The 45th SIGGRAPH computer graphics conference (August 12-16 in Vancouver, BC) has revealed details of this year’s Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality program. Featuring the brand-new Immersive Pavilion (sponsored by NVIDIA*), VRcade games area, VR Village for large-scale projects, and a celebration of immersive storytelling in the Computer Animation Festival’s VR Theater. The expanded program reflects the rise of these three mediums in the consumer market.
The Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality program is open to Exhibits Plus registration and above.
“We are so excited about the new Immersive Pavilion — it will instantly become the place for our attendees to experience, play and learn about the latest technological advances across all areas of these rapidly emerging media platforms,” said SIGGRAPH 2018 Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality Chair Pol Jeremias. “This year’s VR and mixed reality offerings will include innovative experiments, research, games, music videos and more that are focused on the exploding and immersive interactive experience.”
Highlights include:
- Cycles (Village) Jeff Gipson, Walt Disney Animation Studios — Walt Disney Animation Studios’ first VR short film, Cycles centers around the true meaning of creating a home and the life it holds inside its walls. The short makes its world debut at SIGGRAPH 2018.
- Welcome to Light Fields (Village) Ryan S. Overbeck, Daniel Erickson, and Daniel Evangelakos, Google Inc. — Light Fields lets us experience the freedom of motion, realistic reflections and translucence like never before in VR. Explore the Gamble House, Mosaic Tile House, and Space Shuttle Discovery. These navigable light field stills showcase the emerging technology Google is using to power its next generation of VR content.
- Wolves in the Walls: Chapter 1 (Vrcade) Peter Billington and Jessica Shamash, Fable Studio — Hailing from a new studio that recently joined content creation for virtual reality cinema, not everything is at it seems when eight-year-old Lucy’s imagination proves to be a reality. Wolves in the Walls is an immersive fable that asks, what would it be like to interact, have a relationship, and go on a quest with a character inside a virtual reality movie?
- Multiplayer Augmented Reality: the Future is Social, presented by Niantic (Village) Si ying Diana Hu and Niniane Wang, Niantic, Inc. — As the creators of Pokémon Go, Niantic takes AR to the next level by enabling multiple mobile devices to experience the same AR objects in real-time! Watch people play pong against each other, where the ball and paddles exist in AR for all users. Shared AR experiences is essential for keeping AR mainstream in the future.
- Crow: The Legend (Vrcade) Larry Cutler, Eric Darnell, Nathaniel Dirksen, Michael Hutchinson, and Scott Peterson, Baobab Studios — Crow: The Legend is a re-telling of a Native American folktale about a bird with the most dazzling plumage and mellifluous voice, who, after the planet turns dark and cold, must journey far from home to bring light and warmth back to the world.
More highlights from the VR Theater on this blog post.
*No members of the NVIDIA team were involved in jury selection.
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