WEEK 2 - HOW TO GO ABOUT IT

As my self-directed learning for this trimester, I will be in charge of transforming this project into a functional VR film. This blog will contain my research and development on the VR aspect, while future blogs will contain my flexibility and adaptability in implementing these into the project.

For my research, I looked at the render settings in 3Ds Max VRAY as that will be our primary engine for getting shots out. This online VRAY school (2017) explains the camera setup in VRAY, how to edit Metadata into your images so that it is registered as a 360-degree image, and provided links and access to free VR viewing tools. With the help of a brilliant tutorial (uploaded below) that explains each step and the kind of settings that need to be played around with, I was able to create a rendered test shot of a proxy scene for our presentation.

This has helped me create a rendered test shot of a proxy scene for our presentation.

(Render test done by me and posted on my YouTube channel)

This proxy scene is something we are looking to create for our own film so it is basic low poly assets. However, it took me 4 hours to render this out on my computer for the demo. I uploaded it to YouTube as a test trial because it will also be the final platform on which we showcase our work. In case this video needs to be viewed on a pc, there are apps that allow for this to work such as:

1. MarziPANO: http://www.marzipano.net/

2. GoPRO VR Player: http://www.kolor.com/gopro-vr-player/download/

(Video by VRAY School, 2014)

In terms of editing, I used premiere pro’s new VR feature. Chiu (2017) explains how to do so in a detailed step-by-step guide and what the various types of 360-degree panorama features can provide. Through following this, it helped me broaden my knowledge in VR editing already!

However, we will be needing to use After effects in our post production process for this trimester so I have that sorted out in this video that explains how to set up a VR environment and editing tab in After Effects. Because I am more flexible with Premiere Pro at this stage, I used it for the demo test but I will practice being flexible and adapting to a new software (After Effects) in the latter weeks.

For now, I believe that this amount of information through research is ample enough to get me started and prepped for the technicalities of the project. I will use this knowledge to help myself and my teammates in creating the best renders for our VR film.

References:

https://vrayschool.com/vray-spherical-rendering-360-vr-viewer/

https://studio.knightlab.com/results/storytelling-layers-on-360-video/how-to-edit-360-video-in-

premiere/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddy7w6yABfM