developer makes the process even longer. But a new application called Gamelodge seeks to accelerate that process.

It can take months to even approach the starting point of development
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For an aspiring game developer without a background in tech, the path to creating a game can be long and daunting, especially for VR
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Gamelodge, is a new platform that serves as both a depot for games made by other users and a stepping stone for aspiring game developers. It is a cooperative game engine that offers users an all in one opportunity to design, script, and share game ideas socially in VR and on desktop. It aims to resolve common pain points in game development, such as the tedious write, compile, distribute, test process, by eliminating the need to compile code and allowing users to build and test together in real-time. The application is available on Kickstarter through August 22, 2020.

Existing applications that have attempted to offer a sandbox game building environment have a variety of limitations that Gamelodge overcomes. Roblox has become popular with young gamers, but falls short on graphical fidelity and VR controls. Other options that thrive in VR suffer from limited scripting accessibility, poor control systems, and often don’t offer desktop support. These shortcomings are core competencies in Gamelodge.

Gamelodge, is a new platform that serves as both a depot for games made by other users and a stepping stone for aspiring game developers
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From start to finish, a user with no experience with complex game engines or knowledge of code can build a game in a weekend. Objects, particles, and textures can be easily uploaded to the shared database, or users can drag and drop objects from the existing library of models to start building a scene. Users can make games without writing a line of code with the in-app scripting library. New scripts can be swiftly written in Miniscript and immediately applied without compiling a new build or exiting the program. The whole process can be done collaboratively with other users in-game.

Only 20 percent of game released games make a profit
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From start to finish, a user with no experience with complex game engines or knowledge of code can build a game in a weekend
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Even experienced developers can find value from a tool that allows for such swift creation. One study showed that just 20% of released games make a profit, which means a lot of time, money, and energy is lost on games that don’t resonate with their audience. For a creator who is debating the direction to take their next project, the ability to build and test game concepts in an easy and accessible environment can be a form of early market research. An early draft of a game idea, built quickly and shared within the community, may help identify which aspects resonate with players and which parts miss the mark.

In the ever-growing yet slowly diversifying community of game developers, new tools that help democratize the industry are more important than ever. Broadening access to both creating and testing games could reduce developer resource waste and expand the voices and concepts showcased in the game world. Ultimately, a space that allows anyone to play and create games with friends collaboratively across platforms could break down some of the barriers in game development and empower a new community of creators.

In the ever-growing yet slowly diversifying community of game developers, new tools that help democratize the industry are more important than ever
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To become a chef, you must attend culinary school, but you don’t need a culinary degree to cook a good meal. With tools that increase accessibility to game development, you don’t need an engineering degree to build a good game.

About the author, Ela Darling, co-founder of Gamelodge

Ela has a diverse background in Virtual Reality spanning over six years. Cofounder of GonzoVR, a live VR broadcasting platform, and Gamelodge, a comprehensive sandbox game builder. She has spoken about various aspects of VR at conferences all over the world including a TEDx talk in 2016, and is considered a pioneer in certain verticals in the industry.

The post Expert View: Eroding the Barrier to Entry in Game Development appeared first on Tech Trends.

By Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble

The Infinite Retina comprehensively documents everything you need to know about Spatial Computing and where it’s heading
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Spatial Computing, the fourth paradigm of personal computing, sounds like science fiction but isn’t. Unlike previous paradigms of computing, like working on a laptop or a mobile phone, Spatial Computing allows you to move around inside computing. You will be able to talk to new virtual beings who will know more about your world than any single human does and you will literally talk to and touch the computing that will be all around you, either within complete virtual environments or within new forms of augmented reality. R&D labs are already showing us that it will go beyond that, with sensors that will interact with your brain directly – not needing optics or keyboards. But for now, that’s five to 20 years further out.

In this article, we will explore the fundamentals and scope of Spatial Computing and how The Infinite Retina by Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble provides an insightful look at the future of augmented reality and Spatial Computing.

Spatial Computing, the fourth paradigm of personal computing, sounds like science fiction but isn’t
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Components and Scope of Spatial Computing

Spatial Computing includes all the software and technology needed to move around in a digital 3D world. That is software and technology associated with AI, including machine learning and natural language processing, Computer Vision, augmented reality, virtual reality, and all other apps that support the creation and the maintenance of a digital 3D world. We see great strides that will be made in how Spatial Computing is being used across many industry verticals, including Transportation, Technology, Media, and Telecommunications (TMT), Manufacturing, Retail, Healthcare, Finance, and Education. There are chapters in The Infinite Retina that detail our vision of where each of these industries will be when the Spatial Computing wave hits.

The current state of Spatial Computing and Augmented Reality

The holy grail of Spatial Computing is a pair of very light glasses, or contact lenses, that let computers completely change how we perceive the real world via next-generation augmented and virtual reality that some call “mixed reality.” While we have early devices that give us a taste, like Microsoft HoloLens, these big and expensive devices haven’t yet made their way onto consumers’ faces. That will change over the next few years as these devices become much smaller and more capable due to new 3D sensors, new Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision, and new hyper-small displays. The HoloLens is already changing industries, and the book describes how this new technology is being used in places like operating rooms and factories. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. We’ll see many more uses for this technology as the devices get smaller and become more capable. In other words, we are literally at the beginning of a new age in computing, the Spatial Computing Age. By the end of the 2030s, how we compute will be radically different than it is today and, we posit, much more enjoyable and more productive, to boot.

We see great strides that will be made in how Spatial Computing is being used across many industry verticals
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The inclination of big firms like Tesla, Apple, and Facebook towards Spatial Computing

Spatial Computing is a new paradigm of computing where humans, robots, and virtual beings move through computing. Companies like Tesla, Apple, and Facebook are investing heavily in it because of its capability to completely change how we access, organize, and use information. Instead of seeing computing on flat screens on laptops or phones, computing will literally be on everything and will be controllable with our hands, eyes, and voice. In addition, robots and autonomous vehicles will use Spatial Computing to move around and assist humans, which will lead to very deep economic and societal changes as well.

By the end of the 2030s, how we compute will be radically different than it is today
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The Impact of Spatial Computing

The world is about to radically change. Factories will become much more virtual. We are seeing not only new kinds of robots, called “cobots” because they work much more closely with humans, but they are also being virtualized to enable new kinds of training and remote working, too. This calibre of change will be seen across many jobs — from new kinds of retail experiences to massive changes to transportation.

The Infinite Retina by Irena Cronin and Robert Scoble provides an insightful look at the future of augmented reality and Spatial Computing
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Spatial Computing emerges as a major culture-changing force
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The objective behind The Infinite Retina

Our goals were to understand and record shifts to the business world and society that are currently underway due to Spatial Computing, and to gain perspectives on what its impact will be in three-to-five years and then ten years out. We talked with dozens of pioneers in many fields, from healthcare to retail to finance to entertainment. This is a hugely important book as a new paradigm shift (the fourth of the personal computing age) hits both consumers and enterprises. We documented this paradigm shift in The Infinite Retina.

The holy grail of Spatial Computing is a pair of very light glasses, or contact lenses, that let computers completely change how we perceive the real world
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Spatial Computing emerges as a major culture-changing force. In the book, readers will look at what is driving business to adopt robots, voice-driven user interfaces, immersive VR or AR training, along with Spatial Computing glasses that will change literally everything about computing. The book also introduces what this all means culturally, both pro and con.

The Infinite Retina lays out why Spatial Computing is the future of technology and why companies like Facebook, Qualcomm, Apple, Microsoft and others are each spending billions of dollars in R&D to make it happen. The book also explains why these shifts are already underway and why the next three-to-five years will see a huge wave of Spatial Computing devices and supporting technology.

Robots and autonomous vehicles will use Spatial Computing to move around and assist humans
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Irena Cronin is the CEO of Infinite Retina, a company based in Pasadena, California that helps businesses enter and succeed in Spatial Computing. She has advised many decision-makers on business strategies related to Spatial Computing which includes AR/VR, Artificial Intelligence, Facial Recognition, Robotics, Autonomous Vehicles, and other related technologies.

Robert Scoble is the Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) of Infinite Retina and a bestselling author. Over the course of his career, he has interviewed thousands of entrepreneurs and has been the first to see the creation of many new technology companies, from Siri to Tesla.

The post Looking Through the Infinite Retina appeared first on Tech Trends.

Vancouver-based start-up Precision OS just introduced a new multiplayer feature for VR surgical training platform. This means that surgeons and nurses can work together in the same operating room even if they are physically thousands of miles apart.

The functionality allows up to five avatars at a time, with the collaborative feature bringing multiple users into a single virtual Operating Room
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The functionality allows up to five avatars at a time, with the collaborative feature bringing multiple users into a single virtual Operating Room (OR).

“Multiplayer now permits simultaneous access to the same virtual OR by many users. Each user receives an avatar along with their colleagues while performing surgery,” explained Dr. Danny Goel, a practicing orthopedic surgeon and Chief Executive Officer of Precision OS.

In an era of rapidly advancing technologies and procedures, training is often a rate-limiting factor
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The lack of access to high-quality surgical education is also affecting medical device companies. In an era of rapidly advancing technologies and procedures, training is often a rate-limiting factor. Current training approaches vary in effectiveness and are not helping to address cost, and, most importantly, surgical mastery. It is a well-established fact that by reducing the cognitive load on the brain, training powered by immersive technology allows for better and more efficient training.

Even before the coronavirus, traditional training was simply not up to the challenge of educating today’s surgeons
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Even before the coronavirus, traditional training was simply not up to the challenge of educating today’s surgeons, especially not in the numbers needed to cope with demand. This situation, needless to say, has now become greatly exacerbated by the circumstances brought on with the COVID-19 outbreak. Surgery residents are getting less hands-on experience than ever, and it’s affecting their confidence and autonomy. A significant percentage didn’t feel ready to independently perform core procedures upon residency completion, and over 90% opt for an additional fellowship year. In an effort to address this, The American Board of Surgery (ABS) recommended: “rather than increasing the number of cases, we should be increasing the quality of teaching both clinical and procedural skills.” Immersive technology proved a crucial game-changer.

The lack of access to high-quality surgical education is also affecting medical device companies
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As the new normal imposed by the coronavirus pandemic settles in for the long-term, it’s crucial that we continue to explore and implement these XR collaborative tools
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Precision OS is backed by the AO Foundation and is currently the only scientifically validated, peer-reviewed and published immersive virtual reality product on the market. It was founded by a team of clinical orthopedic surgeons and game developers to create the most relevant and applicable medical-grade simulation experience.

The new enhanced collaboration feature builds on the notion of double-loop learning, an educational concept grounded in search, exploration, and decision-making with the “why” in mind. Unlike single-loop learning methods like lectures or videos via tablet, the Precision OS module is interactive and encourages the user to delve deeper into an ultra-realistic simulation while allowing for failure in a constructive learning cycle.

“Through technology, we’re now able to assemble multidisciplinary teams for training without anyone having to travel,” Goel adds. Recently, Precision OS trained more than 300 medical device sales representatives using virtual reality in just 30 minutes. With multiplayer, Dr. Goel said he envisions surgeons remotely collaborating with other surgeons, trainees, and key OR personnel. including device reps.

The Precision OS platform runs with the Oculus Quest headset, making it a portable and cost-effective option that could be used anywhere
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The enhancement grants multiple users in different locations simultaneous access to the same learning module. The platform runs with the Oculus Quest headset, making it a portable and cost-effective option that could theoretically be used anywhere in the world.

“Multiplayer is literally and figuratively adding another dimension to our proficiency focused training platform. Enabling this type of collaboration and knowledge-share typically found in a clinical setting is of great significance,” concludes Goel.

As the “new normal” imposed by the coronavirus pandemic settles in for the long-term, it’s crucial that we continue to explore and implement these XR collaborative tools, especially where it comes to training essential healthcare workers in the age of remote working and social distancing.

This article was originally published on VRScout

Precision OS Launches Multiplayer Tool For VR Surgical Training via @alicebonasio https://t.co/aEUhi2W1nx pic.twitter.com/GS3DvGHxXO

— VRScout (@VRScout) March 23, 2020

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Virtual Collaboration in the Age of #COVID19 appeared first on Tech Trends.

In the midst of the growing coronavirus pandemic, holding any sort of normal conference is entirely out of the question. But although it might seem like the entire world is grinding to a halt, life goes on and there are still some exciting announcements coming out of the tech world.

XR offers us new ways to enable collaboration, remote work, and all manner of interaction which (at least for a while) might be difficult or downright impossible in real life
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But in fact, there has never been a more opportune time to push for advancements in (and adoption of) immersive tech. As so many of us are asked to work from home or find ourselves isolated from one another, XR offers us new ways to enable collaboration, remote work, and all manner of interaction which (at least for a while) might be difficult or downright impossible in real life.

In the midst of the growing coronavirus pandemic, holding any sort of normal conference is entirely out of the question
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There has never been a more opportune time to push for advancements in (and adoption of) immersive tech
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So we’re excited to see this first all-digital Facebook: Game Developers Showcase which promises many announcements, trailers, developer interviews and more this week.

Things kicked off with a major update to the Oculus Quest system experience that makes VR more flexible, social, and easy to use. It comes with a completely redesigned universal menu, new immersive overlays, and multi-window support for 2D apps starting with Oculus Browser— these updates are launching as experimental features later this month.

The personal dashboard lets you navigate between immersive environments and 2D apps, control your device, and stay connected with people and with your system’s status while in VR
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Redesigned universal menu

The personal dashboard lets you navigate between immersive environments and 2D apps, control your device, and stay connected with people and with your system’s status while in VR. The new design organizes information more clearly to help users navigate to commonly-used system apps like Explore, Store, Browser, and TV more quickly, as well as access key settings like brightness and volume. It also brings recently and frequently used apps front and center so it’s easy to jump back into the action.

Immersive overlays

These make it possible to bring up content, like the universal menu, without leaving the app you’re in. That means it’s easier than ever to find and control system functions without returning to the home screen. This should provide more seamless access to functions like making a friend request, casting, or live streaming. This will be available in WebXR apps launched from Oculus Browser to start and will come to more apps on the Oculus Platform as developers add support, so over time, you’ll have instant access to your menu anytime and anywhere in VR.

Oculus Browser supporting multiple windows

Users can now multitask, opening, closing, and rearranging windows from a new control box above the window. Support for multiple windows will first come to Oculus Browser, with support for more 2D apps like Chats and Store coming later.

These updates continue to evolve the Quest experience and represent a step toward VR becoming the next computing platform
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Together, these updates continue to evolve the Quest experience and represent a step toward VR becoming the next computing platform. It all starts rolling out this month, users can opt-in by going to the Experimental Features section in Settings and toggling the new features on.

The VR platform of the future must enable people to multitask easily, navigate between apps seamlessly, stay connected with others, and quite simply do more. From gaming to media and entertainment, from social experiences to getting work done, VR as the next computing platform will support the full spectrum of uses that people expect from their devices, like phones and laptops, today.

New Timbaland Music Pack Announced for Beat Saber

Launching March 26^th, gamers will be able to access new music by the legendary rapper, created specifically for the game. It features hit artists like Bruno Martini, Kaydence, Common Strangers, Sid Tipton, and Timbaland himself. The pack, priced at $7.99 (or $1.99 per song) on Oculus Quest and Rift, includes the following tracks:

• Sid Tipton, Timbaland – Has A Meaning
• Kaydence, Timbaland – Dumb Thingz
• Wavezswavesz – While We’re Young
• Nash Overstreet, Karra & Common Strangers – What I Like
• Bruno Martini, Timbaland – Famous ft. Jake Davis

On launch day at midnight, these tracks will also be available on iTunes, Apple Music, and Spotify

Beat Saber has also proven a viable way for artists and entertainers to connect with their fans
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Beat Saber continues to dominate the charts and has gone Double-Platinum, selling over 2-million copies worldwide across all platforms. In addition to breaking records within the VR community, the game has also proven a viable way for artists and entertainers to connect with their fans, as the packs have sold 10 million songs through downloadable content from artists like imagine Dragons, Green Day, K/DA, and others.

Beat Saber continues to dominate the charts and has gone Double-Platinum, selling over 2-million copies worldwide across all platforms
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Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Building the VR Platform of the Future appeared first on Tech Trends.

The BIFF is widely recognized as one of the world’s coolest film festivals, and this year is the first time the event is dedicating an entire pavilion to XR experiences, a move that celebrates the evolution of storytelling and recognizes the integral role technology plays in filmmaking. It will feature curated VR films and AR art from around the world, an opening kick-off party, industry meetups, interactive workshops, and the Boulder XR Science Fair highlighting VR and AR innovations from local university labs, tech teams, and professionals.

The BIFF is widely recognized as one of the world’s coolest film festivals,
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BIFF attracts more than 25,000 film enthusiasts, media and industry every year
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BIFF attracts more than 25,000 film enthusiasts, media and industry every year. Now in its 16^th edition and celebrating 100 years of cinema to boot, they are still keen to look to the future as much as celebrating the past. Featured films will include Disney’s “Cycles” and “Myth: A Frozen Tale” as well as keynotes and events where you’ll get to hear from Disney Animation creatives such as Jose Luis Gomez Dias and Jeff Gipson.

“The future of storytelling will be an amazingly new and exciting experience that we can’t even imagine today,” said Kevin Smith, executive producer for BIFF. “The XR Experience provides a glimpse into this ground-breaking new medium while providing a great community event to mix, learn and experience.”

The pavilion space will also prominently feature a retrospective of large-format Augmented Reality artworks from 2011-2018 by HEAVY, a multiple award-winning creative studio that specializes in using immersive technology to reclaim public spaces for civic engagement, enlightened interactivity, and fun & thoughtful experiences. The HEAVY team manages to do this mostly through large-scale art installations that utilize XR technologies to explore the intersections between philosophy, art, and design, utilizing the talents of a mixed group of developers, artists, and academics.

The future of storytelling will be a new and exciting experience that we can’t even imagine today
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Our own personal data has become a digital avatar that often carries a higher degree of perceived value than our physical presence
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Since 2011, the company has pioneered the use of Augmented Reality to engage audiences with fine art installations that explore the building tensions created by a historically analog world quickly transitioning to digital life. Their installations have not only graced events such as SXSW and Google i/o, but also taken over Times Square, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Brussels to the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Wynwood Walls in Miami, and the iconic Bowery Wall in New York.

“It’s really nice to get this recognition for our traditional body of work from over the years, but it’s also a reminder of how far XR has come, both in terms of the tech itself and also as a compelling storytelling and artistic medium in its own right,” says Chris Nunes, Head of Studio at HEAVY.

The high demand for truly innovative experiential art is illustrated by the fact that the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam recently lost its top place as the most popular single-artist museum to Tokyo’s MORI Building DIGITAL ART MUSEUM: teamLab Borderless (or “Borderless” for short).

Since 2011 HEAVY has pioneered the use of Augmented Reality to engage audiences with fine art installations
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And this is a trend that Nunes believes will start gathering significant momentum over the coming months and years as technologies and creative approaches to using them evolve and become more ubiquitous.

“I was at the Tate Modern gallery in London recently and I got really excited imagining the possibilities of making a dedicated art installation for such an amazing, forward-thinking cultural institution. We’ve been engaging with people in urban environments for years as they go about their daily lives, and that’s fantastic, but I think we [in the XR industries] have reached a real tipping point where artists and art fans are actually purposefully seeking out these experiences because of what they add to our understanding of reality and each other’s perspectives. These technologies live with us -in our pockets, under our pillows- and rightfully, are becoming an integral part of the artistic spark and expression, as opposed to something simply added onto the underlying art,” he concludes.

At the BIFF retrospective for HEAVY, visitors will get to experience a range of the studios’ most popular installations, such as “More Human Than Human” [MHTH]. It’s a fascinating use of data visualization and Augmented Reality that debuted in 2018 in Moscow’s Zaryadye Park. The team took datasets from the City of Moscow’s Open Data Portal – specifically, the latitude and longitude of all of the theaters, exhibition halls, and museums in Moscow – and digitally interconnected those waypoints with a 3D lattice that was meshed over a skull model. The idea they wanted to represent through the artwork was that our society’s sense of “self” has become increasingly defined by the accumulation, aggregation, and interpretation of massive amounts of personal data.

“With the rise of ever-present high-powered mobile devices, social media, and artificial intelligence, our own personal data has become a digital avatar that often carries a higher degree of perceived value than our physical presence,” HEAVY Creative Director BC Biermann explains.

Also featured in the exhibit is “Digital Neuron,” which was originally commissioned by the University of Geneva in Switzerland in 2016, and has since won an Auggie at the Augmented World Expo (AWE), was a 2019 Merit winner in education and was named a Top 100 Artistic Destination award by CodaWorx. The piece depicts the neuron’s central importance in human cognition and as the deeper engine of medical research, also using neurons as a visual metaphor for how ideas are spread between people.

These technologies live with us - in our pockets, under our pillows - and rightfully, are becoming an integral part of the artistic spark and expression
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Digital Neuron – augmented reality from Heavy.io on Vimeo.

“Parabola,” is yet another interesting interactive mural included in the retrospective, which featured in San Francisco’s Design Week 2017. It depicts a fractal background with a digital sculpture of a chair in the foreground built by impossibly interlocking and twisted parabolas (the parabola is a foundational design form found in everything from natural forms to product design and DaVinci sketches). Using AR, you can change the scene by moving the chair to different parts of the virtual room, its colors and the design and lighting of the room, and even exploding the entire suite as a form of design protest.

The BIFF XR Experience will be free to attend and runs from March 5th to the 7th at tech co-working space Galvanize
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In the meantime, the HEAVY team continues to push the envelope creatively, and they’re just putting the final touches on a 3 sculpture installation for the newest JW Marriott 5-star hotel in Anaheim which marks the first time they have integrated custom-made 3D sculptures with an AR experience. As far as Nunes and Biermann know, this installation will be the first time anyone has done that, so these are heady times indeed.

The BIFF XR Experience will be free to attend and runs from March 5th to the 7th at tech co-working space Galvanize with the VR Theater moving to the main Festival Tent for a few hours on Sunday, March 8.

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Experiencing Immersive Art in Colorado appeared first on Tech Trends.

This looks to be the year where we move beyond tentative experimentation into scalable deployment of immersive tech in the workplace. That’s the consensus that seems to emerge from “Top 2020 Trends: Enterprise AR & VR” a report published today by Unity Technologies, where 15 industry experts (yours truly among them) outlined how Mixed Reality (or XR depending on what flavor acronym you favor) will supercharge and transform the world of work.

XR has proven to be a paradigm shift for enterprise in terms of boosting productivity, cost-savings, and learning and development
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According to the report, we can expect even cautious companies to finally follow in the footsteps of their pioneering counterparts as XR becomes more accessible and mainstream, driven by a wave of new and improved HMDs, mobile AR and standalone VR, and the onset of 5G networks.

This looks to be the year where we move beyond tentative experimentation into scalable deployment of immersive tech in the workplace
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XR has proven to be a paradigm shift for enterprise in terms of boosting productivity, cost-savings, and learning and development, particularly in relation to highly skilled and specialized areas ranging from surgery to spacecraft engineering. Yet where so far we have seen pioneering companies work largely on an experimental trial-and-error basis, this next decade will see research catching up to meaningfully support this deployment on the ground.

We can expect even cautious companies to finally follow in the footsteps of their pioneering counterparts as XR becomes more accessible and mainstream
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Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, enterprise stakeholders will increasingly have the information and expert guidance at their disposal to tailor and customize solutions optimized for their specific industry, goals, and needs.

A recent Harvard Business Review Analytic Services study found that 87% of large companies are currently exploring, piloting, or deploying Mixed Reality, but the vast majority of those are still in the exploratory or proof-of-concept stages.

Academic research is now being conducted all over the world to investigate not if XR works but how it works and what considerations must be taken into account when designing content. One recent example is this article published on Frontiers in Psychology, which identifies significant differences in how people retain information in the short and long term depending on whether content is delivered in “active” or “passive” VR modes.

In the last couple of years, major companies everywhere ran proof-of-concept XR projects with uniformly positive results
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As more such studies are conducted, and more use cases are shared among enterprise stakeholders across an expanding ecosystem of different industries, we will move on from the heady days of experimental exploration and marveling at the power of immersive technologies towards more targeted, considered, evidence-based and industry-specific approaches. In other words, enterprise XR is about to enter its grown-up phase.

A Harvard Business Review Analytic Services study found that 87% of large companies are currently exploring, piloting, or deploying Mixed Reality
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“After a few years of testing applications, many verticals and use cases have proven ROI. The perception of gimmickry has given way to real business value,” says Maria Fernandez Guajardo, Facebook’s Director of Enterprise AR/VR, adding that 2020 is going to be a critical, if not glamorous, time for enterprise VR. “The industry will need to put in the arduous work of scale: establishing infrastructure, integrating workflows and connecting a comprehensive ecosystem,” she says.

With its effectiveness well established, the time has come for XR to move beyond “fancy demos, proof-of-concepts and pilots” to become “an indispensable digital productivity tool” used across the entire product lifecycle, from R&D to marketing to maintenance the report reads.

Academic research is now being conducted all over the world to investigate not if XR works but how it works and what considerations must be taken into account when designing content
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Yet these new opportunities also bring new challenges. Timoni West, Director of XR Research Unity Labs says UX designers will have to adjust in order to meet the demand for these new kinds of experiences. “Instead of making responsive design just for different devices, they’ll have to start thinking about responsive design as computers react to everything in the real world. Gestures, voice, gaze, time of day, how many people are in the room, and where you are: all of these variables are now new user inputs that have to be taken into account,” she explains.

According to Vinay Narayan VP, Platform Strategy and Developer Community HTC VIVE, this upcoming year will present the most robust ecosystem of innovations yet. “Technological innovations will make XR experiences a widely accessible tool for industrial enterprises of any scope and size,” he says.

There is also a lot of hard work to be done on the infrastructure and connectivity side for this promise to be delivered: “We can expect that enterprises will be spending less time on UX experiments and more time on designing a solid infrastructure around the data,” says Andreea Raducan, Head of Marketing at Innoactive, adding that whether we’re looking at 3D assets, VR apps, internal processes information, or lines of code, data needs to flow across platforms and reach various locations in real-time.

“As 5G networks come online, graphics and compute will increasingly be served from the network edge,” adds NVIDIA’s Director of Virtual Reality David Weinstein. “In the last couple of years, major companies everywhere ran proof-of-concept XR projects. The results were uniformly positive: faster time to market, lower total costs, better trained employees, happier customers, healthier patients. These early results will drive a virtuous cycle of growth and innovation,” he concludes.

Enterprise XR is about to enter its grown-up phase
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You can download the full report for free here

Want the latest insights from industry experts in enterprise AR & VR? Look no further!

Read our blog to see how 2020 will be a defining year https://t.co/zyibVIsMR8

— Unity (@unity3d) February 12, 2020

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Enterprise XR is Coming of Age appeared first on Tech Trends.

If it’s true what they say that time flies when you’re having fun, then 2019 must have been a really good year for immersive tech, because here we are gearing up for the holidays and I haven’t sent a single Christmas card. Literally, where has this year gone? Still, it has been such fun looking back at all the milestones we’ve experienced in immersive computing over the past 12 months, and I actually had a hard time picking out just 25 of them to share again with you.

A pretty compelling picture is starting to emerge of the paradigm shift towards spatial computing
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These stories are ranked in no particular order, and are a mixture of some pretty momentous stuff that has happened in the industry and a sprinkling of use cases that illustrate how these technologies are already impacting every aspect of our lives. When taken together, a pretty compelling picture starts to emerge of the paradigm shift towards spatial computing, and as we look back at the last year and wrap up another decade, it’s a reminder of how far we’ve come, and what’s in store for the future. Will the 2020’s finally hail the age of XR? I think they very well might, and hopefully, we’ll stick together on that journey.

The Oculus Quest saw console-like engagement from users as well as strong sales
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The Oculus Quest was a hit

At this year’s year’s E3 conference, Facebook’s Vice President of Special Gaming Strategies Jason Rubin told audiences that the Oculus Quest was seeing “console-like” engagement from users, selling $5 million worth of content in first 2 weeks since the device started shipping back in May. In fact, the device sold out at retailers such as Amazon, Walmart and Newegg. Since then, Facebook has continued to roll out new features such as native hand tracking and Oculus Link, which allows users to experience PC VR HMD quality on the standalone headset. By October, it was reported that Oculus Quest sales were responsible for significantly boosting the company’s non-advertising sales, which jumped to $269 million during the third quarter, a 43% year-over-year increase. “Quest is growing and doing quite well. We’re selling them as fast as we can make them, the demand has been strong and the content is starting to pick up,” Mark Zuckerberg said at the time.

The HTC Vive was phased out in October
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HTC Vive Retires

2019 said good-bye to the headset which was largely responsible for enthusing people about the possibilities of VR in recent years. The HTC Vive was phased out in October, replaced by the Vive Cosmos, which was priced at $699. But although industry pundits such as Venturebeat’s Dean Takahash called the new HMD an “engineering marvel” it came with a number of difficult trade-offs in terms of cost, visual quality, accessibility, and mobility.

There could be challenging times ahead for Magic Leap, and this could have a negative knock-on effect for the AR industry as a whole
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Bumpy Road For Magic Leap

As the year draws to a close, things are looking rather worrisome for what is arguably immersive tech’s most hyped-up company. First came the news that the company had signed control of its patents to JPMorgan Chase as collateral, closely followed by announcement of a new funding round, culminating with key resignations from high-profile executives including CFO Scott Henry and Senior VP of Creative Strategy John Gaeta (a special effects industry veteran who has worked on movies such as The Matrix). Magic Leap then announced it was pivoting towards enterprise customers following damning reports of extremely weak sales. Taken together, this could signal challenging times ahead for the start-up and possibly have a negative knock-on effect for the AR industry as a whole.

Cows Like VR Too

Dairy farmers in Russia started testing Virtual Reality on their dairy cows. According to Sarah Webber, a Research Fellow in Human-Computer (and Animal-Computer) interaction at the University of Melbourne, there is little evidence that the cows appreciated the content on the same level as we might, but argued that seeing animals interacting with technology could positively impact their lives by changing our persceptions and creating an empathetic bond between people and animals.

Dairy farmers in Russia started testing Virtual Reality on their dairy cows
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Google Ends the Daydream

The key message to come out of Google I/O this year was that the company largely abandoned its plans to push forward the development of headsets and content for VR effectively retiring the Daydream and focusing on Augmented Reality features for the Google Lens instead.

Trippy VR

The ‘Cyberdelic Incubator’ in Melbourne, Australia, is promoting a more conscious approach to technology through immersive media. The group’s lead Carl H Smith told the Guardian that XR’s power to instigate empathy can help us create more meaningful human connections, allowing us to experience what it’s like to be another gender, or to have a mental health condition such as schizophrenia. One of the incubator’s projects “Death is Only the Beginning” even went as far as simulating a near-death experience, and was subsequently adapted for use with palliative care patients.

Immersive Masterpiece

Visitors to the Mauritshuis museum in Holland were able to use AR to step into Rembrandt’s haunting painting “The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp” which was painstakingly recreated – with actors standing in for each character in full period costume and makeup – and captured with 600 reflex cameras to produce 3D scans. The intention, says Dutch design agency CapitolaVR, was to ‘create a portal to the past, to the moment the painting was created.”

Visitors to the Mauritshuis museum in Holland were able to use AR to step into one of Rembrandt’s most haunting paintings
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#MeToo

The words of sexual assault survivor Chanel Miller were brought to life with an AR project undertaken by her fellow students at Stanford following a dispute with the university about how her ordeal should be memorialized. The “Dear Visitor” guided AR exhibit placed her own words, spoken in court, on the spot of the attack she suffered. “It goes beyond what a physical plaque could do,” says Hope Schroeder, a graduate who was part of Stanford’s augmented reality club, 4 AR/VR that developed the project.

Sony’s Next Move

Although the PSVR has proven to be the most commercially successful VR hardware to date – selling over 4.2 million units so far – there are high expectations that its next generation headset will bring significant improvements including wireless connectivity. At the same time, the company has also signaled that it is not ignoring the Augmented Reality market, launching a frankly awesome AR location-based Ghostbusters experience back in October.

The words of sexual assault survivor Chanel Miller were brought to life with an AR project
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Valve’s Long Game

In June Valve released its Index headset priced at a hefty $999, which got mixed reviews for providing a good experience, but only under very controlled circumstances. In short, the headset was hard work to setup properly and not very user-friendly. But the company’s ace in the pack was yet to be revealed in November, when it announced that its new Half-Life game would be released as a VR exclusive in 2020.

In June Valve released its Index headset priced at a hefty $999
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Nintendo Dips it Toes Into VR 

Arguably the best-loved company in gaming, there is always excitement whenever Nintendo starts to dabble with VR, and the success of the Labo kits was proof that the company could actually have a better chance of enticing the average consumer to engage with immersive tech than some other bigger players in the space, not least because they still hold the IP for some of the world’s all-time most popular games such as Super Mario and Zelda, both of which were supported in VR.

Arguably the best-loved company in gaming, there is always excitement whenever Nintendo starts to dabble with VR
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Virtual Immortality 

A $2.5 million project funded by the Dallas museum and created by Steven Spielberg’s USC Shoah Foundation immortalized holocaust survivor Max Glauben as a hologram able to share his WW2 experience with future generations. The project involved a week of filming, during which Glauben was captured answering over 1,000 questions by 18 cameras placed at 9 different angles.

A $2.5 million project funded by the Dallas museum and created by Steven Spielberg's USC Shoah Foundation immortalized holocaust survivor Max Glauben as a hologram
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Rising From The Ashes

Following the devastating fire at Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, visitors turned to VR to experience the magnificent building and its destroyed iconic spire. Several virtual tours remain available, highlighting the potential of such immersive technology to help preserve at least the essence and significance of historical monuments for future generations.

Talk Show Fun

Jimmy Fallon has proven to be a bit of a VR champion, showcasing it in fun ways on mainstream media. In April the Tonight Show host played Beat Saber against Captain Marvel star Brie Larson, followed by a hilarious game of Virtual Reality Pictionary with Kristen Stewart, Gaten Matarazzo of Stranger Things

Jimmy Fallon has proven to be a bit of a VR champion
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Holographic performances

Artists have embraced immersive tech with gusto in 2019. Bjork launched her Vulnicura VR album, David Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust” character was brought to life with real-time motion capture technology and Madonna performed at the Billboard Music awards alongside no fewer than five of her Augmented Reality personas. Meanwhile, Facebook hosted a concert by GRAMMY award-winning singer/songwriter H.E.R. and Dean Takahashi tested an app that let him remix AR audio at a live Elton John concert.

Artists have embraced immersive tech with gusto in 2019
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Virtual Worship

Churches across the US are embracing technology, including conducting whole services in Virtual Reality.  “We are leaving the information age and entering the experience age of VR and AR,” said D.J. Soto, pastor of VR Church, where roughly 150 avatars regularly attend services in AltspaceVR. Soto believes these virtual churches are much more inclusive, allowing for conversations to happen which would be difficult in physical places of worship.

150 avatars regularly attend church services in AltspaceVR
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Snapchat

Snap has emerged as a major player in the AR space thanks to its popular filters and lenses, even releasing a Gucci-themed version of its proprietary spectacles hardware. Most significantly, however, 2019 has seen a creative community start to grow and earn substantial revenues around the format. AR lenses were used to promote blockbusters such as “X-Men: Dark Phoenix” and “Joker” or the new latest adaptation of Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” as well as indie films such as Borley Rectory which turned users into a character from a classic ghost tale for Halloween.

Snap has emerged as a major player in the AR space
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Training for Just About Anything

By far the most compelling use case for immersive tech at the moment is in training and simulation, and those applications are virtually endless. From teaching firearms safety to Kentucky gun owners to helping train police in identifying cases of human trafficking or teaching veterans how to cope with hostile job interviews, all the way through to a “Thief Simulator” (which does exactly what it says on the tin) and even an active shooter training which was deployed in the Walmart Academy experience to help its employees prepare for such scenarios following recent shootings.

Losing One’s VRginity

No technology can be considered successful if it doesn’t attract use cases in the adult industry, so it is actually encouraging to see stories emerging such as that of porn company VRBangers charging couples around $15,000 to make their own naughty VR movie, or of Anna Petukhova, a Russian fashion model and entrepreneur who launched a global franchise of VR sex clubs called VRayu, which caters equally for men and women looking to explore their sexual fantasies in a safe virtual environment.

Anna Petukhova, a Russian fashion model and entrepreneur, launched a global franchise of VR sex clubs called VRayu
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Shut-Downs and Acquisitions

One notable casualty in the AR ecosystem this year was Daqri, which shut down in September in spite of raising $275 million in overall funding. There were also some significant acquisitions in the space, such as Jaunt XR being bought by Verizon, and Apple acquiring UK start-up Ikinema.

VR Therapy

A University of Barcelona study documented the therapeutic effects of virtual body swapping. Results showed that subjects holding conversations with themselves – while inhabiting an avatar of Dr. Sigmund Freud – showed improved mood compared to talking about problems in a virtual conversation with pre-scripted comments. Researchers believe that this method could be a useful tool for clinicians in the future.

A University of Barcelona study documented the therapeutic effects of virtual body swapping
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MacGyver Escape room

MacGyver creator Lee David Zlotoff teamed up with “Lawnmower Man” director Brett Leonard to create a VR escape room experience called MacGyverWorld slotted for release in 2020. The experience will use 3D capture technology, which scans participants as they enter a location-based VR venue so that friends can see each other as holograms and work collaboratively.

MacGyverWorld is slotted for release in 2020
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HoloLens Army

A version of the HoloLens designed for military use has been tested by the US Army earlier this year, following an announcement that Microsoft accepted a $480 million deal to supply thousands of HoloLens units to the army, in spite of strong objections from many of its employees. The system – which is still in the prototype phase and is not expected to deploy until 2022 at the earliest – also collects data to highlight areas that need improvement and further training.

A version of the HoloLens designed for military use has been tested by the US Army
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Minecraft

After releasing a teaser trailer in May and unveiling the first gameplay footage of “Minecraft Earth” at Apple’s conference in June, Microsoft proceeded with gradually rolling out what was arguably the most anticipated AR title of 2019 with a Beta version released in several cities including London and Seattle in July, followed by broader public releases in the following months. As of the end of November, the game had reportedly surpassed 2.5 million downloads.

As of the end of November, Minecraft Earth had reportedly surpassed 2.5 million downloads
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Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a XR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Top XR Stories of 2019 appeared first on Tech Trends.