Darren Emerson: Touring VR - In Pursuit Of Repetitive Beats - IEN Immersive Experience Summit 2024

[Music] hello everyone um so today I'm going to be talking about uh my project in pursuit of repetitive beats and also very specifically around the tour that we're doing uh at the moment um uh touring VR in the UK before that an introduction my name is Darren Emerson I am uh immersive artist uh writer director and I'm the co-founder of uh a London production company called East City films which we started in 2006 which is why it says films but we don't actually make films uh for quite some time um our work is really in just Pride uh really in VR uh our work is known for its hybrid approach to the medium uh where we like to fuse documentary Cinema theatrics embodiment interaction to create emotionally resonant work that is exciting for audiences and which can reach uh a community and and be and be sort of uh shown uh as lbe location-based experiences the last talk was quite interesting because we use the word immersive quite a lot and um and they were obviously talking about domes and projection when I talk about immersive I really mean virtual reality and one of our most uh exciting and I guess most popular pieces of work is this piece of work called imp pursuit of repetitive beats um it is a a documentary narrative that is set in uh 1989 where you have to go and find an illegal acid house party on the out on the outskirts of centry um it's it is a music documentary but it's a music documentary that in um and it's really I guess it it uses a lot of different uh techniques it's free roaming it's interactive it uses hap ticks wind machines uh art Direction uh and uh projection and sound cues to create a very uh a very it's a very big and complicated thing to tour and the reason I wanted to talk specifically about VR is that actually VR as an immersive tool or immersive uh way of showing something as a medium is extremely hard and complex to T effectively to large numbers of audiences before I get into that though I'm going to show you a trailer of imp Pursuit repetitive beats you're L driving around at like 12:00 on the night the windows open with the stereo off trying to listen out to Something in the field in the background [Music] excitement go from the pit of your stomach all the way up into your [Music] chest hello this is amnesia house tonight's massive party will be taking place as schedule it was the most amazing experiences of my life I just wish that I could go back to those nights that was nice and Loud actually wasn't it um it should be loud um so this piece of work pretty much contains all of the different techniques that we've been honing I've been working in VR for about 10 years so you know it contains volumetric capture motion capture immersive video both 360 180 but also 69 interviews that we project animation obviously real time and game engine uh 3D models and environments and also archive but really it's about this it's about a community of people it's about how we use those techniques to tell this story of of a community you take the tech away and this is what it's about it's about acid house and it's about people that have helped change the society and have through misadventure I guess and and in search of Civic freedoms created uh something culturally important and something that they feel very nostalgic about uh we speak to real people and our experience really is connecting people and the stories of that time to uh people that want to experience immersive and and go on this journey um our show once we've made it is really using lots of different sort of techniques techniques that are borrowed from lots of different immersive uh shows that you might hear that you might see here so we we start with art direction we have we when you come into the space we we really believe in terms of showing VR that there is a free stages to it there is the onboarding the setting the scene getting everybody into the right environment and the right headp space then there's the actual showing of The VR itself which is free roaming and complicated and it has lots of gear that you have to put on but then there is obviously the after bit where you come out and have that moment of reflection you're able to connect with people and so we have uh different stages with that so we have art Direction and set building where we we make it as if you're going into a an legal Warehouse when you come in and we've got sound cues in there you can hear a rave in the distance we have haptic so we use we used to use subpc now we using the wua vest uh to deliver Bas when when you're doing the VR so the Bas uh is part of the narrative it's about excitement it's about connecting to that feeling of uh going to uh an event where you're not really sure what's going to happen we have projection which is outside of the headset uh space but which is uh timed for when you come out into a sunrise we have multi- sensory elements like wind machines which are tied to uh ele ments in the experience for instance at one point you put your head out the sunroof of a perso 205 and get hit by the wind and then we have artwork and original Flyers uh original photography that we show we also have an interactive phone box 80s phone box where you can leave messages on and we localize that exhibition wherever we go um so when we were in Taiwan for example we had a whole exhibition that was run by the guy who did the first Taiwanese Raves which was in about 93 or '94 and that was really interesting for us to be able to talk and have that conversation locally with people um all of this though all of this effort is really to create something and I think the last speakers mentioned it you you go to all this all this trouble and all this uh te technical stuff and then really what you're trying to do is get people to transcend the technology completely not really think about it so once they are in suited up excited and we've onboarded everybody we hope that that we have uh created something that actually transcends that techn technology and you can see here some people transcending the technology uh and dancing like nobody's watching and funny enough people are now watching so that's good um all of this effort in in this piece of work has really paid off uh we've had really happy audiences great reviews uh lots of publicity uh we've won awards like the if for do clab for immersive non-fiction and best uh lbe at the XR Awards and we've been able to show this piece of work in over 20 countries uh doing simultaneous shows at like the F Center uh in Montreal uh Adelaide Fringe and Contra in Sweden and our last two uh International shows which was at the L Festival in Madrid and uh the Camen Art Gallery in Maine uh in the us both sold out um the reason that we're able to show this piece of work in so many countries at the same time is because we have a tiered approach when we license it out and we work with institutions uh because not everybody can a afford or is or have the space for a large scale um uh VR installation so we have something called beats light which is as you might expect it's just the build that we give them but then we give them the guidance and the files and and and everything that they need to do to put it on locally uh we have a medium version beats midi which is again the build the files and the guidance but then we also provide the show control system uh we have continued show support with their team but then we also provide them with access to the haptic vest and stuff like that and then we have four fat beats as we like to call it which is where we as a production company put that in and uh we do all sorts of stuff we put in we own all the kit we move the kit in we design the space we bring the haptics the wind machines the projections the gallery but what we do importantly is we also do all the training of the staff uh and help with the marketing and the ticketing of it but what we have found and I think the last speakers also said this is that it's it's been easier to T this piece of work internationally than it has been in the UK in the UK it's much harder and that's really ironic because this is a piece about the UK and and the culture of the UK um so why is this well we have found that we come up often against uh a series of of problems that come up again and again some of those are really practical like the venue having enough a large enough space to give over to an immersive project like this we need a lot of space this is not VR where you're all sitting in a kind of Cinema seat this is free roaming VR each person gets 6 M by 4 M that means we need uh a good 200 square meters to do about 10 people which is you know quite a large space um the other challenge is that the we don't most venues don't have any in-house kit uh particularly in VR or any knowledge of how to put on VR uh effectively so that's something that we come up to and the the reason that we need a large space is also because frut is so is so small the more more immersive the more the more intricate that we make this VR experience the less throughput we can do their venues are naturally a little bit scared about giving over a large space to what could be 80 people a day if you're doing eight sessions or 100 people a day so uh we have to convince them uh that we need a longer run the longer run means that it will again pay off uh the investment and and wash its face so these challenges is are really lead us to today and what we're doing at the moment with our uh UK tour 2024 to 2025 um it's funded by uh subsidized I should say by the Arts Council and the BFI and it's an 18mon long tour that is taking uh us to eight venues in the UK um what we realized when we were wanting to do this tour is that there is a lack of infrastructure and knowledge around specifically VR and large scale VR projects um so we needed to tour beats as a what we're calling a Pathfinder project so with the help of the Arts Council and the BFI what we have done is create a model where uh the where we subsidize the first 10 days what that does it means that each of those venues we can go in we can bring in all the set and all the kit and all the all the environment but we can also then train uh their team their hosts uh their tent managers for the first uh for about 5 days and then uh we it covers the um it covers the costs for their for their staff for the first 10 days after that period the idea is that they would then extend and each one of them has extended to we just finished at Birmingham and that was 45 days we're going to be doing 80 Days in the London venue as well so once we get past that that that moment of risk where we drisk it for them then they're very happy to keep going and then they can see for themselves the success of the project how audiences react and and we can then learn and share together like what is working and what isn't working um the tour itself is represents a great opportunity for Learning and building towards a sustainable future for for large scale VR projects uh to do this we're trying to create this network up and down the UK uh because we want people to understand the power of VR when it is done well and we want immerses to be part of the core offering and we want them or uh venues to realize that the VR can be part of their core offering as part of that tour we are creating uh we're doing a very long uh a very big audience study with I2 media we're doing ticketing analysis best prct practices information on kit and Staffing requirements that we can share and this will form evidence essentially uh that that this type of work will will work in large scale venues um and for us it's vital for us to do this because you know we want to make the next thing and we want to tour it over the last 10 years of making VR I've became very frustrated about making this great work being at film festivals and everybody slapping each other on the back but then nobody getting to see the this sort of work and what we have found with with imp pursuit of repetitive beats is that there is audience appetite for it people want to see it and it's not because it's VR it's because it's the right subject matter culturally uh and that spans uh around International uh audiences not just the UK so what have we learned so far well one of the uh big issues that we have when we're talking to a venue and especially an Arts venue is whether you're part of their program or you're going to be a project that they're going to put in for a period of time when they've got a space that is um free if you're part of the program the core programming then you get uh a budget signed to you you get a priority and and that's really good for us if if we're part of a project that's coming in because the space is free for for 30 days or something like that then there are often lots of costs loaded onto the project which is something that we can't really handle with that sort of fr put we've also leared that training needs time training is very very important VR is still to do VR really really well and seamlessly when it's complicated VR and it has lots of different moving Parts is is actually really hard to train there's lots of troubleshooting there's lots of elements where it can fall down and so uh we need to uh train for at least 5 days and also we've had actually kind of an issue with like venues not wanting to give staff the breaks that they need they they they want people to come in and they want to start the show and they want to go on for like 10 hours and we we've been in like trying to uh make sure that there are shift patterns and breaks in that day because actually Staffing VR being in a dark environment it being technically complicated is is actually quite tiring and and it needs it needs to happen on on sale scheduling is another thing we've learned stuff because we you know we're makers we make the stuff but I think like the last guy said like if the infrastructure isn't there then we have to build it ourselves because we grow frustrated with the idea that we can't show this work so scheduling when tickets go on sale learning about that and also learning how to Market VR uh is is really um has been something that we've really kind of learned marketing and communicating what a VR experience is is is a really hard thing uh you can say oh it's immersive it's embodiment it's interactive it doesn't really mean that much to the general public because most people we found have not done VR what we do need to communicate is how people will feel when they're doing it and um and again this is documentation that we are uh Gathering and we're going to kind of share with the community via the Arts Council and the BFI and I think what's important to say is that over the last 10 years we've been experimenting with what makes great storytelling and now it's time to learn how to get to audiences and so we've been learning with our partners on the tour and we wouldd love to encourage more venues more exhibitors to take a chance on uh VR in particular because I think what's when we when what you're offering is bold uh complex and has stories that can generally connect with people then it can change the way that people think about uh your organ your Venue your organization uh We've from our first from our first tour stop in birming we found out that 60% of the people had never been to the Birmingham Museum uh that came to see beats and about 60% as well had never done VR before it was their first VR experience and I think when you're in the immersive sector uh you kind of you're surrounded by people that are working in this uh area and you just believe that everyone knows exactly what you do and what you're doing and most people either don't care or you know have never done it before but given the opportunity and the right setting then they will come and it will and it will be something that they will remember for a long time so I think reaching out to communities is really really important but you need the venues to to understand that this is something that they can do it's something that they won't lose money on and it's something that can change the culture of their organization and also the demographic of their audiences so I'm just going to play this quick video of some people coming out of beats in uh Birmingham it took me way back seriously back to the days early 90s lot of actually B around that's how good it was I'm buzzing I'm actually buzzing it incredible I'm as VR so to do that was just an incredible experience just all inspiring it was absolutely brilliant and it takes you through where you need to go and it it's really easy to follow the steps that need to be followed there were points when you literally felt you were in the warehouse or you felt you were in the flat it was absolutely fantastic so it was my first time ever doing VR and obviously cuz I'm quite young I don't really know anything about about like Rave culture or anything like that so being able to kind of experience it in VR was really really cool really immersive really felt set like as if you were really there it's like we managed to make the Rave yeah finally end finally finally we got if you feel like you just you know what you got those regrets cuz you never got there come here and you you won't have any regrets yeah so this is the tour as it stands so we've just uh been in Birmingham and we're about to uh launch in November at the Brighton dome which is already sold out I'm pleased to say um which for us by the way is like a big thing we're like we sold out you know that's that's amazing because this is VR and it doesn't really sell out so uh for us that's a really big uh thing then we go to the Belfast XR Festival uh in February March we're in an amazing venue there this like uh church that we're going to convert into a kind of Rave Shrine I guess and then to August we're going to be in London I thought I could announce uh the venue but I can't but it's a big venue in London and that's a really long run and what we're going to try and do on that piece is that at the moment we're developing in pursuit of repetitive beats to be a multiplayer uh piece which at the moment you're one person you do it and and you do the whole thing and then and then you come out there is a moment of networked um connectivity where you see the other people who are doing it in the in the in the Rave but uh this will be something that you do with three to four people uh the big thing for us on that is that we go from 10 people an hour to 24 to 30 people an hour which makes a big difference uh commercially as you can imagine then we go to Bristol uh which we're still working on uh the the venue but we're very very very close and then War Art Center we finished at the Wales Millennium Center which we've already been to and it was really really popular so they wanted us to come back so that's really cool um so that's me I was meant to be joining by my head of touring as zucha danant tuo who couldn't make it today so even though I made in pursuit of repetitive beats he is the expert on the touring so I'm kind of covering for him a little bit but if there is any questions I'm happy to to do questions about in Pursuit repetitive beats because I do prefer Q&A to doing all this sort of stuff thanks thank you very much um uh you mentioned that you were going to move to multiplayer can you talk a little bit about how the storytelling changes when there's more than one person in it yeah this have have you done it uh I'm doing it in Brighton okay uh so funny enough in Brighton we we're presenting a version of it which is we when we made in pursuit of repetitive beats one of the key things that we want to do is make it accessible so we have the free roaming version which is over a large space bigger than this this um stage and in brighting we're doing an accessible version so everyone has slightly smaller space where where you use the controllers to move around I wasn't like massively into doing that but it was part of our tour uh as the Creator I want everyone to do like the most immersive free roaming version but so it'll be interesting what you think about that but the space is quite small at the Dome it's not in the big space it's in one of the studios so there will be 10 people in there and you'll be teleporting and within that you'll be able to move around in a smaller space so it' be interesting you'll still get the fans and the haptics and all that kind of stuff so should be great the what we have normally though is a larger space and that's a large enough space for people to be able to do it together so without giving you too many spoilers it's it's set over the the the course of the night so you start in someone in your mate's bedroom uh and it reminds me of my mate's bedroom in the 90s there's stuff all over the all over the walls there's like a coffee table everyone's like kind of like you know just hanging out there that's enough space for you and your friends to be in that in in that together what happen happens in terms of the interactions is a really good question so we are doing workshops starting tomorrow at the baracon on uh so Tuesday and Wednesday and that's our first uh look at how we convert what is a one player sort of uh documentary narrative with interaction into a multi-user CO collocation experience we think actually we can redesign some of the spaces make it slightly slightly larger within that within uh within the current sort of play spaces but then there are some interactions that we're really going to need to work on as the sort of creative behind it you know I'm constantly being asked like oh we need to make it multiplayer it needs to be multiplayer because people want it to be more commercially viable for me the the challenge there is how do you how do you maintain the Integrity of the project from a from a documentary standpoint and also from an enjoyment standpoint of each person because you know there is enough to do for one person to do it in interactive and be really swallowed up it as soon as you're sharing some of that interactions it becomes a little bit more tricky so my job is to really make sure that actually that experience is still um still a really good experience that can be shared and that those moments of shared interaction are really rewarding in a different way as they would be if you did it as a single person so that is actually the challenge my main challenge uh ahead of me uh apologies came in late if you already covered this but um excuse me in and I know your partner is really the um the touring touring guy he's the touring human but um are you working with a Distribution Company in any way shape or form or how are how did you guys decide to uh shoulder the burden of the distribution um outside of it sounds like you're also getting funding from people to support your drro and which uh exact organizations are those so we are Distributing it ourselves there we we were in talks to to do online Distribution on meta store store and stuff like that which we've kind of pulled away we were kind of very close to doing that with with with a big distributor and then we pulled away from it mainly because we didn't feel that it was worth it and whilst we were touring it internationally we felt like for us the location-based uh experience area is like where we see most growth and we see the most opportunity for um uh for ticket sales and engaging with audiences where we feel like online uh narrative VR is not uh very well curated on those stores and you get kind of lost uh I think most people who work in VR know that um as well and and and that's something that is is is a challenge so we are Distributing ourselves so that is taking a lot of work you you might have seen that we have like different tiers of the experience so we'll be contacted by we've been we've shown it in like Lithuania and Poland and all these different places where where people have had limited budgets but we still want people to see it so they can kind of do it themselves a bit more DIY which is actually very much the OS of Rave so we kind of are able to charge a license fee but then at the same time uh guide them through that and then when it comes to the the UK tour I mean that was a lot of work to get that off the ground I mean probably close to a year uh trying to get the funding from the Arts Council and the BFI and and getting those two institutions to understand that this was something that was necessary I think they did but you anyone who's have applied for tour in Grants uh from both institutions know that it's a complicated and you have to kind of tick a lot of boxes and one of those things is you know it's for me as the Creator and the artist it's like I want people to see this piece of work for them as the institutions they want to answer lots of other questions skills diversity uh reaching new audiences in underserved communities and stuff like environmental sustainability so you have to put together a whole very much a complicated package to get that Mone to be able to do it but I think the plan that we put together for the UK tour is sound in terms of what it's trying to achieve and the way that it Dr risks some of it for that venue and and that was a real big big thing for us and that's a big thing for the venues yeah and if I can follow up with a really obscenely specific question you said you're subsidizing the first 10 days is that part of that is that part of that Council money that you guys built into that gr it's it's a combination of both of those uh funds put together but yeah Essen as I mentioned you know it's a lot of Kit so it would cost probably about 25 to 30k to install it into a venue um we don't charge for the kit but but you know it's all been paid for but we do have to install it we have our art directors we have all the stage hands and then our Tech manager who and and other people putting it in once it's in set dressed and ready to go and that always takes a few days then uh we need to train people we need to train the hosts and we need to train the tech managers we need to check train the duty managers who are getting people into the building explaining what's going on and stuff that that all takes time but that all gets paid for and then once we start and we hand it over to them and normally the first couple of days you get lots of whatsapps about how how does this work well you know this this is not working after a while though that that dissipates and then we're left alone and we just get on with what we're doing we have and luckily it's robust enough to not need that much content contact but for that first 10 days once it's going that Staffing is is covered so the if it's a museum it's the museum Staffing is covered if it's a gallery it's a gallery Staffing so those people that are bought in and they're normally Freelancers as well anyway there there will be some in-house staff uh an organization but they normally need to bring in people locally and we encourage people as part of that making sure that we're bringing in a diverse set of people that want to work in this uh in this sector and that's part of another thing for for the funding and um and yeah so luckily you know that first in days is completely paid for and then once it's in it's in so you know and people are loving it and it's selling out and it's selling it it's a no-brainer for them to continue and then after that you know there's a revenue share and and and stuff like that once once the rest of the costs are covered so it sounds like it's five days of install and training and then you're also covering the first five days of show roughly first 10 days of show oh first oh so the the install is a completely separate the in the install would normally take about 3 or 4 days training would be about 3 or 4 days then we launch we have the we have the Press day and then the first 10 days of show ticket it show okay so it's almost like 15 free days of uh yeah Brant brilliant way to get over the hump yeah yeah sorry okay sorry it's time but I'm around if you want to talk to me um so yeah feel free to come and grab me [Applause] [Music]

2025-02-15 06:10

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