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A vision for the future of Virtual Reality in Design Viz: Advice from the Experts

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说明

Over the last several years virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality have really taken hold within the visualization and AEC fields, but the future of this technology and how it evolves are far from set in stone.The speed at which developments in software and hardware are happening make this one of the most exciting and challenging technologies of the last several decades. In this panel, we will discuss the current state of the XR (x Reality i.e VR, AR, MR etc)industry, strategies for keeping up with the latest advancements, balancing creativity and technology through storytelling, collaborative design, new technologies that could help our industry in marketing and design, how to find the right people to manage XR projects and much more.Join us for this open talk about the future of XR and how it will change the industry.

主要学习内容

  • Make better business decisions in the implementation of XR into your company
  • Learn what XR technologies can benefit you the most in AEC design and marketing
  • Understand how to bring creativity to the XR pipeline and build engaging experiences
  • Learn about current and future XR technologies that will shape the AEC industry

讲师

  • Jeff Mottle
    Jeff Mottle is the Founder of CGarchitect Digital Media Corporation (www.cgarchitect.com), the leading online magazine and user community for architectural visualization professionals. He also co-founded the CGschool, that caters exclusively to architectural visualization professionals. Having worked in the industry since 1996, Jeff has been involved in developing and speaking at conferences around the world. He is immersed in many areas of the industry and actively pursues initiatives that help promote the growth of the field, including CGarchitect's yearly Architectural Visualization competition and 3D Awards.
  • David Scott
    David is the Director of Business Development at Transparent House, a creative agency based in San Francisco that specializes in 3D CGI and Visual Effects campaigns for Product and Real Estate Marketing & Advertising, and whose client list includes Samsung, HP, Sony, Dell, General Motors, Marriott Hotels, Microsoft, Google, and Apple. Prior to joining Transparent House, David was the Executive Producer and co-founder of Identity FX, Inc., a Los Angeles based VFX studio that provided Visual Effects and Stereoscopic 3D optimization & conversion for dozens of theatrical and broadcast projects, including Nike, Google, McDonald's, The Amazing Spider Man, Prometheus, Green Lantern, and the Chronicles of Narnia. With a background in Visual Effects and Live-Action Production, tempered by a decade of working in Hollywood on some of the biggest titles in the business, David brings a strong combination of creative insight and practical execution to his role as Producer/Director. David has helped establish production co-ventures and tech partnerships in NY, SF, LA, Germany, Hungary, Spain, Ukraine, China, and South Korea and has spoken as an invited guest at SIGGRAPH, REDucation, and The 3D Quality Alliance. A graduate of Carnegie-Mellon University, David is also a member of the Producers Guild of America and the Visual Effects Society. When he is not working, David likes to climbs rocks, mountain bike, snowboard, and fly airplanes upside down.
  • Alex Coulombe 的头像
    Alex Coulombe
    Alex Coulombe is the Co-Founder and Creative Director of Agile Lens: Immersive Design, a virtual reality consultancy building custom content and workflows for the AEC industry. A recognized thought leader of this emerging field, Alex graduated from Syracuse University with a B. Arch in 2010 and found his passion in purposing new technology for architecture firms. When the Oculus Rift DK1 hit the market, immersive technology became his focus. In 2013, at the theatre planning consultancy Fisher Dachs Associates, he pioneered the world's first use of VR for accurately testing sightlines and adjusting room design based on the results. Other early immersive creations included an app for Bravo Media to set up architectural projections for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, an "equipment clearance checker" for the Hudson Yards project, "The Shed," and a mock-up of various design elements for the Park Avenue Armory's production of Kenneth Branagh's Macbeth. His work in enterprise solutions grew, and culminated in the formation of Agile Lens. Using cutting-edge software and devices, Alex crafts tailored workflows focused on VR's singular contributions in the design process, from initial concept through project completion. He specializes in VR's capabilities beyond simple representation, particularly, its potential for design and communication. He develops tools and experiences for desktop, mobile, and browser-based VR platforms. Follow him on Twitter and Youtube @iBrews.
  • Martin Enthed
    After having worked for 10 years at IKEA, I have recently been appointed Managing Director for the newly established IKEA Digital Lab, aiming at identifying, investigating and evaluating new technologies specified towards the needs of IKEA and its customers. My new responsibility is added on to my role as Development & Operation IT manager at IKEA Communications, the IKEA in house agency for communication.Before joining IKEA, I worked over 20 years as an independent consultant, focusing design support. This entailed computerized support, including animation, to various design-undertakings, be it the car-industry, bio-medical research, jewellery, or home-furnishing design. I did have IKEA as a frequent client of mine during my years as a consultant, assisting them in development of virtual prototypes. And now, I have the privilege to further explore and experience the very latest in digital development in an open and curious environment, encouraging innovation and new thinking.
  • Scott Dewoody
    Scott DeWoody has always had an affinity for art and technology. After seeing the animation being done through computers, he knew he could combine the two. In 2007 he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in media arts and animation. He focused on lighting and rendering techniques using 3ds Max software, V-Ray for 3ds Max, and Adobe Photoshop software. A day does not go by when he is not using one of these applications. Image quality and workflow are the top priorities in his work. He is constantly studying color theory, composition, and new ways to produce the most effective possible results. He has worked at M. Arthur Gensler Jr. & Associates (Gensler), for the past 8 years as a visualization artist and manager. He has worked for numerous clients, including NVIDIA Corporation, ExxonMobil, and so many more. Currently, he is exploring the new possibilities of architecture in the interactive space with gaming platforms, augmented reality, and virtual reality.
  • Obrien Chalmers
    An entrepreneur and 3D visualization and branding expert, O’Brien Chalmers is the Founder and President of Steelblue, a creative agency that works in partnership with premier developers and architects to brand and market new developments with a compelling visual reality before the buildings materialize. With a client list that includes Tishman Speyer, Hines, Boston Properties, Golden State Warriors, and Millennium Partners, Steelblue brings real estate ideas to life in Award-winning format, enabling clients to win prestigious development projects, and to engage prospective buyers in a competitive luxury market. O’Brien also cofounded Screampoint and served as COO, where he directed global operations across the U.S and Asia. O’Brien earned his Bachelors and Masters degrees in Architecture from Tulane University in New Orleans, LA. He has juried international real-estate visualization competitions, and his 3D imagery has been published in over 100 publications.
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      Transcript

      JEFF MOTTLE: Wait for the mic. Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for coming to our panel this afternoon. Just quickly, I'm just going to run down the line of panelists here. I'm going to get each of you to quickly introduce yourself, kind of where you work, and briefly what you're doing with XR in your own business. So just super quick though, Alex.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Hey, there guys. My name is Alex Coulombe. I'm the creative director of Agile Lens immersive design and. We actually consult with architects and other people in the AEC industry to help them see strategies and opportunities to use VR in their work flows. Everything from design, over to representation and marketing.

      MARTIN ENTHED: Hi, I'm Martin Enthed from Ikea. I run something we call Ikea Digital Lab, where we are looking into the future interface for the customers that we think will be three dimensional in some way. And I'm also part of creating the VR stuff we have put on Steam, and those kind of things.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: O'Brien Chalmers, founder of Steelblue. Myself have background in architecture, affinity for art, and design, and technology. Steelblue is a creative agency based in San Francisco focused on communicating developers and architects visions. We've been using VR past few years, both six degrees of freedom and static 360 renders.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Hi, my name is Scott DeWoody. I am the firm wide creative media manager at Gensler. And we're using VR, AR, and all that throughout the entire design process from early conception, all the way to the end with marketing with our clients.

      DAVID SCOTT: And I'm David Scott. I'm the Director of Business Development at Transparent House, and we're a creative agency based in San Francisco. We're a 3D CGI studio that leverages photorealism, and our goal has been to make VR look as good as it possibly can. We've been leveraging our photorealistic skills to kind drive adoption in VR, both in mobile and in real time.

      JEFF MOTTLE: And my name is Jeff Mottle. I'm the founder of CGarchitect, which is an online community for professional architectural visualization artists. So I'll be the moderator of the panel today. So before we get into the questions, one of the things that we do at CGarchitect is try to keep a pulse of what's going on in the industry. And we do that through a number of mechanisms, including market research and surveys.

      So we did a survey back in mid 2016 asking some specific questions about where architecture was with VR, AR, MR. And we've just recently did that survey again, and I sent it out to, I think, a lot of people that registered. Just with a show of hands, how many people here ended up participating in the most recent survey? OK, that's great. So we had about 500 people that took the survey. So I'm just going to quickly run through a couple of the results, and sort of show how that's evolved since 2016.

      All right, so this is just showing where people that took the survey were located. You know, obviously, primarily Europe, and US, and a little bit of Asia. . Industry affiliation of the people that took the survey. What sort of work are they doing within the industry. Primarily, Viz companies, and architectural firms, closely followed by freelancers in engineering. And just as a note, all of these slides that we'll see through the presentation are all available to download as well, so it's one of the handouts. So if you miss something, don't worry about trying to photograph it. We'll be able to get that you.

      So one of the questions we asked is whether or not people we're using XR. XR are being VR, AR, MR in production this year or in projected into next year. So we have kind of a comparison between the last survey we did and the new survey. And I think the fact that we're seeing very little change between 2016 and now into 2017, I think is probably an indicator that we've kind of reached the peak of the hype within our own industry. I mean, obviously, VR and whatnot have been around for quite some time in many industries. But I think we've hit the peak of our industry, so I think from now is where we start to probably see a little bit of a decrease in the excitement. But at the same time, a lot of maturation of the technology, and some really interesting stuff that starts to get done that's going to have some significant impacts on what we do.

      This is a list of the HMDs that were used in production in the last survey. You can see that the rift in their Gear VR and Cardboard were tops the list. And this is what the survey that you guys all took. This is the results from that, so we're starting to see a whole bunch more HMDs that are starting to get a little bit of traction. You can look at the bottom. The one thing that was really interesting comparing the two is there was a 16% increase of usage of the Vive in the last year. But a decrease in the Rift, the Gear VR, and the Cardboard, obviously in favor of Vive and all of those other HMDs.

      So I think what we're seeing here is a lot of experimentation, people getting a little bit more comfortable with what's going on the industry, and kind of deciding what platform is going to work best for what they're doing. And this is whether or not people are doing or using xR our technologies in R&D. So if you're not using it in production, are you investigating how these technologies might work? And obviously, 78% this year indicated that they are, again, not a huge change from last year. So I think sort of speaks to what I said earlier, and you can see here a list of the HMDs that are being used in R&D this year.

      So with the panel discussion, I guess the question I want to ask now obviously just based on the survey results that we saw there. Do you guys feel like much has changed in the last year, 2016 to 2017? I mean, are we much further ahead now compared to where you guys were in 2016 in terms of adoption of the technologies, the challenges you're running into, the types of developments and experiences you're creating? Has it changed much, or are we kind of in the same place? Open that up to whoever wants to take that first.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Yeah, I can just say that in my experience, and the firms that I've been working with, there's much more interest in trying to incorporate it as part of the design process. Whereas before, I think the interest was primarily how do we use this to sell for our services based on projects that are already completed. So that's been the biggest trend I've seen.

      MARTIN ENTHED: I can continue. The difference we have done so far is that the first things we did was just plain rooms that you could visit. And the difference now is we're trying to use it, and testing it internally to do kind of knowledge transfer, those kinds of things. That's the main difference really. We're still struggling with the pipelines.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Yeah, I would agree with Alex. It's starting to become a lot more design focused. And presentation focused is often taking away the VR, and just show me some real time. I think we'll see a lot more XR, and MR, Ar sort of this year and next year with the development of ARCore, ARKit. We'll see a growth in that, but VR is fundamentally what we're seeing, very similar to what we're doing last year.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah, I'll go ahead and echo a lot of that too. I think AR is going to blow up quite a bit this next year. Now they're sitting pretty much everyone's mobile devices. Like Ensler, for the most part, I would say we've probably hit that plateau as well. It's a pretty common place that if a project wants to use VR, they can jump right in it and do it. And it's not really an issue, so it's starting to become just as natural as us doing renderings.

      DAVID SCOTT: The only thing I'll add is if we can get to untethered real time, that might change things in terms of the desire to have the Viz kind drive it more than the design side. I think the danger is on the design side, it becomes an internal business tool, and you need the Viz side to really drive public adoption of VR. And it's essential to kind of keeping things innovative and moving forward. And so I think that untethered real time could be a kind of game changer there. Other than that, I completely agree with you guys.

      JEFF MOTTLE: One of the other questions that we asked was whether or not companies were generating revenue with their XR initiatives. Just curious kind of going down the line. I mean, I know some of you guys, it's not part of the way you have it set up, your business model. But those who are, are you earning money from it? Is it as much as you had hoped or expect? Do you think it's--

      DAVID SCOTT: It's never as much as you hope, right? We started up THVR the branch of Transparent House that dealt strictly with VR, about two or three years ago. And we started monetizing real estate right away. Our first client was a paid client that drove the development of the department. I haven't seen any let up there in terms of the real estate side for Viz. We don't do a lot of design side work. Sometimes for interior design, we'll use the tool for that. But we've seen monetization in real estate consistent through the years, the last two and half years at least. On the product side for us because we have a lot of product clients. You know, electronics, manufacturers, and so forth.

      It's a tougher code to crack. There's sort of a question is how advertisers will use the technology in advertising for product, so we're trying to kind of dwell in that space as well. And try to help crack code, and monetize there as well. But on the real estate side, yeah, we've done really well from the start. And I don't see any slowdown.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah, we have a few projects that go into straight monetization. But we found the tool to be more helpful during the design phase, and we've seen a massive return on investment in terms of having that tool, making design decisions faster and more accurately. We've seen a big return on that.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: In VR, monetization right away. We've been creating [? DVR ?] for 23 years, and so it was sort of an easy step to give us another device to view those. So that's been successful for last three or four years. AR and MR, not yet. It's more of a research phase for us right now.

      MARTIN ENTHED: Yeah, we released the AR thing on the iOS devices. You don't know if you've seen it. Ikea place, and it's become quite big. A lot of people are using it. And when it comes to revenue, we don't really account it from that because we get revenue from sales somewhere else. But it's getting a lot of traction.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Since Aglie Lens is a consultancy, all of our revenue, in fact, is from our XR initiatives. And just piggybacking a little bit on what Scott was saying, it's interesting that a lot of companies rather than thinking of it in terms of generating revenue, it is very much a cost saver and a time saver, which you could interpret as a way of making money.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So the next question was we asked people how difficult they found it to find qualified people to manage, develop, and research their XR initiatives. And on a scale of one to 10, one being really easy, 10 being really difficult. The average was about six, so I'm curious given that many of you have staff in house that are now doing this. How hard is it, and how did that evolution happen of when you decided you wanted to get involved with these technologies to find the people to run those? And then as you grew, how hard was it to find additional people to help with that?

      DAVID SCOTT: I mean, I think we try to stack the deck in terms of the people that we have on board ag Transparent House. We've got people with architecture backgrounds. We've got people with industrial design backgrounds. I come from a film background, so I think doing that gives us sort of entree into the creative side of things. And that's mostly what I'll speak to here in terms of VR today. We never had any trouble finding people, I think. I think there's a good talent pool in San Francisco. We just got lucky in terms of being in that region, so we've always had the people on hand to kind of do what we need to do.

      But I think we try to kind of curate our staff a little bit more to have diverse backgrounds to give us sort of that creative edge that we need to sort of succeed. We transitioned from of a Viz agency to a full service creative agency over the past couple of years. And so the creative background side of it all was much more important to us. But I think in direct answer to question, I haven't seen any trouble so far just being in that region.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yes, so I'm looking at a much broader scale. I would agree with this figure. We have we have a lot of designers internally who are really, really interested in this. And then some who just aren't, and it's just part of the job. So they do it, so we definitely try and curate that talent pool internally that already exists. But now we're starting to realize that if we want to push the needle forward a little more, that we are going to have to go out and hire more creative talent specifically to Viz and VR.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: The panel is so organized the way we answer our questions. It's in line. We've had more success training internally than bringing people in externally. And maybe as a creative agency, our existing pool of talent knows sort of what we believe in, sort of what our brands about, how to craft a story over how to technically do something. What we've had with people that we brought in that are very technically focused sort of lacked the communication and sort of art to be able to tell the right kind of story. Which I think is really important in these experiences.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Martin, I should talk first just to break it up. Yes, so an interesting thing we've found is, you know, I'm based out of New York City. And there's a lot of talented coders, people with computer science backgrounds, people who have the technical ability to help with these initiatives. There's a real lack of people who have a design sensibility, especially when it comes to fields like architecture, who actually know how to make something that's going to be a you know well curated, well designed experience for the user.

      So I meet people all the time who I can give a very complicated design problem to, and they can come up with a functional working prototype of that very quickly. But if it's a UI, it's not going to be legible. If it's a teleportation system, it's probably going to make people sick. So there's a lot of effort that we put into working with people who are thinking very much about the human experience, and how that should be designed.

      ALEX COULOMBE: One of our biggest problem then is actually getting people to know that Ikea is interested in doing this overall. We are not really the company you look for when you are a game developer or something like that. So that's one of the reasons I'm out talking at these kind of event, of course. That's one of the things, but then we have had the same kind of trouble before. We are using computer graphics a lot to create normal images in the first five, six years before people knew that we were doing it. We were struggling so much to get people to even apply to our open positions, and we are a little bit in the same way now when it comes to getting game devs. So we have open positions now, and we don't get like thousands of applications. We get a few, but not that many as I would like to have.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So the next one. Scott, you had mentioned just a little bit earlier that-- I lost my train of thought there. I'll just start of this. This is the question that people we asked how important do they think XR was in technologies, and about 72%. I guess, 72 on a scale of 1 to 100, 100 being the most difficult. We'll go into the next one. Yes, this is where actually it was going. This slides the right order. So you had mentioned design in your firm was kind of where you saw the most benefit. How important do you think collaborative XR are is in these technologies?

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah, I feel like both those numbers are a little low, at least from my experience. We do a lot of collaborative VR. Even internally just for fun, we host a weekly what we call VR jam. And we get about 21 offices doing a virtual tour of our project every week, which is a really just cool way internally how we can help share design, and ideas, and the experience. But more importantly too, we're doing that with clients. And we're trying to sync up Gear VRs, and other HMDs, and even creating our own multiplayer unit inside of a real time engine because we realize that VR is a very siloed experience. And when you're trying to sell something, it's really awkward when you've got the headset on. And I'm trying to talk to you, and see what-- it doesn't work very well. So the big leap here, and I think we'll see it this year, is getting more than one person into that experience to help present.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Scott, what software are you guys using to do that?

      SCOTT DEWOODY: We use a lot of Unity, but also we're using we're using [? Fuser ?] to do a lot of that collaboration, especially the VR jams. Because we'll just take a [? Revit ?] model, and port it right in, and then send out the files for the collaboration.

      MARTIN ENTHED: We are also looking into the same kind of issues because most of the things that you do when you-- even if you buy something like a sofa, you don't want to take the decision by yourself. You want to do it together with somebody. I showed it on my session earlier today. We did a thing with the HoloLens where you can be in a mixed reality thing together with a few people. And everybody can put things out and take away things. And it becomes a collaborative kind of fun thing to do, and it really shows the potential of what you could do. Everybody can't have a HoloLens. They're quite expensive, but it's something really nice to do experiments with.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: And it's going to get there. I imagine this next year or two, I imagine we'll start seeing things like that show up on our iPhones and our Androids with the new core kits. So it'll get there for sure.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: And turn, I want to get invited to one of these sessions.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: OK, come by the office.

      DAVID SCOTT: Diddo on that.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Its a virtual tour.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah, come over to San Francisco. We'll host.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So over the last year and the kind of mainstream media in their coverage of XR technologies, they've kind of been indicating there's been a slowdown in the adoption on the consumer side of these technologies. Given that, at least for now, is a pretty big driver of these technologies, and how far they develop, how big of a concern is that for you and your own investments in these technologies?

      DAVID SCOTT: For us, we try to be as tech agnostic as possible. We're much more about the creative side of things. Purposing the 3D model to the technology is something we've done since we started just with renderings. In terms of VR, it was no different. It was a no brainer for us to take on that technology, and purpose our creative to that. So things are always going to change. You know, you're at CES. And one year it's 3D TV, and the next year it's HFR and 4K. And then it's internet of things. Then it's VR and mixed reality. So you're always going to be chasing a moving target if you're trying to just focus on one technology.

      I think the best thing you can do is be as tech agnostic as possible, and put your content where the people are consuming it. So the slowdown doesn't really bother us much. We've pivoted many times at Transparent House, and actually, I shouldn't even say that. I don't really see a slowdown from what we're doing on the creative side right now, but I can see the possibility of it coming. And I think you just have to remain as loyal to your creative as possible, and really understand what people are looking for in terms of that side of things. And then think about the technology sort of after that.

      ALEX COULOMBE: I don't think I'm disagreeing with David here, but tell me if I am. When you say agnostic, when I think about the way we tend to use technology, we're still always exploring everything coming out. Like you're not taking the perspective that you guys decide this is working, and then you stick with that. You're still researching, and looking at what else is there, right?

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, we're always on a deep dive R&D at Transparent House. We've got a dedicated team to VR, R&D, and we're not we're not dictating the technology. We're just accepting what kind of comes through the doors and adapting to that. There may be a case where the technology drastically changes so much that would be an issue for us, but currently, and I think O'Brien would agree is that we dwell on the 3D model as our asset.

      And once you've got that 3D model, and you've modeled it to 360 degrees in 3D, you can purpose it to the tech. Whether it be outputting at rendering, or acute TVR, or VR experience, or an AR experience. So if that starts to dry up, I think we can all agree you can kind of sense when that's coming. You can kind of read the industry, and see where things are slowing down. Hopefully, contribute to the extended growth of it, and keep it going for as long as possible. But in the end, it's going to change. That's a given. That's a constant is really change in this industry, so you have to be ready to pivot. You have to be ready to innovate and adapt.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Yeah, to me, there's two big things happening as well. There's new innovations coming out every week in this industry, and there's a lot of fragmentation. So there's a huge proliferation of devices, and techniques, and software. And I think something we probably all struggle with is figuring out what's most useful. So we try to make an effort in our work to at least explore every one of those new devices or software techniques as they come out. And then make a judgment call for is this something worth passing on to architecture firms, and this is actually going to make it a difference in their day to day lives?

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Yeah, and I would agree. We look at it a little bit differently versus trying every piece of hardware that comes out, which we started that way. We just can't do it anymore. It was just too many, but we don't know what we're going to do when we started project. It's story first. What are we going to tell, and then how do we do it? And so the technology lends itself to sort of supporting that story. Sometimes it's going to be VR. Sometimes it could be [? handsketch. ?] We don't know.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So you kind of just segued into my next question there. I think for the most part, what I see in the industry reminds me of a lot of when rendering kind of became for photoreal 20 years ago, 15 years ago. And how it was very much a novelty. And a lot of focus on the technology, and not necessarily on the artistic side or the storytelling side. So how are you guys addressing? I mean, obviously, I think you're a little bit more mature, both in your studios and in your approach. But as an industry as a whole, how do you kind of reconcile? Try to not get caught up in the technology and the novelty side, and really try to focus on why these technologies are actually useful.

      ALEX COULOMBE: For me, you know, my background is in architecture and design. And so when I am testing-- to be fair, not every single device in software and technique, but the ones that look like they could have relevance. I actually try to actually design with it, whether it's a real project or a proof of concept. I really try to get into the weeds and say, OK, is this actually something that could make a significant difference?

      DAVID SCOTT: So were you asking how important is photo realism or--

      JEFF MOTTLE: No, I think a lot of people right now just because the technology within our industry is still relatively new. Is they tend to get hung up on the novelty and the tech, rather than the storytelling and the artistic side.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Tech for tech sake.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, absolutely. So there's two sides of with the coin with VR. One's tech, and one's content. And there's, I think, I might be jumping ahead here in terms of where you're going with this. But I think there's a danger in terms of jumping on the bandwagon and creating content that just is there to be there to be involved in the space. And I think photorealism plays into that in the sense that I think it's critical to maintain quality standards. And to me, photorealism is the benchmark of quality standards for VR and real estate development, and marketing, and advertising for them.

      So if you are just jumping on the bandwagon to get content out there, it could lead to bad things in the industry. I came from 3D TV. I came from stereoscopic 3D in Hollywood, and the 3D TV protocols, I think we all know what happened to that. Everybody bought these great TVs with their glasses, and how many times did anyone use them? Do you guys use 3D TVs at home? Not a single hand, right? But we all bought that stuff. But I think what happened there was a lot of people jumped on the bandwagon and contribute a lot of bad content. There was also barriers to entry in terms of the technology.

      I think we have a similar risk here in VR in the sense that there is a barrier to entry right now on the tech side, and that's the goggles. A lot of people don't like to use them, and there's a barrier to entry in terms of the content. And without photorealism, without making the content better, I'm not saying photorealism is it. But without making that content better, you're going to alienate your audience. And it could lead to some problems downstream. So I think photorealism, especially in architecture and real estate development, is critical.

      MARTIN ENTHED: Yeah, when we were starting out, we were looking into how photoreal could we get it? But one of also the more important things is that we wanted to do something that you couldn't do in any other media. So in the first experience we did that went public, we shrunk you to a child size so you could experience as somebody else. And that for me is what makes this kind of media different.

      You can be longer, shorter. You can be visually impaired. You can try a lot of things that you couldn't do in any other media, and that's also why we have been mainly focusing on things where you have six degrees of freedom. You can walk around 360's, normals, spherical, panoramas. We haven't done much of that because it doesn't give you much extra. Not in my point of view at least, so that's where we are trying to use this in a way that you can't experience it in any other way.

      ALEX COULOMBE: I find personally that photorealism has its place, but I think it's often overvalued actually. I think people get hung up on making something look the way something is going to look when it's built, which is fantastic when a design is at that level of completion. But we've also found that VR in many cases, especially in the AEC industry, can run the risk of, a, being overwhelming and, b, drawing attention to things that shouldn't have attention on them yet.

      So if a project is only in concept or SD, and the materials haven't been worked out for the space, you shouldn't be showing people of your experience that has placeholder materials. It's OK for a VR experience to have white walls or more of a diagrammatic quality. Because if you are only drawing attention to the important elements of the VR experience at that time, then that's when a really productive conversation can happen. Whether it's with your collaborators in the design team, or even the end users of an experience.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, and to add on to that. A majority of the VR renderings we do at Gensler are actually just that. They're very conceptual looking. We don't push photorealism too early. Sure, we'll have some physically based lighting and all that kind of sell it a little more. But nine times out of 10, the first VR renderings we're kicking out for the first couple months of the project. They're white. Maybe a little toon shading on it just to add some definition, and that's about it.

      The one thing I usually like to ask my designers when they're jumping into this is like why are you using VR? And it kind of helps deter that technology conversation. Where it's like they have to actually sit and think like, why am I choosing this medium over just a standard rendering? And then you start getting into more of the more, well, I need someone to experience what the ceiling height in this room feels like. I'm like OK, well, that's better. Like don't worry about the tech. We've got plenty of that to communicate that with.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: I think the question why becomes even more important. I think fast forward in a few years, and photorealism is the part of the conversation. It's automatic. It's a click of a button, and you're there. Granted different stages of the lifecycle when you're in sort of design versus marketing. You're going to want to see different output. But in a few years, I think the question is, again, why as the photoreal is automatic?

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, I mean, I agree. It's listening to your client for sure. For us, we just dwell on that side of it. I think we're trying to sell real estate overseas to buyers that will never come here. They're going to want to see it in photoreal quality before they make a decision like that. But I absolutely agree across the board with you guys.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So next question here. So how do you guys deal with helping people, especially people who are new to VR? And perhaps this is more on the client side, avoid a negative experience with the technology that might turn them off entirely from ever using any form of this technology.

      DAVID SCOTT: Sure, so for us it's client education. It's just a matter of really helping them understand how to use the technology, and what the benefits really are to them. Just like you were saying, O'Brien, is that what is it that you guys want to get out of this? And a lot of that comes down to listening.

      There's a funny story. We were given our first HTC Vive live demo at the [? Linar ?] Shipyard Kickoff Launch. And there was a long line of people trying to come up, and use the experience. And one guy was waiting for about 20 minutes, and he got up there. I sat there, and I went over like sort of what you should do and how you should use it. And he kind of nodded along and so forth. And he proceeded. I don't know. Maybe didn't understand English that well. But he proceeded to put on the headset, and then walk off down the hallway. And before anyone could catch him, he got to the end of the tether. And it yanked him backwards, and knocked him on the floor.

      So for us, it's a matter of really just educating people as to sort of what to expect. You know, what the expectations of VR are, and then really listening to them. One side of the equation is helping them. Sort of talking to them about how to use technology. Their side is listening to what they don't like about it. What's gone wrong with it. What makes them uncomfortable, and then trying to fix that and address that. Whether it's latency issues, or photorealism, or what have you. So there's two sides to that for us.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: I will admit, I'm guilty of having shown a client a roller coaster ride in DK1 one many years ago. I know, and so that clients now jaded with their first impression of VR is not a good one. I think that that's a problem because I'm surprised that the number of clients that come in, and no, no. We've seen VR. You don't need to show us. We know what it is. And all VR's XR's are not created equally. And I think there's differences.

      And I think fast forward three years now. I'm in the process of educating clients in terms of what's possible. And one thing I'll add is when you're educating a client when they see their project in VR, when they're vested in it, it's 10 times more valuable to them. So I could show a client, here's is a demo of building a. Here's a demo of your project, almost identical, but it's their project. It's amazing. I'm going to go out, and buy a VR headset today.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah, I had a lot of experiences about that trying just to sell my senior level staff in VR was first coming out. And they're like oh, no, it's just one of those 360 gimmicks. I don't need that, and I was like, OK, OK. What are you working on? Give me the project file. Come back to me in two days, and I'll show you something. This is just the time we were doing 360 renderings. And the second they put the headset up to their face, it was like order me 10 of these like right now. And for the most part, we do the same with our clients. We'll do maybe like a little mockup demo, or something along the lines. It's just really quick and dirty, but it gets the point across. And when they do see their project, they are very much fully invested into it.

      One of the other bigger things we do see, and I've seen trending a little lately is that we've had some clients just afraid to put the headset on. And we've learned if you remove the head strap, so they're actually just holding it. They can quickly pull it away from their face. They're much more open to then trying it. And then once they get comfortable with it, they want to stop holding it. You put the head strap back on, and they're good to go.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: We have boxes of head straps.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Yeah.

      DAVID SCOTT: GO 40's work really well for that too. We've had clients put the headsets up to their face and just kind of stare straight ahead. And you got to tell them you can look up. You can look left. You can look right, but they feel kind of constricted.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Yeah, the GO 40, by the way, is this right here. And it's nice because it just slips right onto a phone. I'm not sponsored by them. I promise. And yeah, it's just a really easy way to show an experience in a very non-committed kind of way.

      MARTIN ENTHED: And in this thing, we actually did a huge investment in internally. Every year, we have an internal expo thing, and about 1,000 people are coming there. And we actually run a VR event with them, so they get a 15 minute experience in an HTC Vive. The first thing they actually saw, and it was really interesting to see how non-gamers react. And people who are not really in this at all, and it was very interesting and sitting and having interviews with them afterwards. And their response was awesome. If you have something that has fully six degrees of freedom, no lag, you are interacting and doing things. Everybody gets awesome response, really awesome response. But then again, if you don't go back to a normal phone with a Google Cardboard on, and then you move around and feel the lag then. Then you start appreciating the good things. And of course, in a few years, everything will be that good probably.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Martin just reminded me of a really crucial thing we found with introducing non-gamers to VR. Don't make every button on the controller do something. One button, like if you can, make it one button because you're putting a headset on, and putting a foreign object in someone's hand. And they have no idea what it is, and you're saying the joystick does this. And this button is this, and this does this. They're just going to feel stupid, and they're not going to want to do it.

      MARTIN ENTHED: One thing that was really interesting-- of course, showing Ikea products to Ikea managers is easy. But what we did was we put a physical share in the virtual space at the same place. So we took away the hand controllers, and then they have been walking around in a virtual space for a little while. And then they were reaching out for a physical thing in the virtual space, and it was in the same place. Everything was perfect, and then that made it sell the whole thing. That's actually part of the same thing that we have out there. You can try it out if you want to.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So as this technology matures even further, we experiment more with it. Is there an ultimate winner or an ultimate format that becomes the most useful?

      SCOTT DEWOODY: I mean, I feel like from at least my experience, we feel like the six degrees of freedom being able. And once wireless comes in, that's probably going to be it because people want to first thing anyone ever does, even if it's just a Google Cardboard, and they put it to their face for the first time. The first thing they want to do is take a step forward, and you're like no, no, no. Don't walk. Don't walk. Don't do that.

      As in terms of platform though, I mean, I don't know. I don't know who. I guess whoever really gets there first for the most part, but I'll weigh a lot of the real time engines are going. They're realizing that there's so many different platforms out there. Even they are trying to standardize the code. So even if I have a Vive, and you have a Rift, it is not going to be difficult for me to publish to both devices. So yeah, I really think it's just going to be sort of that wireless freedom. And even then, and I don't like people comparing VR and AR. They're actually completely different mediums for me, and they both have their own use cases. Where VR is like the place does not exist, you're going to use VR. If you want to bring something into place, then you're going to use AR.

      ALEX COULOMBE: World scale tracking is a big one for us both. That'll come I think with certain limitations of even the Windows mixed reality headset since you have inside out tracking. Oculus Santa Cruz is going to have some level of that. And even actually with ARCore ARKit now, we've done some experiments with actually using the AR functionality to track motion. So I could walk from here all the way down to the exit sign with there on a phone, and it would actually track motion that entire time. So when you start imagining putting someone in a warehouse or a big field that is actually the size of their project. And they can just walk around like they're there, and not deal with teleportation or anything that removes them from a sense of immersion. That's something that people seem to be really excited by.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: So do you think that they all merge, AR, MR, VR? There's one.

      ALEX COULOMBE: That's a great question, O'Brien. I think eventually they do. Yeah, that's just my personal take on where the industry is going. But I imagine we're actually going to get to the point where you'll have very discreet goggles. We might even call them glasses. And you'll essentially be able to toggle between turning off the world in a virtual space, or still looking at the world and virtual objects are around you. And to a certain extent, I think it'll lend itself to people who are more naturally introverted versus extroverted for what they use it for. Although that's more on the personal side on the enterprise and business side.

      Like I think it was Scott or David who was saying that, yeah, both have their own use cases. And I think even when they do eventually merge, you are going to see them being used for different things. Walking around on a project site when that project site is eventually going to have a building on it, and looking at a virtual overlay of that building is phenomenal. But sometimes you either can't do that, or you want to be collaborating with people from all over the world. And that's when VR is handy because it is location agnostic.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Yeah, not the moderate, Jeff. Sorry, it sounded like where he was going.

      JEFF MOTTLE: It was a good question.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: It's interesting. I did the same test with ARKit where I was able to with my iPad, walk across an environment. But it didn't click like this could be a replacement. I think mixed reality and augmented reality sort of become one, and it becomes mixed reality. But I still see a distinction between VR and MR, and that those stay separate for a while.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, I mean, I see the trend towards emerge for sure. I think if you're talking about right now who's the winner, they both have very different use case scenarios like you said. It's the ease of use, and the cost for static is a no brainer for a lot of our clients. They want a Cardboard. They want it on Samsung Gear VR. But if you want that destination wow experience, that launch event where you have to have a lot of firepower, and you want the Vive or the Oculus. That gives you a whole different kind of deep dive into the experience, so they're very different. Again, I think you have Project Santa Cruz sort of hits, and we get untethered real time. That will be the game changer and perhaps the winner there. But right now, they both have very different uses, needs, costs. And we just go where our client wants to go with it.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So in a similar vein, but more on the content creation authoring side. Do you think the way that we do this five years from now will be with one or a new game engine for example? Or will it be the offline renders now evolve where the hardware is fast enough that our offline renders become real time?

      MARTIN ENTHED: There is where I am struggling. We have been using computer graphics for 10 years now. We have a library of about 33,000 furniture things for Ikea. All in high end definition, and everything and not at all done for real time. But then we would like to automatically convert that to something in any game engine, or web [? GL, ?] whatever there is out there. And There is no generic format for it, and its no generic way of describing materials and all that. And that's my biggest concern, and we don't have this all today because we don't do that big of productions.

      We have the AR thing that is running on the iPhone, and its says 2,000 products in there so far. But as soon as we are doing more and more, and using different engines, we will run into problems because we would like to have this automated way somehow. And so a generic way of describing materials would be perfect for us because we don't have a project, and then we forget it. We use our assets over and over again until they're not sold anymore.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: I feel like a good bridge or something that's going to pop in to help with that is going to be light fields. I don't know if anyone's gotten a chance to really experience a light field. Is Lytro here? No, OK. Well, anyways, Lytro's been doing some really awesome work with Chaos Group. And I got to try out one of their demos at earlier this year in Venice, and it was extremely impressive. It was the ray tracing power of V-Ray, and the six degrees of freedom that you get in a real time engine. And it looks spot on. It was beautiful. And I know Nvidia's been playing with some of that and a few other companies. So I don't know if we'll see-- that may be the merger of real time in offline rendering, but I think the hardware is going to have to drastically speed up before we start getting 90 frames a second.

      JEFF MOTTLE: Well, that particular format has massive IO issues.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Yeah, it's got its own limitations too that we have to solve. So I mean, light fields aren't going to be here tomorrow, but five years from now, I would hope there is a reasonable solution out there for them.

      ALEX COULOMBE: I'll make a prediction. I think five years from now, we're all going to be doing a heck of a lot more web VR. Web VR is still pretty early on right now. For those who don't know, the idea basically is you go to a web link. You're not downloading an app to your phone or your desktop computer. It's a single website that you get a VR experience from. There's also usually a non-VR version if you don't have a headset, and it works on all platforms. And so I don't think one particular piece of video game software is going to win out, but I do imagine all of them at some point are going to be forced to support web VR because it is by far the most accessible way to offer an experience to people.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So what are you guys most excited about with this technology in our industry? Is there something that you've seen that's coming up, or just something in the way that you're implementing that really gets you guys excited?

      ALEX COULOMBE: I really like the-- sorry, you can go ahead. I like the Vive tracker stuff. I'm really excited by all that, so we've been doing a lot of experiments where we'll have 3D models of real world objects. And you can take that, and Ikea, of course, can do this very well. If you have the 3D model of that real world object, and then you put a tracker on it, then it can exist both in the real world and in the virtual world in a kind of mixed reality sort of way. So it's going to be cool to set up an empty space or a room. And then put certain key objects, or walls, or custom. If there's any kind of custom architectural moments taking place, and you have a mockup of that, it's really cool to put someone in the VR experience where they actually are reaching out and feeling the touch experience of that.

      I don't know if anyone's done the Void before. It's kind of a big video game arcade. There's a few locations around the world, but they're doing a more proprietary version of that. And you know, to mixed results, some of it's really good. Some of it isn't. And the possibilities of the Vive tracker, and other things like it to do a more merged virtual experience that feels that much more real is very exciting to me.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, I completely agree. I think the tactile experience is really cool. Companies like sixth sense developing the tactile suits and so forth is really interesting. I guess with the risk of finding out that Elon is right, and we're really living in a simulation. And you know, VR is some kind of cruel, ironic joke. But that kind of stuff is kind of cool. Right now, you still have that barrier of you just have this headset, and that's pretty much it. There's some gloves and things like that, that people get to try. But if you could do a full immersion, and feel the wind on your face, and things like that, I think that's where people want to see it go.

      ALEX COULOMBE: There is by the way a peripheral that will blow wind on your face. It's just at a Kickstarter campaign.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: I think one of the coolest things I saw this year done with VR, and especially HTC Vive, was in Venice. The guys from Brick Visual, who mounted an HTC Vive tracker on a camera, rigged it up on a [? Jerry ?] mount. And then was able to film on a green screen, and take that tracking data and pump it right back in 3ds Max. And do all their camera movements from that. And then render out an animation, and do all the compositing. That was actually pretty impressive. And then even taking that a step further like also hearing how Disney is filming the Lion King completely in VR is something else too. Because I know they're calling it a live action movie, but I think it's all CG, so it kind of makes sense that you could do that.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: I'm interested in all these things VR, and we haven't talked a lot about MR and AR. That's just still a research part for us. But something I'm interested in seeing with mixed reality is not only the building in its footprint as you walk down the street, but being able to be two, three, four blocks away, and see foreground obstructions removed. And I'm not talking about a light pole or a trash can. But foreground buildings instantly matted out, so you could see a future skyline with all the buildings in place slipped into the city. I don't know if it's going to be with depth sensors at that distance, or maybe it's real time photogrammetry based on sort of the movements. But that will be really interesting.

      MARTIN ENTHED: If you look at what we do, and what we sell at Ikea, then everything we do is centered in a room scale in interior some kind of thing. And everything is not an individual products its like function, so the three dimensional space and especially mixed reality is something that is really interesting for us. And virtual reality is a stepping stone towards that. We need the same kind of access. We need the same kind of groundwork done, and its more powerful as you was saying over there before. So you can have a high end machine doing stuff that. But in the end, mixed reality with some kind of glasses, or lenses, or whatever will come in the future is where we are looking into the real use case for us because you would like to see furniture in your own home. That's no secret. I guess most people would understand that.

      JEFF MOTTLE: Kind of the opposite of the previous question, is there anything you've seen with VR that scares you in the way it's evolving, or the way it's been used?

      ALEX COULOMBE: This probably isn't specific to our industry, but the data is a mixed bag for us. Especially when things start to happen with more eye tracking, and foviated rendering, and all the wonderful things that can come from that. The fact that all of this data can start to be collected, that's great if you're using it in a really productive way. You're looking at the way users are eventually going to use a built space, things like that. But then also knowing that virtual reality and augmented reality to a certain extent have the potential for a lot of recorded data about what you are doing. Everything from what you're looking at. To how you're moving your body, To what you spend the most time in. That's not great.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: I think one of my biggest concerns is that we start relying too much on I think like push button VR, and that we've become very dependent on that. And not because I feel like it's going to put me out of a job. In fact, I think it might do the opposite. But I feel like we start selling our clients these just like, oh, let's put it in VR. Button push, there it is. Button push, there it is. And then they one day go, well, my 14-year-old can do this. What are you bringing to the table to me, and then you're like button push.

      And that concerns me a little bit because even coming from Gensler, I've actually even experienced that in the past with doing really simple renderings out of like some applications like SketchUp, and [? Lujan, ?] and whatnot. Where it was just like so simple. We're like done, screenshot. There's your rendering, and then all of a sudden the clients like my 14-year-old can do this. What are you bringing to the table? And then they call me, and they're like you need to do 20 renderings by the end of the week. And you need to make them all photographic. I'm like, OK, and then that kind of scares me. And so I would like us to I guess maybe focus on, again, the why, the storytelling. The extra bit of work that needs to go in there I think is something we need to keep our sights on.

      JEFF MOTTLE: What advice would you guys give to people that are wanting to get involved with this technology that maybe are just early in their research stage, or maybe haven't even started yet? And maybe they don't know where to start. What would be your advice?

      DAVID SCOTT: There's so many places to go to find out information. You can find out stuff by coming to events like these obviously. You can go online to free tutorials on YouTube. Unity and Unreal have some free tutorials as well. Then there's paid tutorials like Unity, and so forth that you can use, which are very effective. I think just networking is a really big one. In every city, there's so many of our events going on, local events.

      At a Transparent House, we host one about every quarter where we bring just the general public in, and anyone who is interested to talk about VR. What's going on. We're starting sort of podcasting to kind of get just general messaging out there about the technical side, about the creative side. So you can absorb it in so many ways. You've got so many access points to get in. Send me a resume. We're hiring right now as well.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Yea, we live in an incredible age. And the access we all have now to forums, and YouTube videos, and all that to teach ourselves. And it's incredible, and then you have companies like Autodesk, of course, offering software educationally for free. That's all wonderful for the industry. I think there's a misconception that a lot of people have that doing anything in VR is a very different workflow from what they're used to. When in fact, if you're day to day work involves 3D modeling, lighting, texturing, rendering, any of those, you're kind of on your way to figuring out how to do this.

      And I tend to phrase to people who are looking to get started with this that it's a lot like learning guitar. A lot of people learn how to play guitar, and at first, they can be kind of intimidated by it. But I was when I was a kid, and my dad was like, you know, Alex. There's like 100,000 songs you can play if you learn four chords, and so I frame it as that way. And I play guitar now, and I can play even more than four chords. And when I'm talking to people who want to get started in some of this stuff, I try to phrase it like that to them. Like whether you want to learn how to code in C sharp, or start understanding a little bit about how you optimize 3D geometry for VR, there's a couple bar chords, so to speak. That once you learn those, you can do 80% of the work you need to do. And then once you feel comfortable with that, the finer detail and the more complex work isn't going to be as intimidating.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: I think those that are just getting started out, ask why? So we've answered that question first. There is a wealth of knowledge online. I think going to the meet ups, the conventions, the conferences to get your hands on these devices is really valuable. If you're just starting out, there's only so much you're going to get from the internet. You need to get inside of these devices, and get your hands on. And there are so many that it's difficult as you're just starting out to get a big collection of every device that's out there. But there's a lot of meet ups that you can go, and people are bringing in devices. And it'd be a good way to start.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: So to kind of piggyback off that, the biggest thing people usually ask me like what do I get? Would I do my responses? Find out what fits in your budget, and then just buy it and roll with it because all of this stuff, regardless of which is it, five, any of it. You're going to be able to generate VR content, and you're actually going to be able to sell your idea if you've got a solid why. Regardless if it's just a 360 rendering or something that's interactive. And so if you're trying to figure out what to buy, just look at the price. Look at how it fits into your pipeline, and how it works. And then just get rolling in it. Because if you dwindle on it too much, you're never going to get anywhere if you keep focusing on that.

      ALEX COULOMBE: Yeah, and guys, the price drops on this technology have been insane. I mean, a year ago to get an Oculus Rift with sensors and hand controllers was $800. And now it's $400, and there's all sorts of Black Friday sales coming up. So anyone who's like, oh, maybe I want to get one of these. This is a good time.

      JEFF MOTTLE: Sure you're not selling them?

      ALEX COULOMBE: Huh?

      JEFF MOTTLE: Sure you're not selling them?

      ALEX COULOMBE: I'm not. I promise, no commission.

      DAVID SCOTT: One other quick thing too. Don't be afraid of being in any specific industry as well. A lot of us come from different backgrounds up here, And as I said earlier, we hire across the board in terms of people on tech side, people on the creative side, people that come from architecture, people that come from film. So I think you can enter the VR marketplace from many different places. They're all valid.

      MARTIN ENTHED: And I can finalize this by saying I think that what computer graphics and 3D has been the last 20 years has been a little bit confined into a certain industry. Just look at us and companies like us. We'll probably have assets in 3D, and then start doing interaction in 3D. And then we start having user interface in 3D. So if you're new to this, I think it's a perfect time to get into this, and it doesn't have to be game. It doesn't have to be architecture or retail. It will probably be everywhere in 10 years.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: Designs design.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So we've got a couple of minutes left here, and probably maybe get two or three questions. Is there anybody in the audience that has a question for our panelists? Maybe we'll try to get you to say it without a mic, and then I'll repeat it. If that doesn't work, then we'll have to run a mic to everybody here. So go ahead.

      AUDIENCE: I have been to implement VR. I work for a health care organization. Over the last year, I've been trying to implement, and I just cannot seem to get it off the ground. I see the value for having design [INAUDIBLE] quickly. But I think everybody's afraid of it. Any suggestions on what to do? [INAUDIBLE]

      JEFF MOTTLE: So just to repeat the questions for people online. Gentleman in the front row has been trying to implement this technology in the health care industry, but is kind of running into problems.

      DAVID SCOTT: What are the points of resistance for you? What are you trying to do, and where is it being resisted?

      AUDIENCE: We're trying to use it at far as the design process. Oh sorry. We're trying to use it as part of the design process, and I think it intimidates the designers. And they're afraid. I mean, they're already busy, and they already have tools that they're used to that they're efficient in. So I think they see it as something that's going to slow them down instead of help their clients make decisions quicker. Any ideas on what I can do with the staff? Maybe to have fun, or I don't know. Something to get them more comfortable with it.

      MARTIN ENTHED: I don't if this works, but one thing I did with some of the Ikea designers was I let them into Tilt Brush, and let them try that out. In the end, I have to kick them out because they were doing everything in there. It's so creative. And it can get the fear of using your headset, or the fear of do it being in there getting that out. I don't know. Any other suggestions?

      SCOTT DEWOODY: That's actually a really good point. I would say, and this is how I sort of tackled it at my firm, is that I found a project that was not struggling, but maybe needed some visualization help. And I asked them what the biggest design issue they were having at that time was. And I knew I could solve it with VR, I went ahead and did it for them. Now the downside is you're probably going to have to do that on your own time, and you're probably not going to get paid for it. But if you're really trying to make it happen. Like if you can just solve that problem, and say, hey, look. This is the experience when you walk into the atrium. This is what it feels like. You put the headset on them, and it's their project that they're invested in. You get them automatically, and then it's like how many can we order? How do we do this? Because as soon as you start solving that problem for them in a new way that is faster in a sense, yeah, you've got it.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, I think just opening up and listening to them. Interviewing them about what it is that they're just having trouble with, and making it fun. I agree. If you can make it fun for them, and show them that it's not all about you're solving that specific problem. And sort of seeing the resistance because I already have a way to do it. But show them that the technology itself is kind of fun to use, and does things from a tangential point of view, kind of gets them in there. That can be pretty effective as well.

      ALEX COULOMBE: I'll just give a really quick specific example. So I was working with a theater consultancy that part of the design problem of designing theaters, of course, is checking sightlines, and making sure everyone has a good view to the stage. And so, yeah, I built a VR application that allowed you to drop into any seat in the hall. And you see that you that view, and wow. Looking around, and getting a sense of scale, and feeling present, and seeing the stage. And being able to lean, and see how that changes the view. That's 1,000 times better than a flat rendering workflow, which is what had been in place for 15 years. So yes, I agree with everyone.

      JEFF MOTTLE: Any other questions in the audience? Yes, right here. Just wait for the mic to come to you there.

      AUDIENCE: Hello, so I'm still in college right now. So with the VR, you guys are saying that implementing into your companies is having different people trying to learn about it. Do you guys see going into higher level institutions, or even high schools? Actually promoting it within our schools themselves. So by the time we actually come to work for a company or under you yourselves, that we actually wouldn't know what you want from us. Instead of having to learn it on the fly when you have us to do whatever that we have to do, but we can learn it within school.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, coming directly to you guys, we've started doing that at TH already. I just did a talk at my son's school actually. I've got kids who are one, seven, and nine. And I went into their school and the middle school after that as well just to kind of introduce the technology to them. And sort of feel out where they might want to see it. Is it on the education side? Obviously, on the gaming side, it's a no brainer. But getting out there, and doing outreach to the younger generation is absolutely essential. There are going to be defining kind of the language of VR, the expectations of VR. So we make it a point to get out there, and sort of give these little classes to organizations like that.

      Higher level education, of course. We do outreach on a business level. It would make perfect sense on the college level as well. We do these lunch and learns where we go out, and kind of demo the technology, and sort of talk. Make it a frank discussion about sort of what you guys are seeking, what your expectations are, what your preconceptions are, and things like that. So yeah, I would say just make an outreach to local companies that might be in the space, and invite them in. And see if they'll come, and do a lunch and learn for you guys, or host you over at their facility. We would do that. If you called us, I would say come on over. Bring your class over, and we would do an evening event for you guys. Absolutely.

      AUDIENCE: Can we do that over winter break?

      DAVID SCOTT: Say that again.

      AUDIENCE: Can we do that over winter break?

      DAVID SCOTT: I can't understand.

      AUDIENCE: Like winter break. Are you guys free then?

      DAVID SCOTT: Winter break?

      AUDIENCE: January.

      DAVID SCOTT: Yeah, absolutely. Where are you based out of?

      AUDIENCE: Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.

      JEFF MOTTLE: OK, yeah. We're downtown San Francisco.

      O'BRIEN CHALMERS: Yeah, I think we're doing some middle school introduction, but I haven't looked it at higher education. I think if you do reach out to groups in your area, they would be happy to go there. Because every time we show this to somebody, we learn something about it. And so it's a reward for us as well to sort of see how people are thinking, and how they're processing the information when they're in their VR.

      ALEX COULOMBE: And just piggybacking on that, we're running out of time here. But I just want to say that some of the educators I've seen for anyone who's thinking about actually trying to implement this into a curriculum, it's particularly nice when these tools, and techniques, and different software are being used in a way that isn't just in service of let's use this as it's being used right now. But taking advantage of the sandbox quality that an academic environment can have some time to really push the tools. And really see what happens when you push them beyond what they can do now, and maybe what they're going to be able to do in 10, 20 years. I went to Syracuse University, and they have a program there now where they actually are trying to get architects to think about what a design studio is going to look like in 50 years. And use AR, and VR, and MR, and XR to help visualize, and represent, and design what that experience might be like. And I want to see more you know educational programs doing things like that.

      DAVID SCOTT: And I think it's a natural next step adoption. When I was going to school, it was language, lab, and then it was computer lab. And now we're seeing VR labs pop up in schools and so forth. So the expectation of how you're going to learn is essential, and obviously, it's the youth that's going to drive that. My kids, every time I bring home a headset from work, it's unzipped, open on the table. They're already digging into it, so they have an expected natural expectation to use the technology that way.

      SCOTT DEWOODY: And the beautiful thing is the majority of this software is now free, especially for education.

      JEFF MOTTLE: So I think that's our time today. So I want to thank all of you for joining us, both online and in person. And also thank you very much to our panel for helping us out today. Thank you.

      DAVID SCOTT: Thanks Jeff.