Dyskinetic
Writer and Technical Lead
The Project
Dyskinetic (2014) is a Live Action Virtual Reality film made for the international short film festival GoShort.
A short drama film about powerlessness that touches on the idea of player agency, the film puts the viewer in the body of a coma patient and a family who is trying their best to cope with loss.
Two copies of the film exist, one that refers to the viewer as male and another as female.
the work
- Writer
- Concepted and wrote the script for the project.
- Worked with director to realise vision.
- Blocked out actor movement for technical limitations.
- Technical Lead
- Researched the pipeline for Unity to work on videos in VR.
- Learned to work with various video editing & panorama stitching software and video equipment.
- Programmed various C# scripts.
An old ambulance was used as part of the experience. The viewer would climb into the ambulance and lie on the bed inside. They would be given the Oculus Rift and 'wake up' in a hospital room.
What I learned
This was one of the first projects where I was in charge of programming and I am incredibly proud of it.
The film itself is actually not fully 360 degree since we only had two GoPro cameras as a rig, meaning that we had a very visible seam behind the viewer. This constraint was the core reason that the film is one that is meant to be viewed whilst laying down on a bed.
Ultimately, there was a lot of trial and error with software that I hadn't even heard of two weeks before. Through intense research and persistence, I worked out the post-processing pipeline and how to get it running in Unity.
It was a wonderful experience to have others watch the film and as a university side project, it helped set up the ground for other students to experiment with the medium.
Additional information
I spoke in Unite Europe 2015 about the project, presenting how and why others can also create 360 films. Since my workflow was using rather old equipment and software, I focused on the overall steps and hints for non-programmers on how to tackle the challenges.
"Having created two live action virtual reality films for the International Film Festival GoShort in Nijnmegen, Narrative and Game Designer Brenden Gibbons explains the problems that he's encountered and their solutions. This talk aims to inspire and get others started in this new territory in entertainment media."