Tribeca Immersive: Virtual storyscapes

Creators of VR often liken it to an “empathy engine” but tech critics are less convinced by the description. “I don’t think we can say definitively that VR is an empathy machine,” says Rose. “Anecdotally, yes, it does place you in a situation that no other form of video does, but at the same time, in most VR, you’re there but you’re not there. The people in the video can’t interact with you so it’s like you’re dead and from outer space.” In a February 2018 article for Wired UK, Jeremy Bailenson, professor of communication at Stanford University, notes that “there is no medium that magically produces empathy… In VR, content that moves the body will also move the mind,” suggesting that genuinely interactive storytelling, as seen in Hero, is the key to generating empathy.

Terminal 3 is an augmented reality (AR) story that focuses on President Donald Trump’s 2017 executive order that temporarily halted people from seven Muslim-majority countries entering the United States. The project launched last week and puts participants behind a metal table, confronting a Muslim hologram and learning more about the hologram’s background and life story. Terminal 3 features six holograms, each based on a real person. The project attempts to give an up-close and personal account of what it feels like to single someone out in an interrogation room.

Embedded within a story

Not all projects at Tribeca Immersive required participants to play an active role. Viewers were also placed within a virtual setting to witness stories unfold. Fire Escape: An Interactive VR Series is based in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. The audience is invited to observe and eavesdrop on the private lives of eight tenants from the vantage point of a fire escape, and piece together a larger story that involves deception and murder. Dinner Party invites viewers to sit around a real table and enter the virtual memories of two “UFO abductees,” revealing the trauma of the experience and the uneasiness of hearing about it.

Social VR

VR is often an isolating experience. “There’s no good way to experience it in the presence of other people,” comments Rose. “That’s a real handicap, especially when it comes to digital media, unless you’re using it purely as an escape.” Facebook has dabbled in social VR. However, Rachel Franklin, the company’s head of social VR, who oversaw the launch of Facebook Spaces, tells MIT Technology Review that consumer feedback can be summed up as: “There is not enough to do here yet.” Exploration in this area continues to evolve, as making VR social seems to be a natural next step.