The London Film Festival Expanded runs from October 6-17 with a total of 18 pieces of immersive stories and art, with 9 of those pieces available remotely via their LFF Expanse art gallery that is available for free on Viveport (with nine interactive & 360 video experiences), as well as an Oculus Quest App Lab version of LFF Expanse 2021 (featuring five 360 videos), and Mac & PC versions as well.
I had a chance to talk to the XR and immersive programming lead at the British Film Institute and lead curator of the London Film Festival Expanded, Ulrich Schrauth. Schrauth is also the founding curator of the VRHAM! festival in Hamburg, Germany, which was one of the first immersive storytelling festivals to have a virtual exhibition in the Museum of Other Realities in June 2020. We talk about his journey into XR, the process of bringing immersive stories into virtual platforms, latest trends in immersive storytelling from theater and fine arts, and the different site-specific performances that’ll be happening at the London Film Festival Expanded 2021 selection. A selection of 9 experiences are available remotely on “>Viveport LFF Expanse 2021 app now until October 17th.
LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE VOICES OF VR PODCAST
Here’s the trailer of the 18 experiences that are being featured within the London Film Festival Expanded selection.
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Music: Fatality
Rough Transcript
[00:00:05.412] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR Podcast. Hello, my name is Kent Bye and welcome to the Voices of VR podcast. So in today's episode, we're going to be doing a bit of a sneak peek for the London Film Festival's expanded selection, which is a total of 18 different experiences, but only nine of them are available virtually if you're remote. But if you're in the London area, then you can check out some of the other in real life performances and installations that are only happening in their site specific locations there, which is running from October 6th to 17th. So I had a chance to talk to the XR Immersive Program Lead from the British Film Institute, Erlich Schauth, to run down the program and a little bit more details as to how to get access to the program. It's available both on Viveport and there's actually a Quest App Lab version where you can download that and get access to the installation gallery and look at 14 installations that are there, but only five of the 360 videos are available in the Quest. And there's four interactive pieces that you can see if you have a Viveport version, which you can download and see all the experiences there. So that's what we're covering on today's episode of the Voices of VR podcast. So this interview with Erlich happened on Tuesday, October 5th, 2021. So with that, let's go ahead and dive right in.
[00:01:19.217] Ulrich Schrauth: My name is Ulrich Kraut. I'm, among other things, the Exile Immersive Program Lead for the British Film Institute. And one of my tasks here is to curate the new strand Exile Immersive LFF Expanded. We started this last year. And this is the second edition. And in addition to BFI, I also have my own festival in Hamburg, Ramm Festival. Many of you might know it. And yeah, that's what I do.
[00:01:43.470] Kent Bye: Great. So maybe you could give me a bit more context as to your background and your journey into XR.
[00:01:49.020] Ulrich Schrauth: Yes, my background is actually not film or tech at all. It is performing arts. I come from a theatre background. I used to run theatre companies. Actually, I'm a trained performer, singer, dancer, actor, so that's long ago. And then I ran a lot of theatre companies, World Theatre Festival, was with Sydney Festival. And I've been always very, very interested in this immersive art form, to be in the middle of the artwork. And no matter what the genre, be it visual arts, be it theatre, be it performance, design, architecture, I always want to be in the middle and the center of it. And then I found VR, or let's put it XR, and I thought this is such an interesting and emerging art form and not the technology. And it's not something like some addition to anything else, but it's a new art form that's evolving. And I was so thrilled by this that I decided to start my own festival, basically. And this is how I started RAM Festival four and a half years ago already. in Hamburg, an annual festival for virtual reality arts. So that's how it all started. And then I started to curate more different exhibitions, also do the immersive exhibition design for loads of projects and loads of exhibitions around the world. And yeah, now very happy to work with the British Film Institute as well.
[00:03:02.142] Kent Bye: Okay. Well, I know that the cycle of film festivals, there's like the big major ones that kind of starts with Sundance and then South by Southwest to draw Becca and then the Venice Film Festival, if a doc lab, but those are the big ones I see in terms of innovations of immersive storytelling. But there's also lots of other regional festivals that have been out there that has been harder for me to get to just because if you were to go to everything, you'd be traveling once a month all over the world. often seeing a lot of the experiences that may have premiered at some of these other festivals. So maybe if you take a step back and look at the VR HAM or VRAM festival, that was one of the first immersive storytelling festivals that was actually virtual within the Museum of Other Realities that I had a chance to attend. So I've attended one of the virtual Hamburg festivals and the British Film Institute's Bond Inn Film Festival is coming up here with another virtual exhibition, which I also had a chance to attend the virtual exhibition last year. So maybe you can start with the virtual Hamburg moving into a virtual festival, and then you then becoming the curator of the London Film Festival virtual component last year, and then again this year.
[00:04:09.254] Ulrich Schrauth: Yes, as I said before, VRAM is really focused on virtual reality artwork, basically, and it's always been super important for us to have this physical exhibition, large-scale set design, etc. So when we had to shift to a virtual version due to the pandemic last year, 2020. We were trying really hard to find the perfect space to showcase the works, but also to contextualize them, so audiences get this immersive feeling of virtual reality art. And we were really, really happy to partner up with these great guys from the Museum of Other Realities, and we built our own wing to the museum, basically, which looked exactly the same as our physical venue in in Hamburg, which is an old train track station. So with the help of NVR in Berlin, the VR studio, we recreated these spaces and built specifically designed rooms inside the exhibition for the works. And as you said, we were the first ones to actually venture into this world. So a lot of learnings, a lot of things went really, really well. A lot of things didn't work, but it was a great way to learn. And it was very well received by the audience, which was great. And the artists who really liked the way we presented the works. Yeah, and then actually in the weeks when the pandemic started, I had been appointed Exana Merced Curator for LFF Expanded, the London Film Festival. So the whole world changed and we had to do all of this remotely, a lot of it. And also with my learnings from Bram Festival, we decided to have a digital first version also for London. And we designed our own venue, a bespoke virtual reality platform that was hosted both on Viveport, but also on Oculus. so people all over the world could access it free of charge and see all the artworks. And we built this bespoke platform together with NVR from Berlin. So it was from scratch. We imagined our own spaces. We thought about the interaction design, how the avatars look, how can you actually interact, how can you speak to each other. So we built this from scratch and had a physical access point here in London already last year, but a very small physical exhibition where you could jump into the headset and see how the art works. So that was last year's LFF experiment.
[00:06:21.844] Kent Bye: Okay. Yeah. And I see that there is some interesting analogs to the metaverse, let's call it, which is that you go into a virtual world and then there's a portal that takes you into another world. And I feel like these film festivals are kind of prototyping different aspects of that. And one of the things that I've seen over the years is the creation of immersive installations that form this magic circle that allow you to enter into something that's usually in real life, but gives you a taste of the world that you're about to enter into. And I, see a little bit of a similar pattern here in terms of like these virtual installations that allow you to go into this larger virtual space, this context that you've created. And then there's these virtual installations that then teleport you into sometimes a 360 video, or sometimes you download a six degree of freedom application that then launches a separate application. But there's this seamless experience of going into one world and being able to explore around more like you were to go to like an art gallery or something like that. Exactly. So I'd love to hear a little about your own process of taking that idea and actually making it happen first with the museum of other realities, which did a lot of the technical backend, but then rolling your own platform to be able to essentially do the same thing.
[00:07:33.375] Ulrich Schrauth: It's an interesting point that you bring up because this is really at the core for me what experience in VR art is, to create a portal where people can seamlessly interact with the artworks. That was my main goal for both FRAM but also LFF Expanded, to have a platform where people don't have to jump onto another platform or take off the headset and like download other things. So we try to make it as seamless as possible. You just jump into this little ray of light and then suddenly be it a 360 film or be it an interactive piece. And we worked very closely with the artists thinking around how is this best both technically but also in terms of visual design, how do we present this. And there's a lot of thought gone into this and this is really at the core of what I want to do with these we call it metaverses, or these sort of platforms. Because I come from a, as I said, theatre background, but also visual arts background. For me, this experience of going into a gallery, into a museum, and then diving into another immersive artwork is so extremely important. And this is what I try to replicate with these virtual platforms. And hell, I think we all know it's super difficult. I mean, sometimes it's super seamless and sometimes it isn't, as we know. But this is why we need to push the boundaries of what's possible. And when I started out with this, all of the data said, oh, that's not going to be possible. You always have to go to other portals then, or you have to close the application. And I'm very happy that we made this. And I think this is a really new way of showcasing work virtually to be continued, because it's always evolving, obviously, with performance.
[00:09:13.214] Kent Bye: Yeah. So right now we're talking on the day before the opening of the London Film Festival expanded version, which is going to be this downloadable application called the Expanse that are able to go into a number of different virtual experiences. So maybe you could tell me a bit about if this is going to be generally available for people, how do they get ahold of this? And then we can dive into the program.
[00:09:34.120] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah, for sure. The Expanse is a virtual museum or platform and it's going to be available both on the Viveport, but also in Oculus App Lab. and you find all this information just on our website bfi.org.uk and there you find the London Film Festival and LFF expanded and there you have a direct link that brings you to both Viveport and App Lab and so it's available for tethered headset but also for Quest. But also because we want to make it as accessible as possible, we have a desktop version, both for Windows and Mac. So you can download them directly through our website and you can then just have it on your laptop or computer and walk around the spaces. You can interact with the other people. Obviously, you can't see an interactive artwork, but you can see 360 works on your screen and really engage and interact with other attendees. So that's how you can see the experience. And it's globally accessible and free of charge.
[00:10:28.628] Kent Bye: Great. And so it's free for people to download, check it out. And it's surprising to hear that you have a quest version. Can you expand a little bit in terms of like, is it just the 360 videos? Cause I know oftentimes you have these six degree of freedom experiences that are not even available on the quest. And so, yeah, I'm just curious to hear a little bit more about the actual experience of is it selected. Versions, are you able to have the same type of social interactions with everybody else in the same space who are on the either desktop or PC VR version?
[00:10:59.927] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah. To your last question, you have the same interactions with the other attendees, no matter if you're on the whiteboard or on the Oculus or on the desktop version. So you can talk to other people, you can roam around the space. In terms of the artworks, we put a lot of thought in it. So there's definitely all of the 360 videos available on the Crest version and also on the desktop version. With the interactive pieces, with some of them we have sort of a little sneak preview or like we envision the space together with the artists so people can get curious about the artworks, basically. And then you're going to have a little sign saying this is not available on this platform, obviously due to the technical difficulties, but please visit us in London, which would be great if people can do. But also we have trailers, 2D trailers for all of the artworks inside the space. So at least you get an idea of the program, you can read about the artworks and get a better understanding of what they are. And there's also going to be a live performance inside of future rides at some point. So we're trying to have different experiences inside the virtual world for our visitors.
[00:12:05.393] Kent Bye: Okay. And so one of the things that I always like to know as something that's starting up is, are there things that aren't only happening that you have to get a ticket for or sign up for the, you mentioned a performance. And so usually that indicates that you have to be at a specific time and place. So yeah. What are the experiences that you have to ahead of time, be sure you get tickets for, otherwise you might miss them.
[00:12:26.790] Ulrich Schrauth: So the physical access for LFF Expanded here in London, we have four access points. So one is our big major exhibition at a wonderful venue called 26 League Street, which is directly below Waterloo station. It's just like five minutes walk from the BFI South Bank, where our main festival is. And it's these old train track tunnels that we completely remodel into an immersive exhibition space where we showcase 15 of the 18 works. So a large variety of VR pieces, but also screen-based immersive pieces, VR performances. I'm going to tell you a little more about how the exhibition works in a second. But to the other three access points, we have a world premiere of an immersive audio performance by Darkfields. Many of you probably know the company. They do these amazing works where you're going to be in complete darkness inside a shipping container and you experience a sort of performance. And as I said, it's going to be the world premiere here. So really, really exciting. We have to book this in advance and it's very well thought after. So get your tickets soon. This is going to be right in front of the National Theatre. All of this information, of course, is on our website. And then we have some special presentations. One of them is an immersive audio walk by an amazing sound artist called Duncan Speakman. and it's called Only Expansion, and you actually walk up to BFI South Bank. It's on both weekends of the festival, so from the 7th until the 11th, and from the 14th until the 17th of October, and you just walk up and you get this wonderful special device which gives you a possibility to walk around the South Bank And then we have Future Rites, which is an interactive VR performance, dance performance by the acclaimed choreographer Alexander Whitley. And this is only available on the 13th and 14th of October at Rombert Studios, also where everything is in close proximity of VFS Outline. So these are sort of the four different access points. I think it's quite clear with the audio performance, et cetera, how that works. But the exhibition that we have at 26 League Street We are going to have time slots around two hours for visitors to attend. So you just book a ticket to our exhibition. Then we have a briefing so everyone knows what's going to happen, what the different experiences are. And then people are going to swarm around the space and be able to see the different artworks. We have a lot of docents and guides here to help the people with the tech and with the experiences. And then you just have time to see three, four works because we all know that's quite a lot to take in with interactive and immersive work. So that's the idea behind the exhibition space.
[00:15:11.298] Kent Bye: Yeah, I had a chance to see, I think it was the same Duncan Speakman piece back at the IFIT doc lab a couple of years ago, where it was like an augmented reality audio piece. It was sort of the blending of realities and augmented reality with audio, which was really quite compelling because I was taking stuff that was happening in the world around me and modulating it in ways that were like really quite trippy. So I imagine a piece like that is not going to be made available remotely because there's special hardware that you have to even hear a lot of that type of experience.
[00:15:43.710] Ulrich Schrauth: Exactly. And as you say, the program is sort of divided into things that are globally accessible on the expanse, which are the linear VR experiences, the interactive ones, but the ones that are more participatory or require special tech, as you just said, like on the expansion or eulogy are just to be experienced here on site in London.
[00:16:03.547] Kent Bye: Okay, well, I know that Darkfield actually created a virtual recreation of one of their pieces, and it was in the Museum of Other Realities, and it was a part of the Immersive Stories retrospective that was happening by Digital Catapult. They had put together a number of different series of retrospectives. Is that going to be generally available for people to listen to? Because I know they have their own special app that they've been releasing a number of different experiences. I'm obviously going to be missing being immersed within the container. So I imagine that there's certain elements that it's actually better to be seeing it in real life.
[00:16:36.037] Ulrich Schrauth: Exactly. So this particular piece, and especially since the world premiere, there's not going to be remote access yet. Maybe they will turn it into another piece. But the ones you were talking about, or two of them at least, they have specifically been designed through the pandemic to be experienced remotely. And it's actually quite trippy, as you just said, you're going to be in the same experience with someone who's not next to you. But this one is really, for now at least, it's sort of physically experienced.
[00:17:05.147] Kent Bye: Okay. And maybe we should take a step back and give a little bit more context as the British Film Institute, the BFI founded in 1933 and doing lots of stuff in the realm of film, but maybe talk about the decision last year to start to expand into creating a virtual reality exhibition and how that kind of fits into their overall mission of the British Film Institute, but also how it fits into the London Film Festival, which obviously is another film festival that's been around for a while. But, you know, a lot of these film festivals are expanding into like Sundancers New Frontier and Rebecca has their immersive story escapes. And so there's different programs that these festivals have to be able to feature immersive storytelling. And so, yeah, what the interest is to the British film Institute and the London film festival of what's happening with immersive storytelling and all the different technologies of virtual and augmented reality.
[00:17:53.690] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah. It's at the core of the BFI strategy, the long-term strategy, to think about broader screen approach, to think about how do filmmakers, but also other artists from other genres, expand how we experience stories, how interactive, how immersive storytelling works. And one idea, one part of this is the ambitions of the London Film Festival to have their own strand around interactive and immersive art. But always taking cinema, obviously, as a jumping off point, but really think about how can filmmakers, artists, creators expand our vision of storytelling. And that has also been a long-term strategy of the London Film Festival. And with this last year's LFF expanded, it was sort of the first version of it. had a long time to prepare for it with different applications, etc. So, this idea has been around for quite a while and I was very, very lucky to be brought on board in 2020 to make the first edition of LFF. But it's really at the core of what the DFI wants to do. So, I've also now been brought on as the Exile and Immersive Program Lead year-round. So, I'm also having different exhibitions throughout the year at the BFI South Bank. We also think about differently around the film fund, about funding for immersive projects, also for younger audiences. Think about inclusion, audiences, disabilities, younger audiences. So there's a whole discussion going on and we're trying to sort of drive this discussion with our resources.
[00:19:26.123] Kent Bye: And I know that for each of these festivals, there's a mix of things that are premiering their world premieres, but also regional premieres, but also stuff that may have appeared at other festivals that are like a curating of the highlights of the, what you see is significant innovations when it comes to immersive storytelling. So. Maybe you could talk about your own curatorial process for how you kind of mix both taking in these submissions, dealing with some of these different live site-specific performances of the blending of the technologies, but also keeping tabs of what's happening at these other festivals and either inviting or bringing in specific pieces to be able to have the curatorial vision that you have.
[00:20:06.559] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah, actually, you totally nail it. It's very different. backgrounds and ideas that feed into this. Of course, we have quite a few premiers, also world premiers, UK premiers, but we also co-commission work. So this is, of course, curatorially something different. You really look into the pieces that you want to focus on, that you want to support and co-commission. But with the London Film Festival itself, we don't have any premier status obligation. So I'm really free, which is great, to also program work that's been showcased somewhere else before. And for me as a curator, I really look more around thematic strands. What are the artists want to tell us about the way we're living at the moment, cultural, social, political urgencies of our times? but also what are new aesthetics, what are new innovations, you just called it. I totally agree in terms of immersive storytelling. How do they think differently to engage with audiences and how do they use these technologies to tell a story in a different way? Because for me, VR, AR, mixed reality, it's not about the technology. It's really as a medium. how to tell stories differently. And I was very lucky now this year to expand to very different formats. So interactive live performances, linear VR pieces, audio performances. So you wouldn't be able to do this in a remote access. We just talked about this. So I'm very, very happy to have the opportunity with this physical access points to give our audiences a very broad variety of different artworks.
[00:21:40.760] Kent Bye: Yeah. And in the press release, there's also a curatorial statement that you have what's left of reality. I guess it's like, maybe you could explain your curatorial vision and what the intention was for the different pieces that you're selecting for this edition of the London Film Festival expanded.
[00:21:57.172] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah. Yeah. I called it what's left of reality. And my feeling as a curator, looking at these very different submissions and artworks that I have come across is a reflection of our times, the very difficult times that we live in at the moment, with the global pandemic going on, with global climate change, with racial and ethnic discussions going on. And there is a search for new meaning. It's always out there, but I have a feeling at the moment, creators really try to tackle these questions even more strongly. And I was really, really happy to find a lot of pieces that firstly deal with what's been happening to us around the last 18 months with social distancing confinement. How do we actually get close to other people anymore? And I think VR is an amazing medium to shift our perspectives and to think about Are we close to someone? Do we just feel close to someone? What's actually getting in contact with people? In quite a few works, I have one piece, for example, it's called Captured by Hannah Aslati. It's putting ourselves in the shoes of an artificial intelligence, basically. So it's a screen-based installation. You stand in front of a capturing machine. like a 3D capturing of your face. This is put onto an artificial intelligence avatar, and you see it on a huge screen right in front of you. And there are three different types of people. One are the bystanders, one are the aggressors, and the other ones are the victims. And they just there's this trigger event and suddenly you see your own face, like your own avatar, suddenly getting very aggressive with someone else or hitting someone else to the point where you actually kill this avatar. And it makes you think very differently about your choices. How do you connect with other people? How do you interact with other people? And that is, for me, is a reflection on how we think about connection at the moment in these very difficult times.
[00:24:04.372] Kent Bye: Yeah. And is that specific piece going to be made available as well remotely? I imagine that's tricky to kind of scan people's faces, but if there's some experiences that are only going to be on site and if there's going to be a selection of other ones that are going to be made remotely.
[00:24:20.680] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah. Um, this specific one, there's going to be a trailer of this inside the expense to raise interest. But as you said, it's going to be really difficult to replicate this in the virtual world. We have most of the linear and interactive VR pieces that are in the collection here at 26th Street are going to be in the Expanse. What's not going to be there is a piece called Eternal Return. There's just sort of a teaser version because it is a live performance here on site. It's a piece done by Luna Lansaito and ScanLab Productions, and it has a performer that's leading you around the space. have to be on site, and it's this physical installation. Another piece is called Inhibition by two really great young VR artists here from London. And it's also a live performance that you need to be on site. We also have a teaser of this in the Expanse. The third one is called Museum of Austerity, and it works with the HoloLens. So it's an augmented reality installation around government austerity. So this is also going to be on the available here on site.
[00:25:25.797] Kent Bye: Okay. I know sometimes some of these augmented reality experiences have a virtual reality translation, but you know, there's a part of me that always wants to try to see everything, but in the absence of actually being there, I'm not going to be able to catch everything. And so, yeah, with that, maybe we could dive into a little bit of some of the different highlights of the program, how many different pieces are going to be made available virtually and yeah, maybe some themes that arise amongst all these different pieces.
[00:25:48.189] Ulrich Schrauth: Okay. For sure. So we have 18 pieces in the selection for LFF Expanded this year. There are six world premieres, nine UK pieces. We're very, very happy that almost 50% of our creators are female. So I think this is really rare in the selection. So I'm really happy with this. We have seven pieces are going to be available in the Expanse and then a few more previews like I just talked about and the thematic strands that arise. One is really the idea around how did we live the last 18 months and how has it affected our social life. Another one that's really, really strong is social injustice. We have For example, a piece called Container. It was also screened at Venice, which is talking about the modern forms of enslavement, basically. How does capitalism enslave people and how do the goods travel around the world and the global market chains? How do they affect the labor and how people can lead a prosperous life and work in a healthy environment? Another one that I highly recommend is Noah's Wrath by Joel Benson. And it's a VR documentary around education in a slum in Lagos. And this is a part of Lagos where kids normally don't get really educated. And this one person had this vision. He wanted to change his community by setting up this floating school. And he's changed the whole structure of the community by this. So it's really about social injustice, but how do we change this and how can one person or one project really changed the face community. So these are some of the parts that arise. And I guess another one that's very strong and probably has to do with my background as a curator, which is also a lot in visual arts, is the convergence between visual art forms, like fine arts, into VR, into these expanded realities. So we have a very beautiful augmented reality installation right out in front of 26 League Street by Adrian M. and Claire B., which is accessible just by your smartphone. So it's just free for everyone who just wants to roam by our venue and you just hold your smartphone in front of it. And then these posters come to life in a very beautiful visual art style, or the piece Limited Lands by Jakob Kudsteinsen, who's one of the most acclaimed visual artists of our times. And he's done this beautiful take on the landscape of the Karmark and has done this amazing visual arts piece around it in an interactive VR environment.
[00:28:25.979] Kent Bye: Okay. So it sounds like there's 18 total pieces, but only seven of them. Is that what you said? They're going to be available within a virtual exhibition?
[00:28:33.352] Ulrich Schrauth: Nine of them are in the exhibition and then we have a few more as a teaser. Okay. But three of them are interactive pieces. So they're only going to be available on the Vive ports. So you need a tethered headset to see them for the other ones. It's just a brief preview.
[00:28:49.783] Kent Bye: Okay. So you can be in the gallery space with the social interactions. So you can, if you want to just talk to people, you can go into the quest and see some 360 videos. But if you want to see all of the experience and get it from five port. Okay. And I noticed that the National Theater had some pieces that they've been working on over the years. I know All Kinds of Limbo was at Sundance a number of years ago. It sounds like they have another piece here this year. Maybe you could talk about the project that the National Theater has been working on.
[00:29:14.226] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah, absolutely. So the National Theater is our long-term strategic partner on this strand. So we work closely together with also Toby Coffey and the whole team of the Immersive Labs. And one of the pieces that we showcase is called Museum of Austerity. They've been working on this for quite a while and it's by Sacha Ware. She's a very famous theatre director and John King, her collaborator. And it's this augmented reality piece that's working with the HoloLens. So it's an installation that's also showcased here at 26 League Street. And it revolves around the terrible consequences of government austerity to people with disabilities or special needs. And all of these people have either died in the consequence of government austerity or have killed themselves. And the piece is capturing testimonials of the relatives, their families, their friends. And you see representations of the people of real incidents. And you can walk around them with the HoloLens, see them, hear these testimonials with the soundscape. And it's very, very powerful and very disturbing experience. So we make sure All of our audiences here are taken care of well and we do a lot around the social impact and the questions around accessibility.
[00:30:33.433] Kent Bye: Yeah, I'd love to hear some of your thoughts, especially with your background in theater. Cause I do see different theater companies like the national theater starting to experiment within virtual reality. And, you know, often I see people are either coming from like the film world or the interactive gaming world, but you know, I think the theater world is sort of a different orientation and in some ways the virtual reality medium is closer to theater than say film and some of the different staging and. You know, you don't have as many cuts or you have the lighting that's similar. You have the theatrical way that the things are kind of oriented with having one camera and point of view and being able to direct attention in different ways. And so I'd love to hear some of your thoughts and reflections on what you think theater has to add to virtual reality and immersive storytelling.
[00:31:15.930] Ulrich Schrauth: I mean, I totally agree. In many respects, theatre is much closer to VR or XR than filmmaking, because it's all revolving around the three-dimensional space. And this is what's so important about every XR art form. It's always very three-dimensional, which film obviously isn't in that respect. And I see a lot of theatre companies, but also especially dance companies and choreographers, moving into the realm of VR and XR because it gives them very different opportunities to tell stories differently and to interact and engage audiences. This is one thing that's been around with theatre audiences for a long time, to have immersive storytelling within the theatre space, to engage with the audiences on a more direct level. to the audiences from what's happening on the stage. And this is what you can do brilliantly with VR. We have amazing creators like Tupac Meteer, Kira Benzing, but also Alexander Whitley, the choreographer that we showcased this year. They all venture into this world and they try to make interactive performances possible. So you are in the middle of the performance, you can interact with the actors, the dancers, and have a very different kind of experience than you would have in a conventional 2D art form.
[00:32:31.119] Kent Bye: Yeah. And I think it's worth mentioning just the whole fusion of theater with this immersive interactive experiential aspect with immersive theater, which, you know, one of the big innovators was Punch Drunk with the Sleep No More and this fusion of these worlds of immersive theater with virtual reality. And especially in immersive storytelling in these different festivals to see these specific pieces like Finding Pandora X from Keira Benzing that you mentioned, but. Yeah, I'd love to hear what you see as this fusion of the immersive storytelling and what's happening broadly within Punch Drunk being from the region there and United Kingdom and how you see these strands of immersive theater starting to come forth in some of these different pieces that you're creating here at the London Film Festival Expanded.
[00:33:13.805] Ulrich Schrauth: It's interesting that you mention Punchdrunk because Felix Barrett is the jury president for our VR awards this year. And I just had a conversation with him and Ruth Gibson, Bruno Martelli from Gibson Martelli, who's also working on this Dazzle project, which is also a VR dance performance. And they are really thrilled to see the pieces. And they already started to think about, oh, how does this affect our work? And they started to think about collaboration. So it's very, very interesting what's going to come out of these discussions. What I see from the pieces that we are showcasing this year, we've seen a push into immersive theatre and sort of the live installative aspect of VR, specifically in the last few years. You could see it through all the festivals you've mentioned before. Everything got more attached to a physical installation or a live performance. And with the pandemic, many of these ventures and a lot of projects that had been in development had stopped or had to find new ways on how to engage with audiences. Jill Gilbert's work, for example, The Choreographer, is a good example for this. He's done this amazing work around location-based live performance around dance. When the pandemic hit, he pivoted to a very interesting and very exciting approach to make this remotely accessible and have live dance performance shows that you could access from all over the world and even have the dancers be transferred remotely into his world. So one dancer was in Sydney, one was in Zurich or in Geneva. So this is one of the things we're also trying with Alexander Whitley's piece. We're going to try to live stream the motion captured dancers from the performance into our VR platform, into the Expanse. This will be a performance that's going to be for a very specific audience. So it's going to be on our website and people can sign up for it. But it really requires some tech and it's really R&D basically. So we're really just trying out how does it actually work in real life to real time to integrate this into an existing platform, a VR platform. So these are projects that push the boundaries of what's happening at the moment and what's possible and try to integrate the virtual realm and the remote access to the physical experience itself. And this is, I think, a trend we're going to see much more in the future where theatre makers and performers are working on at the moment.
[00:35:40.108] Kent Bye: Yeah. And having people have remote access, thinking about aspects of accessibility that I think is really pushing the larger industry to really think about multiple ways of having things be available to lots more people. I think Dream was the experience that was by the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Audience of the Future. It's a big collaboration. I think actually Marshmallow Laser Feast was also involved. So there's a big collaboration to be able to kind of innovate the audience of the future, to be able to have things remotely. I think there's also this hesitancy to want to go to these physical locations and put an object onto your face when we're still in the middle of a global pandemic. And so I feel like there's COVID and what's happening with the pandemic that has over the last couple of years had the location-based entertainment areas die down, meaning that a lot of the outlets for a lot of these immersive storytelling pieces would be at these art galleries. But if there's not that same distribution channel, I think it's in some ways disrupted the process of innovation, because why would you create a really immersive installation piece if people are afraid to see it, or if there's nowhere to show it? So I feel like things like this with the London Film Festival expanded as an opportunity to showcase some of these different pieces that would otherwise be difficult if there's not as many other galleries available. And maybe there will be curators from those galleries to see these pieces and then start to bring them in. But yeah, maybe you could talk about the impact of the pandemic and where we're at if we're starting to open back up. You know, obviously, you're having a site specific aspect to your festival this year. So there's ways in which that there is a change, but you're also being brought on by the BFI to potentially curate some of these on a more year-round basis, implying that there may be some locations that you may be able to actually host some of these site-specific performances.
[00:37:26.851] Ulrich Schrauth: To your further point, I totally agree that this pandemic has sort of disrupted this chain of innovation, but on the other hand, it sort of pivoted it to other realms. And this is really interesting to see as a curator, how innovative and quick our industry works and the creators that we're working with. So that was really exciting to see. To your question around COVID and how has it affected us, We have, of course, planned very different and multiple versions of the festival and we're very, very happy now to be able to open up a physical exhibition site at this scale, which is very obviously demanding as well in times of a global pandemic, to make sure everything's very safe in terms of COVID protocols. We're very careful here on site with the cleaning of all the headsets and social distancing, of course, following the government guidelines and rules. It's very, very important for us to keep this remote access so people who are not feeling comfortable to come to our venue or people with travel restrictions or problems or special needs can still access the program. So I think it's a push that has been happening within the industry and all of the festivals. We're trying to give a hybrid access to our festivals. So a physical access point with both exhibitions but also industry touch points but also remote access for people who won't come or travel. And also we have to think about the climate impact. So I think it's really, really important that our festivals and venues and exhibitions still give an access for people who don't want to travel and for remote access.
[00:39:05.336] Kent Bye: Yeah. And one of the other big things happening in London right now, just in the immersive industry is the creative XR as a funding institution to be able to fund a number of different projects that I ended up seeing actually a lot of the different international film festivals, but just curious if there's any creative XR funded projects that were also a part of your creation there, since you are focusing on some London specific or UK specific pieces. as well as some of the other international pieces that you mentioned before, how many of them, but you do have some regional pieces that you're featuring there and having Creative XR Imagine would be something that's a big boon to be able to actually cultivate the homegrown talent there.
[00:39:42.335] Ulrich Schrauth: Yeah, it is a very strong focus also for London Film Festival to really support UK artists. So we're not specifically only looking for that, but it is very important. So Creative XR is an amazing opportunity to find new work and Liz and the whole team around it, Liz Rosenthal, and the team doing an incredible job to find this amazing works. So we have a few actually. And so Futurites, we just talked about it, has been one of the CreativeXR cohorts. Also Museum of Austerity has. So there is quite a few build up with UK creators and it's exciting to see what's going to come next.
[00:40:18.287] Kent Bye: You mentioned that there's also some pieces that the festival is able to commission. So I think the funding of projects is also something that I see something happen at Venice that have different programs to have a market, but also to potentially support specific artists to bring pieces to the festival. So what are the pieces that were either commissioned by the British Film Institute or the London Film Festival?
[00:40:41.674] Ulrich Schrauth: So we have a co-commissioning budget each year, so I'm scouting for new work or try to collaborate with different institutions. The big commission that we had for this year was Asif Karpatia, the Oscar-winning film director, and it's his first venture into VR. And he made a piece called Laika, so it's around the adventures of the first stray dog in space. And it's a linear VR experience that we showcase here as a world premiere at the festival. So this is sort of our big co-commission for this year. And it's co-presented with Story Futures Academy. And we have also co-commissioned Future Rites, the Alexander Whitley piece, as a sort of work in progress here at the festival. And also the Museum of Starry Deep piece that we just talked about, the augmented reality installation.
[00:41:30.777] Kent Bye: Okay, great. And, uh, and finally, what do you think the ultimate potential of virtual and augmented reality with immersive storytelling might be and what it might be able to enable?
[00:41:43.925] Ulrich Schrauth: That's a huge question, but judging from my own curatorial practice and what I have the feeling the creators are pushing towards is to open up a new art form in itself. I think what I see a lot when I talk to established galleries coming from sort of the visual arts side or to theatres or to also festivals is they have a very technology-centred approach and they think, okay, this is a nerdy approach to a different form of storytelling. It always has this touch of gaming. I totally disagree and especially it has this touch of separation or a singularity. And if you dive a little further into the potential of XR, it is actually a medium that can bring you so much more together. It can shift your perspectives. It can change the way you look at things and bring you as a person closer to the other person next to you. I think it's a very social medium in that respect. And the voices that we start to hear in this immersive art environment, I don't want to focus on VR or AR. I would say this immersive technology enables another approach towards how you interact with art, and especially how the artist, the creator himself, can interact with the audience. And this is something with conventional art forms you never have, because it's a finished artwork. You hang a picture or a painting on the wall, and there is a communication going on between the artwork and the audience, but it's not as interactive and direct as it is. with immersive art forms. And this is, I think, is one of the potentials and where I see artists and creators thrive. And this is what we do with the Bright BFI, with the British Film Institute, trying to support this and to think differently of how to engage with our audiences.
[00:43:37.702] Kent Bye: Awesome. And is there, is there anything else that's left unsaid that you'd like to say to the immersive community?
[00:43:43.539] Ulrich Schrauth: Well, first of all, I'm very much looking forward to hopefully seeing a lot of you either in person or virtually, either in the Expanse or here in London. And please do give feedback, get back to us. This is the second year that we're doing this and we're still learning. And every year is new. Every year we do something different. So we really, really appreciate you coming back to us. And it was very inspiring last year to hear what your thoughts were. And we really learned this for this year. So please keep doing this and please keep supporting these beautiful and amazing artists the way you are. And I can't wait to open LFF Expander tomorrow.
[00:44:22.637] Kent Bye: So yeah, it opens on Wednesday, October 6th. And I know there's a in real life component and a virtual component. Are they both running the same length and how long are these experiences going to be made available?
[00:44:34.652] Ulrich Schrauth: The expanse of the virtual version will be available also from tomorrow morning, the 6th of October, through our distribution channels, Whiteboard and Oculus, and it will be up and running until the 17th of October, and the same goes for our physical exhibition here, so it's running the whole duration of the BFI London Film Festival from the 6th until the 17th of October.
[00:44:57.563] Kent Bye: Awesome. Well, early, thanks for dropping by and giving an update as to what's happening with the London film festival expanded. I'm excited to jump in and check out some of the new experiences and some of the experiences I've seen, but there's lots of stuff that I haven't seen. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to make it there in real life to be able to see all the performances, but it was great to hear a little bit more context to sort of see how it fits into the larger ecosystem of innovation that's happening within this space. So yeah, thanks for dropping by the podcast to be able to share a bit of your own journey, but also what's happening there with the London film festival expanded.
[00:45:28.303] Ulrich Schrauth: Brilliant. Thank you so much, Ken. Talk to you very soon.
[00:45:31.085] Kent Bye: So that was Erlich Schrauth. He's the XR and immersive program lead for the British Film Institute and talked about the London Film Festival expanded, which is running from October 6th to 17th. So I have a number of different takeaways about this interview is that first of all, well, generally, I think there's a lot of different innovations that are happening in the realm of immersive storytelling. I think it's trying to blend in all these different aspects of different communication media. And with Erlich's background in theater and performance, he's pulling in more of that theatrical elements as well as elements of fine arts. So some of these different pieces, you're not going to be able to have a chance to see if you're remote like I am, but there are nine total pieces that are available. There's five 360 videos and four interactive pieces and quite a number of different world premieres and new pieces as well. So there's some pieces that have been out there. I actually have some interviews with Duncan Speakman, Which is that augmented reality piece that I saw back at if a doc lab back in 2019 Which actually has these headphones that have microphones on them So as you walk around it's recording the world around you and then modulating in interesting ways So you can check out the conversation that had with Duncan or if you're in London area be sure to definitely check it out for yourself because I think it's a really powerful piece and yeah, lots of different theatrical performances and dance and He did say that there was a performance. I'm not sure if that's the future rights, that there's going to be a remote performance bringing in motion capture dance. There is a space that is in the installation gallery that you can go check out there and their own London Film Festival expanded app is very similar to what they released last year. That same architecture of different installations that are in this gallery space that you kind of walk into and. Actually, it's pretty impressive that they have a quest version where you can actually go in and see some lower poly versions of some of the different installations. And yeah, just to have a general social VR space for people to kind of hang out and chat with each other. I didn't happen to run into anybody there, but there is an opportunity that if there are other people, then you can get close to them. And then there's a little audio bubble that syncs up and that you can actually chat with folks there. So. Definitely check that out and gonna be checking out some of the different experiences here And yeah publishing some of the different interviews that I've had the samsara as well as the life and pieces are a couple of conversations That I'll be publishing here as well. So definitely check out the program And yeah, I think it's interesting just to see how there's these different institutions that are starting to support XR in different way In London and the United Kingdom in general, there's a lot of different opportunities for funding for different projects that doesn't have the same thing here in the United States. So you tend to have a little bit more experimentation that's happening from different industries. So what's happening with Creative XR and ways for being able to get works commissioned by these festivals creates an opportunity to be able to push forward the medium in ways that is very interesting for me, at least, to see these different disciplines and integrations of different practices put into what's possible with immersive storytelling. Like I said, I'm not gonna be able to see all the different innovations that are happening there at the London Film Festival Expanded this year just because I'm not gonna be there in real life But if you do happen to be in the London area then definitely check it out and you can check out some of the different immersive experiences online and then check out some of the stuff that you can only see the actual physical installations there, so Anyway, that's all that I have for today. And I just wanted to thank you for listening to the Voices of VR podcast. And if you enjoy the podcast, then please do spread the word, tell your friends and consider becoming a member of the Patreon. This is a, this is a part of podcast and I do rely upon donations from people like yourself in order to continue bringing this coverage. So you can become a member and donate today at patreon.com slash Voices of VR. Thanks for listening.
