Let’s Put the TV in VR and AR

Leave it to the opening of last month's Future of TV Forum here in New York to demonstrate why.  Tech kingpin Lockheed Martin, with assistance from VR content maker Framestore and ad agency McCann, created "Field Trip to Mars," a school bus project that gives students front-row seats for a look at the surface of Mars.  As the bus travels to its destination, students see the view out the windows on both sides of the bus morph from the live roadway to the red planet, craters and all.  Framestore representative Alexander Rea presented highlights of this "Field Trip" before a well-attended Forum crowd. Quite a few eyes popped at this sight.

But here's the thing: The students don’t watch their new journey unfold with helmets, headsets or something in their hands. They watch with their own eyes!

VR and AR institutions can surely offer that level of experience or better for the growing number of smart TV set and TV-making device owners.  Keep in mind that a fair chunk of those owners may prefer not to see what many believe is the next level of content via headgear or mobile phones or look-through devices. Why not service them, as part of generating a mass VR/AR-loving audience?

One company we know about has played both sides of this fence for nearly a year: Littlstar, based in New York. Programming obtained by Littlstar is offered through the likes of Oculus and as an Apple TV app. Under that app, users watch the content over the TV set, using their Apple TV remote or Siri voice control to move the picture up, down or all around. The company is talking to other VR/AR hardware creators and other smart TV/TV-making device players about affiliations.

Some VR/AR advocates dismiss Littlstar's approach, labeling it 360-degree as if that's a second-class medium all its own. Someone should tell them that at the core, this approach works the same as the other:  The user interacts with the picture, just by remote or voice. Given the capability and capacity of these smart sets and devices like Apple TV (which now has more than 7,000 apps) or Amazon Fire TV or Shield, there's plenty of upgrade room.

There's no reason why Samsung or Google can't put more muscle behind a TV path for VR and AR. Samsung is one of the smart TV set leaders, and Google has more than 30 million Chromecast devices in use. Both have representatives coming or speaking at next Monday's conference, and someone should raise this subject to them.

The groundswell of effort to make VR and AR go is very real.  So why not turn that groundswell into a reality accepted by the public?  Going the TV way and the headgear/handgear way, in my reality, shapes up as the best way for all involved. Let's see if next Monday marks the beginning of that movement.

Notes from the Passing Parade

Great move by the (New York) Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment to set up a meeting between women filmmakers and the venture capital/angel investor/incubator community, as part of a new campaign to expand diversity in film and TV for women and women of color.  Here’s an even better move: Invite women TV makers to be in that meeting, or set up a second encounter just for them. Don't leave them out of this picture.

Until the next time, stay well and stay tuned!

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