You can now experience what it’s like to swing across New York as Spider-Man himself with a free VR experience created by Sony Pictures and Intel

VR and Spidey do seem like a perfect match
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I always get excited about a new Marvel film coming out. For the Stan Lee cameo if nothing else! But I have liked many of the Spider-Man films the studio has brought out over the years, so I’m curious to see what the latest instalment – Spider-Man: Homecoming will bring.

It's always exciting to see a new Marvel film, if only for the Stan Lee cameo
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To wet our appetites during the build-up to the film’s release Sony Pictures created a free Virtual Reality Experience (VRE) which was showcased in the US across selected Cinemark locations as well as various events worldwide. But if you have a PlayStation VR, HTC Vive and Oculus Rift you can now also try it out in the comfort of your own home. Just be sure to move the furniture out of the way first!

This companion piece to the Columbia Pictures feature lets you suit up as Spider-Man, hone your web-shooting skills, and sling high above New York City in pursuit of the Vulture. To create this VRE, developers utilized Intel hardware and software to create a fully immersive experience.

Intel sees VR as the jumping point to more immersive experiences
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According to Nicole Smith, Global Brand & Innovation Communications Manager at Intel, the company sees Virtual Reality as the jumping point (pun intended?) to more immersive experiences. The technology, they believe, will evolve to make use of next-generation sensing and digitizing technologies and will eventually include physical and virtual interactions within the same environment.

“Personal computing is radically evolving to become capable of experiences hardly believable today, and Virtual Reality’s highly sensory and immersive nature is central to that evolution. This collaboration is a first for Intel and Sony Pictures Virtual Reality, starting a new era in Intel/Hollywood VR production partnerships using premium cinema content,” said Doug Fisher, senior vice president and general manager of the Intel Software and Services Group. “Together with our silicon, the pervasive power of the Intel software ecosystem offers VR content and game developers the opportunity to create fully immersive experiences that bring the next evolution of compute to mainstream audiences. We are excited to be a part of this blockbuster partnership,” he concluded

Here’s the low-down of the tech used to create the experience, which you can also check out in the trailer.

Boosted by Intel hardware technology and software tools, the award-winning developers at CreateVR* used dual Intel® Xeon® processor-based Dell* workstations to quickly create and render 360-degree, ultra-high-resolution graphics of New York. The premium version of the superhero feature was best realized with the performance of the instruction architecture of the latest Intel® Core processors for ultra-high-resolution content streaming content streaming, encoding and video playback, while Intel® Graphics Performance Analyzers were used for better visual fidelity, higher-resolution and higher frame rates. In addition, Intel® Threading Building Blocks helped developers leverage Intel multi-core performance and heterogeneous computing.

The developers used a variety of Intel-optimized software, including Adobe*, Allegorithmic*, Autodesk*, Epic Games*, Mettle*, Pixlogic* and The Foundry* for authoring, digital sculpting, rendering and production, to deliver amazing performance and realism in the VR experience.

“Virtual reality experiences demand PCs with powerful computing performance—and that is where Intel technology excels; in fact, Intel processors are recommended by leading PC-based virtual reality vendors, including Microsoft, HTC Vive, Oculus, and others. Intel also has many technology assets that can improve the VR experience. A great example of this is Intel’s WiGig technology, which HTC announced they will integrate into an accessory for the Vive,” says Smith “Intel is deeply committed and involved with virtual reality development and innovation– one of the most exciting new immersive technologies in a decade. VR spans business and consumer uses as well as mobile, wearable, desktop and server platforms.”

For companies looking to get into Immersive technologies such as VR/AR/MR/XR our Virtual Reality Consultancy services offer guidance and support on how best to incorporate these into your brand strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a VR 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 LinkedInand follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Virtual Reality Lets you Become Spidey appeared first on Tech Trends.

Technologies like driverless cars, lunch delivery drones, and Augmented Reality Billboards will transform our cities

At London Tech Week which concluded last Friday we saw some of the people and start-ups at the bleeding edge of making that reality come true in our cities. This is Europe’s largest festival of technology hosting thousands of delegates and hundreds of events showcasing the latest innovation. And a survey commissioned for the event shows just how keen people in the UK are to embrace the technology-led transformation that is coming to our cities over the next 20 years.

A London Tech Week survey shows how keen on innovation Brits are
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The survey, which was commissioned by the founders of London Tech Week and inspired by a series of predictions put forward by Imperial College London’s Tech Foresight group, reveals the technologies consumers think could change our global cities, disrupt traditional industries and drive forward the growth of London’s tech sector.

Gavin Poole, CEO of Here East innovation Centre which provides a platform for entrepreneurs to develop and scale their businesses says that these innovators are already disrupting entire sectors: “London is brimming with a huge range of exciting tech start-ups who are leading the way in developing some of the world’s most innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data. In years to come we will no longer silo technology into a separate category – it will integrate into our everyday lives and permeate all aspects of the industry,” he believes.

More than a third of those surveyed (over 2000 people were interviewed) said they would have no qualms about making a journey in an unmanned drone taxi, and most believed that advances in driverless car technology would see dedicated road lanes for autonomous vehicles popping up over the next few years. Eventually – over a quarter of respondents believed – this will lead to cities banning human drivers altogether.

British Commuters would welcome Elon Musk bringing ultra-fast trains into UK cities
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If (or perhaps knowing Elon, we should say when) Elon Musk’s Hyperloop project is rolled out, he’d find willing guinea pigs in Britons, over half of which expressed their willingness to travel in high-speed trains going at over 600mph. And I have to say, as a commuter plagued by regular delays, I can certainly sympathise for this speed craving. Over a third of respondents were also enthusiastic at taking a commercial space flight or commuting to work in a driverless car.

There was less appetite for things such as Food Printing, however, with few people saying they’d fancy a 3D printed meal. Dating robots, however, is something that some women – and more men, around 12% of those asked- would be willing to try.

“From transport and healthcare to fashion and financial services, technology is changing our cities, the way we work and our everyday lives,” says Professor David Gann CBE, Vice President (Innovation) at Imperial College London. “Through our Tech Foresight team, Imperial Business Partners is bringing together world-leading business experts, academics and innovators to envision the impact technology will have across a variety of industries, and London Tech Week shines a spotlight on the range of innovative companies and tech talent in London, as well as demonstrating the future technologies which could shape global cities.”

There are mixed feelings amongst Brits about the AI revolution
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Almost half of people (47 per cent) think that human productivity will be boosted by robotics, two fifths (39 per cent) say robots will have a positive impact on society and more than a quarter of people say they would trust a robot to do a job better than a human. However, 19% feared their job would be at risk of being taken by a robot, although 17% said their job was so dull they would rather a robot did it.

The research also shows that:

• 77 per cent believe we will see eye tracking used to navigate mobile phone applications
• 64 per cent believe there will be solar-powered park benches to charge electronic devices
• 53 per cent believe that tourists will be accompanied by robotic tour guides
• 49 per cent think smart advertising billboards will feature augmented reality
• 47 per cent think DNA dating agencies will be commonplace
• 42 per cent think we will see hangover free alcohol substitutes
• 30 per cent believe high-speed pedestrian walkways will link skyscrapers
• 14 per cent believe there will be underwater housing
• 12 per cent believe flying cars will be commonplace

For companies looking to gain a competitive edge through technology, Tech Trends offers strategic Virtual Reality and Digital Transformation Consultancy services tailored to your brand.

Alice Bonasio is a VR 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 London Tech Week Shows How Brits Embrace Innovation appeared first on Tech Trends.

The question of how Virtual Reality will transform creative industries such as Film is a big one, but Cannes certainly seemed like an appropriate place to tackle it.

We'll soon move beyond current limitations of AR AND VR into Blended and Mixed Reality Experiences
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So in between attending red carpet screenings, gawking at mega yachts and indulging in some celebrity spotting (Nicole Kidman, Colin Farrell and Mads Mikkelsen all in one day!) I attended a series of talks and panels hosted by HP, most of which revolved around the interplay between technology and creativity, with VR being a hot topic.

“Believe me, when we are looking at VR today we are looking at the punch cards of our generation. We are operating in DOS 3.0,” said Shane Wall, HP’s Chief Technology Officer and head of HP Labs, which also happens to be the world’s longest standing corporate research labs.

Yes, he concedes, there are limitations with both AR and VR technologies – Virtual Reality can feel isolating as it shuts out the outside world and there are issues with display and field of view with Augmented Reality, but those are the limitations of today, and we will move beyond that, perhaps much more quickly than we might think.

“These are the pieces that will create the clay with which we’ll build the experiences of tomorrow, experiences we can’t yet imagine today.”

HP has been the technology partner for the Cannes Film Festival for the past 14 years, but you can trace back the company’s filmic pedigree as far back as 1937, when Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard worked with the Walt Disney company to provide them with audio oscillators that were later used in the first screenings of Fantasia, showcasing some seriously ground-breaking sound design technology for the time.

And that model of co-creating products with large-scale creative partners is one they carry on to this day according to Kate Swanborg from DreamWorks, which has been an end-to-end HP studio for more than 15 years. In an industry where even the most minute variations in colour standards are deemed unacceptable (you better believe there’s such a think as “Shrek green”) the studio found it increasingly difficult to get displays that were affordable at scale, yet maintained that all-important colour accuracy. HP worked with DreamWorks to co-develop the product they needed, and the resulting DreamColor display went on to become such an industry benchmark that it was awarded a Scientific and Engineering Oscar in 2015.

HP has been the technology partner for the Cannes Film Festival for the past 14 years, but you can trace back the company’s filmic pedigree as far back as 1937
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“It gives our artists a spectrum that matches their creative palette,” Swanborg continues, explaining the fundamental role that technology plays in the studio’s creative workflow.

“We’re a bunch of artists, but the reality for filmmakers, specially those who work in animation, is that behind the scenes and under the hood, what we make is data,” she says, revealing that DreamWorks generates around half a billion digital files every month.

“People often express surprise at the fact we don’t use ‘creative computers’ at which point I always respectfully point out that computers aren’t creative, people are, and what our people need is the very best technology to enable their creativity,” she concludes.

And that relationship between technology and creativity is something that will become more ingrained as a new generation of digital natives joins the workforce. Companies like Microsoft – with whom HP also partners – have also put the focus firmly on creativity-enabling with its Fall Creators Update recently announced at the Microsoft Build conference in Seattle.

SVP Immersive Media at Technicolor Marcie Jastrow, says VR is a perfect example of technology and art coming together. In her talk she highlighted six key factors she believed would converge to make VR into the mass-market entertainment experiences of the future. These included not only creating high-quality native content, but ensuring that this content had a strong storytelling backbone, was disruptive, had “episodic cadence,” (what is known in tech talk as “stickiness”) and provides a user experience that is both intuitive and comfortable.

VR is a perfect example of technology and art coming together
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She further stressed that developing the immersive media such as VR to its full potential would require a lot of collaboration and was not something that any one company could achieve on its own.

And the fruit that such collaborations bear was on display there in the form of the Tree experience, created by New Reality Company in partnership with the Rainforest Alliance. HP provided filmmakers Milica Zec and Winslow Porter with z640 workstations that allowed them to play the experience consistently at film festivals around the world after premiering at Sundance earlier this year.

As I experience life through the eyes of a tree – from a seedling to towering hundreds of feet above the canopy of the Peruvian rainforest– I also smell the damp earth and feel the heat as I meet my end in a forest fire
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The experience uses haptic devices to send subtle – and not so subtle – rumblings and vibrations through my feet as I stand on a mat, and via the small backpack I’m wearing. As I experience life through the eyes of a tree – from a seedling to towering hundreds of feet above the canopy of the Peruvian rainforest– I also smell the damp earth and feel the heat as I meet my end in a forest fire. Many people cry at that point, and I admit to feeling quite emotional myself.

It’s all part of what HP calls “Blended Reality” (which sounds akin to Microsoft’s Mixed Reality concept) and it is indeed a very powerful tool in creating a sense of connection and empathy with nature, something that has also been explored by researchers at Stanford University.

The true gift of VR is that ability to connect with your audience
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Wall believes that the way Tree brings in all the different senses lays the groundwork for something quite profound in the industry: “It’s the first visualization I see of activities we’ve had at HP labs for a while, which is how you move from the headset into creating total body, fully sensory immersive experiences.”

“That is the true gift of VR, that ability to immediately connect with your audience,” agrees Zec. Yet Porter stresses that in order to deliver that they first had to overcome some basic technical challenges. “As soon as we got the experience into the headset we noticed we were dropping at below 45 frames a second and immediately everyone got nauseated.”

Being particularly prone to VR simulator sickness myself I could see how that could derail the whole experience, but with the HP workstations and Quadro P6000 graphics cards they were able to speed up the frame rate to average over 90, which indeed felt much more comfortable.

At this stage it very much feels like you’re building the bridge and going over it at full speed at the same time
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The speed at which the technology is advancing is dizzying according to Porter. “At this stage it very much feels like you’re building the bridge and going over it at full speed at the same time.”

“The changes we’re going to see over the next ten or twenty years will be profound,” agrees Wall. “The phone of tomorrow, that little glass slab upon which we stare on average 137 times a day in 30 years will not be 30 times more powerful, it will be a billion times more powerful. And when you have that power kind of processing capability, your ability to create experiences that truly amaze will become the center of what film is,” he concludes.

To find out how to leverage VR/AR/MR in your enterprise, Tech Trends offers bespoke Virtual Reality Consultancy support

Alice Bonasio is a VR 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 and @techtrends_tech on Twitter.

The post Blending Realities to Reinvent Filmmaking appeared first on Tech Trends.

Pornography has been instrumental in spurring the adoption of new technologies. As anybody with an understanding of human nature will attest to, if you want people to spend their time and money on something, you need to give them a reason, and sex is always going to be one of the most compelling reasons out there.

Since the Adult Industry is less constrained by societal norms, it is perhaps more free to innovate
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Another reason why the adult industry has proven such a driver of new technologies could also be that it exists on the margins of social acceptability in the first place. They are, therefore, perhaps less constrained by the norms, rules and conventions which tend slow down innovation. In other words, they are less adverse to risk-taking and generally tend to experiment more – which often means being the first to produce embrace new media such as VR.

“Whatever your feelings about it, adult VR is a major driving force for bringing more users into the VR ecosystem. Literally millions of people buy their first VR headset in part because they want to try that VR porn they’ve been hearing about,” says Daniel Peterson Founder and CEO VRPorn. “It’s like the early days of the Internet. Porn was a killer app, and it helped interest grow quicker. Even today, a huge % of internet activity is related to porn, and some of the largest websites are adult. I think the primary way that this drives the growth of the ecosystem is getting more and more people involved. Once they have figured out how to experience VR porn, they will be better positioned to try everything else that VR offers. And obviously VR is much bigger than just porn.”

Whatever your feelings about it, adult VR is a major driving force for bringing more users into the ecosystem
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“The real tipping point is resolving the chicken-and-egg problem caused by a lack of content. Adult always finds its way into the front of the line with new technologies, and it already has limitless content available. Adult entertainment will motivate customers to acquire VR headsets,” adds Jean Claude Artonne CEO of Terpon, who is looking at ways of straddling the divide between mainstream and adult by providing practical solutions to VR’s technical problems in a vertical related to adult interests. “Each vertical has its own role to play, as adult content and mainstream content are actually two sides of the same coin.”

But once we get there, what types of VR Adult experiences can we expect to have, and which are the main roadblocks to getting us there? We asked some key industry players for their insight.

Intimacy

At its best, VR is more than immersive, it’s intimate, says Artonne.

“I travel often as part of my career, and being able to call my wife at home via our VR webcam prototypes makes all the difference. I’m in different countries around the world, and yet my wife and I are never more than one room apart virtually.”

Adult always finds its way into the front of the line with new technologies, and it already has limitless content available
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“Couples have always tried to find ways to make relationships work when they are apart,” says Peterson. “It used to be love letters, now it’s video calls. Many people enjoy using these media for more erotic encounters as well. Phone sex has been a thing for as long as there’s been phones. Yes, couples can get much more adventurous. There are professional adult VR videos shot from both perspectives and synchronized, so you and your partner can experience a fantasy of being someone else, and also of being with someone else,” he adds.

At its best, VR is more than immersive, it’s intimate
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“Adult VR content allows individuals and couples to enjoy another way to interact and live out a fantasy they may not try in real life. These fantasies might include group activities or something even more intimate. This demand will drive new technologies and platforms that support these types of interactions,” says Bradley Phillips Managing Director WankzVR.

The very design and nature of current VR HMDs presents a blocker to such intimacy at the moment, however, since social interaction where you cannot see each other’s faces is challenging to say the least.

“In the short term this means one person can watch and the other person will perform,” says Kiiroo CTO Maurice op de Beek. “There are some technologies like overlaying of the face, but that is in its infancy. Another road would be that couples would both wear VR goggles and they would see a digital representation of each other. The social aspect will be a killer app for our industry, but the technology is not there yet.”

Privacy

A big part of adult related content is anonymous users who never want to register on any website, nor give any payment information. An added hurdle with watching that content in VR is that you need to buy a specific device to watch that content and that transaction and setting it up online often requires providing personal information. For Artonne, however, that actually presents an opportunity:

“Our answer is to have a clear barrier between adult sites and our mainstream platform that can provide a more attractive environment for customers to purchase these kinds of goods without connecting that purchase directly to any specific usage intent,” he explains.

Peterson agrees that whoever arrives at the solution that makes consumers most comfortable will probably come out on top in that space.

“VR technology can potentially record everything you say, do, and see. Proper respect for a user’s privacy needs to be built into VR tech from the ground up. And this is especially true for adult VR tech. The metaverse will come, but it will have privacy protocols acceptable enough that people will want to use it. And if it doesn’t, the consumers will simply join the metaverse protocol that does, and that one will win,” he says.

Multi-sensory experiences

We’re in the early age of VR and it’s like Internet in 1995 where everyone was still finding out what the technology will do.

“In the next few years, you will see more gimmicks coming and every one has its value,” Maurice op de Beek from Kiiroo. “The moment that the best technologies come together in one product is the moment that customers will no longer see it as gimmick, but as something essential in their lives.”

A VR experience that impacts all of your senses at once and in harmony to deliver a perfect simulation is probably a long way off though, according to Phillips.

“We have a lot to do on the road map before reaching our goal of integrating connectivity with toys, because VR requires immediacy based on quantifiable data, and with toys that means measuring a physical and emotional state several times per seconds to allow haptic devices to act as proxies for our own appendages. The technology is coming quickly but it isn’t quite here yet,” says Artonne.

According to Phillips, Adult VR could actually be the first to bridge the uncanny valley.

“Eventually VR and AI will allow us to have virtual experiences every bit as real as any we have now in our daily lives, whether that means flying a fighter plane from your couch or having sex with an entire squad of cheerleaders during the Super Bowl, it’s really something each consumer will decide for themselves,” concludes Artonne.

Adult VR could actually be the first to bridge the uncanny valley
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“Much of the offerings available today … are basically gimmicks, but there is so much more potential,” Peterson said. “I believe that AR and MR will have some great adult applications. For example, imagine having the person of your dreams sitting next to you on your home sofa as you watch Netflix and chill together, and interacting with you in increasingly realistic ways as the technology inevitably improves over time.”

First published on UploadVR

We all know pornography is prevalent, but how soon until #VR porn is mainstream? https://t.co/vL3t2KDfX7 pic.twitter.com/yFfzH3j7X2

— Upload (@UploadVR) May 27, 2017

For companies looking to gain a competitive edge through technology, Tech Trends offers strategic Virtual Reality and Digital Transformation Consultancy services tailored to your brand.

Alice Bonasio is a VR 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 How The Adult Industry is Helping VR Go Mainstream appeared first on Tech Trends.