We make VR easy to navigate and access
We make VR easy to navigate and access
Immersive Film Companion
With another edition of the successful Encounters Film Festival launched in September 2022, Zubr was invited to create a Virtual Reality and 360 Film Player for the event’s newly established Immersive Showcase.
Over 4 days of the event, we saw hundreds of users mounting VR headsets to engage in a 1-hour immersive journey.
4
Day festival
5
VR films
60+
Minutes
100+
Viewers
Partners
This successful Immersive Companion for the Encounters Film Festival 2022 was developed in partnership with Encounters, Watershed and Limina Cinema.
Building an accessible VR player
Our vision was to create an accessible VR player prototype for Encounters Film Festival-goers to enjoy immersive film experiences at the venue in a user-friendly and relaxed way.
Catherine Allen of Limina Immersive provided elaborate User Interface wireframes and environment mockups our design and development team employed to build a first working version of the app.
We were tasked to devise two virtual environments, bearing a life-like realist touch to allow visitors to gently ease into the cinematic experiences.
Starting in an elegantly lit virtual train station with an interactive departure board accompanied by the pleasant hum of a distant crowd, the environment design aspires to provide a safe space for users of all age groups and backgrounds.
After selecting Encounters film Festival as your destination a subtle fade-to-black transports you into the venue’s chic cafe. A festival programme leaflet awaits you there, ready to be opened to reveal the immersive film selection and the official Encounters Film Festival trailer.
By developing a clear and easy categorisation and labelling method for the films, in addition to a simple payment system to rent films, we made the app up-scalable and ready to be enrolled in a wide range of film festivals as they expand their immersive repertoire of at-home and physical event offerings.
During the Encounters Film Festival, small groups of visitors were invited to take a seat in a quiet separated area at the Watershed, ready to mount their Quest 2 VR headsets for a 1-hour session of 360 life action and animation films.
The feedback from the app during the festival was great with all participants finding the interface really user friendly. The screening filmmakers in attendance were super happy with the presentation.
Rich Warren, CEO of Encounters Film Festival
The feedback from the app during the festival was great with all participants finding the interface really user friendly. The screening filmmakers in attendance were super happy with the presentation.
Rich Warren, CEO of Encounters Film Festival
Experiencing Encounters Film Festival via our Immersive Companion
Encounters is the UK’s leading short film, animation, and virtual reality festival. As the official gateway to the world’s most prestigious awards – The Academy Awards, BAFTAs, and the European Film Awards – Zubr was proud to create an interactive virtual environment for the program’s newly established Immersive Showcase.
Our Immersive Companion received great feedback from visitors, film directors, as well as festival producers, and we are preparing to enrol this exciting and innovative tool for multiple film festivals across the UK as they increasingly expand their VR repertoire.
Our Immersive Companion featured a selection of 5 outstanding films by Joerg Courtial (Genesis, 2021), Carlos Isabel Garcia (Caves, 2021), Felicia Bergström (Cycle of Violence, 2022, winner of the Immersive Encounters Grand Prix 2022), Oliver Lindsay (Ripples of Kindness, 2021), and Paul Bush (I Horizon, 2022).
Find out more about the films below, and discover more of our VR work in our case studies, including our previous collaborations with Limina Cinema. We’ve made VR experiences about 19th century Irish emigration, and immersive VR safaris for the Eden Project. If you’d like to work with us on a similar project, contact us here.
Genesis
As time travellers we embark on an emotionally intense virtual reality journey to experience the dramatic milestones in the evolution of earth and mankind. A 24h metaphor of 4.7 billion years of evolution that reveals: We are children of galactic luck.
Caves
Mankind has landed on the moon and flies around in space. But under our feet there are about a million kilometers of cave systems—only one per cent of which has been explored.
Cycle of Violence
Giggling as she hops between hills of fluffy pink cotton wool, Bunny tries to charm and seduce us. The relationship, at first so intimate and lustful, suddenly breaks down and turns to a furious escalation of accusations and violence.
Ripples of Kindness
Created in collaboration with Hamed and Hessam Amiri to honour their brother’s incredible life, Ripples of Kindness invites small groups to share in the positive impact that Hussein had on everyone around him, from Afghanistan to Wales.
I Horizon
You will never touch me however far you travel.
Not a single step will bring you nearer,
Yet each step diminishes you, even if you cannot see it…
For I am Horizon.
SPECIAL MENTION: Immersive Encounters Grand Prix 2022
