Katie and I are creating
free 360 VR videos and we just ended a massive three week mission to capture
the carnage of Carnaval in Cadiz and Las Fallas in Valencia. These two Spanish festivals are wild
and not the safest place for a 360 camera!
We haven't released the videos from Carnaval yet, but we shared Las
Fallas more or less as it happened. This festival is more captivating than Rio Carnaval in my opinion (I've been to both
twice and love both!)
Using #LasFallasVR, we created 16
experiences over three weeks for anyone with a headset (headphones recommendedas
well) to immerse themselves in a REAL LIFE series of events that ended this
week.
This is where I believe the strength of 360
video lies. I truly believe it offers viewers the opportunity to experience something new, or to get a peek into their past. Sometimes it's a nostalgic experience (like a wedding)… Other times
it's an experience you never thought you'd have.
Las Fallas can now be added to the library
of experiences on offer. You can feel like you are part of the festival, as our videos
immerse you in the festival.
Get a quick taste of the festival, by starting
with the experience from this week's closing ceremony. It involves burning 700
structures around the city in a series of escalating fires.
You can dance to the music and soak up the atmosphere
of the opening ceremony!
We have a comedic documentary from last
year (in English, Spanish, and Valenciano) that really immerses you in the
festival! You can experience this three-week celebration in just 24 minutes.
You can observe our favourite structures (Fallas) from 2019 while listening to the constant firecrackers that are the
soundtrack to the festival.
You can feel the pounding of the Mascleta, which is an
INCREDIBLY LOUD firecracker display that occurs every day for 19 days and blows
your ears off!
I'm linking to our YouTube channel but our
videos are also available on Facebook 360, VeeR, SamsungVR, Littlstar and Vimeo. We do this so as many people as possible can enjoy on our experiences!
Please subscribe to our YouTube channel, as
we have very few followers on this platform and it's the only one that allows
monetisation (man gotta eat and I ain't on a fruit ninja diet!)
As I said, it's been a lot of work
producing his content for the VR community and we're grateful for all the love
(especially this!)
From Friday, we're back to our travel VRlog with a series that
culminates in a trip to another wild fire festival in western Spain.
Please let us know what you think about our
360 content (yes, it's mono…) We're desperate for feedback so we can improve
and give people what they want.
TLDR: Experience the mad burning of intricate
artwork at Las Fallas festival in 360 VR. Start here and please subscribe!
It's been a while since we last blogged, but this is because we've been busy making 360 VR content. We have been travelling around Spain, and releasing a new VR experience EVERY FRIDAY. It takes a lot of work to keep this up but we're having a great time and getting lots of support, which we hope will keep growing. We've got over 3000 subscribers on SamsungVR now! This post is all about Las Fallas - a festival which is dominating the city of Valencia this month. If you have to learn a bit about the history of the festival, you can read our previous blog post here OR you can watch some of the 360 VR content on any of our channels (VeeR, Facebook, YouTube, SamsungVR, Littlstar) The festival is now well underway and the city is building up to the main five days, which start this Friday (15th March).
What is Las Fallas about?
Las Fallas is all about explosions, parties, and celebrating Valencian culture. We discuss a bit about the history and its recently awarded status as a UNESCO World Heritage Event in this 360 piece. We bloody love the craziness and carnival atmosphere that consumes the minds and lives of everyone in the city… Which is why we created #LasFallasVR to share the festival virtually with anyone interested, wherever they are in the world.
#LasFallasVR
Feel the pounding and outrageous noise of the Mascleta - explosions that occur every day at 2pm for nearly three weeks. They have even started doing a midnight Mascleta this year! Immerse yourself in the awesome fireworks from unusually close vantage points, without the risk of being injured. Be dazzled by psychedelic light shows set to music by Pink Floyd and Michael Jackson! Explore the monumental structures called Fallas in our documentary, Las Fallas 360 (English, Spanish, Valenciano) or wait for the release of our new experience on 22nd March, which will capture the spectacle of 2019's creations. We're creating these experiences to experiment in VR and show the potential that 360 filming of live events has. So strap on a headset and enjoy Las Fallas with us!
*Originally posted on Reddit but thought I'd share on the blog as well.
2018 has seen a hell
of a lot of progress with the tech. It's easier to forget that the Go only came
out in May, as it has been a staple of my VR use since I got one. I reckon my
hours of Go have surpassed my Rift usage and no it isn't simply NSFW content
(I've gone #noVRfap on that, haha!)
I'm not a big gamer at
all (I use my rift mainly in Premiere Pro or to try out games + Beat Saber) and
bought the Go to help me showcase my 360 VR experiences. Yes, I call my edited
360 VR videos with graphics/photos "experiences" even though they are
hosted on YouTube, VeeR, etc.
For me, embodiment is
a key concept and a well crafted VR experience transforms the viewer to a new
place. E.g. My biggest project so far is where you learn Spanish in an embodied
experience in a classroom and then out and about in Spain (a quick showcase
is here and a survival Spanish pack is here - all free!) It's much more than simply a video
IMO but let's not get bogged down in semantics.
The point is that the
Go has made VR simple, which for me is the biggest hurdle to overcome. The
comfort of headsets is very important but buying a Go for my girlfriend's
parents and having them ABLE to use it is the most important. The Go just about
manages this and I think simplicity is the way forward. I'm sure when Apple
join in the fun, they will nail this aspect. VR can't just be for people with
technical knowhow.
This year, I have
watched hours of 360 experiences (#noVRfap) and played a whole bunch of games.
I've been stealing the best uses of the medium to implement them in my own
projects. There are some great creators out there, which is good to see, as we
can all learn from each other, and the hardware market is improving at an
exponential rate.
My main hardware
decision this year has been about buying (and not buying) cameras. I bought the
Yi 360 VR for its high resolution and relatively simple workflow. After my
failed Kickstarter, I wanted to double down on my bet on VR and go
for a professional rig. I came very close to getting the Insta360 Pro 2. With
the camera and PC upgrade, I realised I would be sinking the best part of £12k
into the upgrade, while giving myself more work to do regarding workflows, etc.
I also realised my main reason for doing this was to show my commitment to the
medium.
I decided instead to
delay the camera purchase and commit my production company to release a new 360
VR experience (video) every Friday. We're currently doing a series around Green
Spain in what we'll calling a VRlog, i.e. VR Vlog. These videos are
sharpening my editing skills and helping me realise what I can improve upon. If
you have some free time in VR, have a look, and tell us what to do better.
So what comes in the
next year? I recently filmed and made an experience for a friend's wedding.
Their reaction to the 20 minute experience was priceless and I was blown away.
It made my day and definitely made theirs. They absolutely loved it and they
now have a memento of their special day for decades to come (assuming no
divorces :P)
We're going to expand
into weddings and other celebrations (I'm filming my cousin's Bar Mitzvah this
weekend) so we'll see if I can actually begin to fund the experiments in VR
we're creating.
I think creating
experiences that put you in the mindset (create wearer embodiment) of an
important life event or cultural event (see our Fallas
documentary) is the key difference between video and 360 VR. You can feel
the joy and relive that special day, or experience that event, in a much more
realistic fashion than any other medium. 360 VR tricks you so completely that
it's almost like having a time machine and gives you the ability to visit your
wedding/big event as a passive observer.
The other major
project I want to do in the next 6 months is a fictional narrative drama that I
have written. I have been writing screenplays for 12 years that have sat on
hard drives and done a few table reads… But now I'm making 360 content, I'm
writing 360 scripts. I have the actors signed up, location agreed, and am
more-or-less ready to finalise the date BUT I want to film using a better
camera than my Yi 360. Anyone that can shoot (and edit) high quality
(6K 3D and above) in London that is interested, send me a message and we can
sort something out. The script is a comedy, similar to Withnail and I, but
set in the very near future with the characters being addicted to tech and not
just booze and drugs.
Over 2019, I plan to
build my knowledge with Unity, and hopefully bring in a business partner (unity
developer) to help with future projects that utilise a lot more functionality
than our simpler 360 VR video experiences. With the Quest, etc coming out, I
think this will be essential to ensuring we stay relevant to our fans.
How am I funding my
life? After 5 years as an engineer, living frugally, and a girlfriend that
works as well, we left our careers to move to Spain from the UK. It's cheaper
here and she works part time teaching English. Her job plus savings are how we
survive day to day. We also have Patreon if
anyone is interested in supporting our endeavour.
My closing point is
one of optimism. This technology is groundbreaking and I know I'm preaching to the
choir, but fuck it, sometimes the choir needs a good preaching!
VR and AR are the
future. The paradigm shift in immersive experiences is happening and we are
watching it unfold, quite literally, in front of our eyes. Quitting my
corporate engineering work and starting afresh, doing what I want to do, in an
industry that is finding its feet, is both exciting and scary. Together as a
community, we will succeed. You only have to remember the first time you used a
proper VR system and had your mind blown to realise that this is an
inevitability!
Good luck with your
projects and let me know what you thought about this post or any of our
experiences you have seen.
TLDR: Not making money
as a VR creator but making weekly 360 VR (video) experiences hoping to build an
audience with a strong belief in the medium!
You may have noticed that the blog has been quiet for a while. It's not
because we haven't been living and exploring, but because our energies have
been focussed on the Kickstarter campaign that most of you know about.
Unfortunately the Kickstarter was unsuccessful
and Dynamic Spanish will not go ahead…for now.
I never like to write things off for good
and we still believe in the product. The future of education will involve in virtual
reality and we will continue to make progress to that end.
The
VR Education Market
My current feeling is that the 2018 VR
market is not there yet for users looking for educational programs. This isn't
to say that we had no interest. If you ignore friends and family who were
lovely and supported us because they like the product and believe in us, but
aren't representative of a market for a VR Spanish course, you're left with around
20-25 backers.
Although this is a small number, it shows
that there is some market looking for innovative education projects. We didn't
advertise heavily and the project spread mostly organically. We did have some press
coverage on VR news sites that led to pledges. When you consider this, it's possible that the market could be a hundred or thousand times bigger, if every VR user had seen our product. Right now, the market for a VR Spanish
course is very small and that is primarily because VR is being used for gaming.
In my mind the venn diagram looks like this:
The good news is that VR is here to stay.
When you have a behemoth like Facebook backing it, and Sony committing to it as well, the volume of VR users is only going to increase. I expect not
only the number of VR users to increase but the types of VR users to increase. Currently it is mainly gamers and
early tech adopters who own and use VR headsets.
The gamers are more
interested in action-packed, novel games, and early tech adopters in pushing the boundaries of the
technology. As it becomes more popular, the number of use cases
will increase exponentially. One question jumps out: when is this going to
happen?
The answer: Nobody knows.
My guess: In the next 18 months. I think
Christmas 2019 is going to be a big deal for VR with the newly announced Oculus
Quest headset leading the sales.
Standalone VR is the solution to mainstream
adoption, with ease of use at the forefront. This will propel the technology
forward. The Oculus Go has been very successful (estimated over 1 million units
sold at time of writing) and that's just within a 4 month window.
In 18 months, the venn diagram might look
something like the one below. A larger VR market with a wider interest base,
particularly around more educational and less active experiences.
In 2023, I predict VR will be as common as
a large TV in people's homes, and it will look something like this:
Some may read this and think it is unfounded optimism. That's okay. People can continue to be cynics about this new technology, but I'm investing my time and efforts into it. I'm doing that because of the transformative experiences I've already had in VR and what it promises to deliver to the mass market in the coming years.
Was
the failure of the Dynamic Spanish Kickstarter purely down to market size?
The answer to this is not entirely…
We are unable to change the market size but
we can learn from the mistakes we made. Our top three mistakes were:
1.Not building an email list of interested
parties using our free VR Spanish course
Fundamentally we are not Duolingo or Michel
Thomas and getting hard earned cash off people who don’t know us is always
going to be difficult.
We needed to build a community of
like-minded thinkers and learners before the campaign launched. We could have done this by providing them with free content to prove
our worth in this space and also getting a better understanding of our customers' pain points with the product.
2.Focus on the wrong market
We started the campaign aiming at current
Spanish learners who could use the VR course to supplement and improve their
learning. Our Kickstarter video was based on this assumption. This was a big
mistake. We needed to target current VR users who want to learn a language with
the new technology. This would have meant more focus and time on the places VR
users hang out both online and in virtual worlds.
3. Delivery of the free starter pack
Since the Kickstarter failing and feedback
we've received, it's clear that our method of distributing the free starter
pack was technically quite challenging and off-putting for learners. Spending 5
minutes of active time (plus download time) getting the lesson onto your headset
so you are able to watch it is not acceptable nowadays. Although VR users are
used to transferring videos to their devices (cough porn cough) - this is a
pain point for most users. Users
want and need instant access to Dynamic Spanish.
That's where our new VeeR experience comes in. Now someone can be watching our videos in
thirty seconds, not five minutes. It's simple and easy to use and many more
people will watch this than through the original method.
The downsides are that VeeR experiences
only support 1080p rather than 4K, and that we are not able to contact our users
directly unless they sign up for the additional materials. I have contacted
VeeR and have been informed that 4K support may be coming in the next month, so
fingers crossed!
So
what's next?
We will continue to offer our free starter
pack and begin to build up a list of interested parties in the technology.
However, the progression of the full course will be put on hold.
We are going to pivot our focus to creating
free 360 VR experiences on a wider variety of topics, including culture,
travel, and inspiring scenes. This involves a significant investment in a new camera and editing suite. We believe that improving the technical quality of our content will
drive more consumers to watch our stuff, as well as future-proofing the footage and investment of time and money we plan to put into filming in the next 18 months. There is still a big
question mark over the delivery of this content to consumers, as options are currently
limited.
If you do like what we're doing in the VR
space, follow us on VeeR and/or the rest of the usual platforms listed here:
Building up followers and subscribers that
watch but don’t pay for our content may seem like an unsustainable enterprise, but you only have to look at the YouTube influencer market to realise the potential.
We've also opened a Patreon page for
like-minded thinkers and people that love our content to come and support us.
By supporting us, you get exclusive access to content and can help us decide what we
should focus on.
What
is Patreon?
Patreon is a way to
join your favourite creator's community and pay them for making the stuff you
love. For example, if you sign up for $5 per month you’ll get access to all of
the content that creator makes for the public, plus added perks like behind the
scenes videos, early access to content, bonus material etc. Supporting someone
on Patreon means the creator gets paid regularly, and you become a bonafide,
real-life patron of the arts. Imagine your favourite creators making a living
doing what they do best…because of you!
Click here to check out our rewards and
please support us at a value that you're comfortable with.
Much love,
Dave and Katie.
P.S. Normal blog posting about our travels
and experiences will continue, along with our commitment to produce a new 360 VR
experience every single Friday.
We are happy and hopeful today, as we launch DYNAMIC SPANISH.
It's a VR language learning course designed for people who want to learn Spanish and get the confidence that comes from face-to-face encounters, which virtual reality makes possible from the comfort of your pyjamas. We have a Kickstarter page and we hope fans of the blog will read, share, and donate. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1595208059/dynamic-spanish-a-12-hour-virtual-reality-language?ref=9ql6b6 Muchos love from your Morning Calm amigos, Dave and Katie
