Don't be Evil (Waiting for Google)
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- Written by Greuel
- Category: Articles
We walked quickly through the all-too-real world of San Francisco's Tenderloin district to see first-hand what was touted as the first theatrical play to premier live on stage and in virtual reality (VR) at the same time. Stepping around limp bodies, past street-side transactions, and over sundry detritus, we made our way deeper and deeper into the belly of the beast.
The destination, a restaurant and club called Pianofight, could not have contrasted more with the world outside, with its milk-white tech worker clientele, portobello mushroom burgers, assorted microbrews, and the lamest of 70s light rock. Further inside, we were handed Google Cardboard (TM) viewers and ushered through a door leading to a small black-box theatre. On stage surrounded by filing cabinets and stacks of paper files sat a lone man: shackled and hooded.
The scene that greets patrons as they enter the theatre to see Don't Be Evil.Stepping into Virtual Heritage
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- Written by Greuel
- Category: Articles
Last night's exhibit, "Inside Real Virtuality" by Artanim at Swissnex SF, in which viewers were randomly selected to enter an underground environment of an Egyptian pharaoh's tomb, was not quite a true exercise in virtual heritage. For that, one might hearken back to the work of Fabrizio Funto at Infobyte S.p.A. in the mid-1990s. Funto's team endeavored to accurately replicate places of cultural significance that were in danger of being lost (recall his reconstruction Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi, destroyed by an earthquake in 1997) and present the results in a virtual reality context. What Artanim adds to the mix in 2015 is the ability for explorers to now bring heir bodies along into such an archeological space.
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