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Good morning!
In this week's newsletter, we take a peek behind the scenes of CBS's high-tech election set, complete with LED walls and an AR senate floor. We also look at L'Oréal's first digital-only makeup collection, ready to wear in all of those Zoom calls. Plus: a deep dive to celebrate a decade of Kinect, and a few words on that Robert Kardashian hologram and the company that created it.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
- the RLab team
We're always working to improve this newsletter - let us know how we're doing and send tips, feedback or questions to info@rlab.nyc.
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MUST-READS
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| Behind CBS News' Augmented Reality and Other Advanced Election Night Tech |
"We're empowering our top political journalists with the latest data visualization and storytelling tools to bring as much clarity as we can to this election." - Susan Zirinsky, CBS News president and senior executive producer
While 'Magic Wall' interactive screens dominated the networks' election night coverage and analysis through days of counting, broadcast studios also used new virtual sets and augmented reality tools to make the 2020 race more visually engaging and less of a slog. CBS converted the old MTV TRL set in Times Square into a state-of-the-art election studio in less than a month, with a multitouch screen, large hi-res LED walls, and AR elements such as a 3D senate floor. "Our Senate [3D] model actually uses the seats in the location where they are on the floor," said David Bohrman, executive producer of CBS News' 2020 election night coverage. "You visualize seats that are up, and you see them in the context of which side of the Senate they are actually on. People aren't really allowed in the Senate. It's very rare for a regular person, even a reporter, to get in the Senate."
4 min read
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| L'Oreal Paris Responds to Pandemic With First Digital Make-Up Line |
In a first for the cosmetic industry, L'Oréal Paris launched a digital-only makeup line that works on Google Duo, Snapchat, and Instagram. The beauty brand worked alongside Virtue, Vice's creative agency (who, you might recall, were responsible for Carlings' AR clothing line) to develop 10 filters across three themes: "volumising capsules," "plump shot," and "fire match," each with their own textures.
2 min read |
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| Ten Years On, Kinect's Legacy Goes Beyond Xbox |
Quick, what was Xbox 360's best-selling game? Perhaps Minecraft? Nope - that was outsold by Skyrim. Maybe Halo 3? No again - GTA V beat it by some 3M copies. It was, in fact, Kinect Adventures, which sold 24M copies. So the original Kinect was a resounding success, right? For a few years, it was. Ellen used it on her show; Oprah gave it away on hers; it won the Guinness World Record for the fastest-selling gadget. Starting as a skunkworks project that eventually took on the Wii, the Kinect was ahead of its time: "Whereas the Wii could only monitor the movement of one hand, Microsoft could offer full-body skeletal tracking, identifying physical gestures and the tech could even recognize faces."
In 2013, Xbox One shipped with a Kinect. It also had facial recognition, years before Face ID, and could start with a wake word before Alexa had permeated American homes. So what happened? In short, the price. The Xbox One - which came with a Kinect - initially retailed for $100 more than the PS4, a critical mistake that eventually saw the unbundling of the Kinect (and its fade into obscurity). Now, the device finds a niche home in research and business applications: "Microsoft resurrected Kinect with an Azure-branded version for businesses. It's already been tested by supermarkets for grab-and-go checkout services, and healthcare companies looking to identify patient falls." For a full history, we recommend watching Stop Skeletons From Fighting's video (below) or diving into Polygon's long-read.
5 min read |
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| How You Create a Robert Kardashian–Style Hologram—and How Much It Costs |
Kanye West recently gifted his wife Kim Kardashian a holographic "resurrection" of her late father, Robert Kardashian. West commissioned hologram company Kaleida for the project. Slate interviewed the company's CEO, Daniel Reynolds, and while he was mum on specifics around the Kardashian hologram, we found out a few interesting things about the industry:
- How much it costs: "The technology is becoming more accessible, so you can do this on a small scale for tens of thousands, but if you want to do it properly, you're looking at hundreds of thousands."
- How it works: "So it is a combination of visual effects, machine learning algorithms, but also physical choreography, and a bit of sound synthesis. But the key element to the production is really the performance.... You can have the best hologram in the world, but if that performance is not right, it's just going to fall flat."
- How you film it: "Filming a hologram requires a very specific lighting setup to create dimensionality. It uses the same tools as a normal film shoot. It's just that the arrangement is very, very specific. So you need to have a very, very good [director of photography]."
- What comes after filming: "Once we capture the footage, that's when the VFX artist gets to work. You have the machine learning algorithm, which is learning—the person you are resurrecting as a hologram, it needs to learn how they express themselves, how they speak, their facial movements. There are different programs out there. People call it different things online. Deepfake becomes the kind of catch-all term."
11 min read |
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| MUST-SEE |
Sketchfab founder Alban Denoyel recently posted a volumetric video, recorded on an iPhone 12 Pro and the Record3D app (also check out his recent iOS occlusion clip).
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| COMMUNITY NEWS |
apelab (RLab Accelerator Fall '19) announced School 2030, a partnership with CompiSternli and San Diego-based educator Kwaku Aning to bring a VR program to secondary schools in Switzerland and the United States. Funded by the Gebert Rüf Foundation through their Digital Education Pioneer program and supported by DartLabs, the project will allow students in 7-9th grade to develop their own vision of what the future of can look like using apelab’s immersive learning platform Zoe.
Mario Mishurenko (RLab Bootcamp Fall '19) wrote about playtesting games during a pandemic for Playcrafting. As a teacher assistant for the Games Studio 2 course at the NYU Game Center last spring, Maria shares research on how remote collaboration required adjustments to the process for playtesting, getting feedback, and iterative game improvements.
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| EVENTS & OPPORTUNITIES |
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UPCOMING CLASSES
Online Course: Designing for the Future: Modern Interfaces & Emerging Technologies
Starts November 17
Developed in partnership with Emeritus, this 6-week online course taught by NYU's Joshua Goldberg and RLab's Adaora Udoji will provide a solid understanding of the business considerations for modern interfaces and emerging technologies for product designers, product managers, creative directors and product directors. Learn more. |
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Event: Unreal Build: Virtual Production
November 10, 12PM
Free half-day virtual event that showcases virtual production projects and innovations from the film and television industry and the latest features in the upcoming Unreal Engine 4.26 release.
Event: The Business of Disinformation
November 17, 2PM
With NYU Data Future Lab, hear from leading experts and innovators in the disinformation field about the state of the market, the business case for fighting disinformation, and the new solutions they're building.
Opportunity: echoAR Spring Internships
echoAR, a company providing a cloud platform for augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) is looking for a Software Development intern and a Business Development intern for Spring 2021. Fully remote.
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| OTHER NEWS |
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Apple, Google Hiring Special Effects Masters Away From Hollywood to Work on AR & VR
Viveport Is Giving Developers 100% of Their App's Revenue Through the End of 2020
The World's Leading VR Soccer Training App Is Now Free on SteamVR
Sports Leagues Are Betting on Augmented Reality, as Virtual Courtside Seats Can't Match the Real Thing
As Augmented Reality Evolves, the Reporting Is All Around You |
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