What is the future of Virtual Reality in Theatre?
A collaboration with Helen van Baal, as part of our master graduate project at the Royal College of Art, this was the starting point for a five month excursion into the overlapping spheres of theatre, immersive storytelling, technology and the future.
With the booming of digital industries exploring Virtual and Augmented Reality, there is no doubt that the world of theatre will be touched and changed as these technologies become more commonplace. Our project was a chance to see what this synthesis might look like and offer a suggestion for a future form of storytelling and experience.
UNSEEN is an experiment. We wanted to see how we might incorporate new technology into a theatrical setting, whilst still retaining the look and feel of such an experience. It is an exercise in many things: research, scene-writing, set design, lighting, technology building and integration. It is both an act of design and an act of directing - one in which I drew upon a range of collaborators in order to make it happen.
It is very much the first step of a much longer journey, but one which has borne much fruit for discussion about the future overlap of these worlds.