Taking technology to storytelling
Virtual reality films allow the viewer to become part of the experience
PARK CITY, UTAH — The words “technology” and “empathy” aren’t generally strung together in a positive context, but some key pieces of programming at this year’s Sundance Film Festival suggest that could change quickly — thanks to some pioneering Canadians standing at the forefront of New Frontier.
For instance, imagine sharing a tent with a Sudanese refugee or running for your life as soldiers surround your village. It could even be something as simple as watching someone sit at the piano to compose music, or something as high stakes as taking part in a revolution.
Thanks to advances in virtual-reality technology showcased as part of Sundance’s New Frontier — the section of the festival that supports artists who fuse creative impulse with cuttingedge technology — all these things are now possible.
“With virtual-reality technology, the viewer becomes a part of the experience,” says Félix Lajeunesse, one half of Félix & Paul Studios, a Montrealbased company on the leading edge of the VR revolution.
“The viewer becomes conscious of his own presence inside the piece and becomes self-aware … and that changes everything. It changes the nature of what you are trying to communicate as a story, so it’s a fundamentally different form of art and storytelling than filmmaking.”
Former commercial and video directors, Lajeunesse and his business partner Paul Raphael have three virtual reality-based pieces in New Frontier. One allows the viewer to spend time with a family of yak herders on the Mongolian steppes, another puts us in a studio with musician Patrick Watson as he works on a new composition, and Wild is a stand-alone experience based on the film adapted from Cheryl Strayed’s memoir of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail.
Fellow Montrealer Vincent Morisset, the interactive storytelling force behind the AATOAA studio and Arcade Fire’s Just a Reflektor video, says all the emotional aspects of traditional narrative can be enhanced by donning an Oculus VR headset — the branded hardware that makes seamless immersion possible.
Morisset is at New Frontier with Way to Go, a project developed through his work with the National Film Board’s digital studio that allows the user to take a surreal stroll through an enchanted forest.
Shari Frilot, the programmer for New Frontier, says she’s thrilled at the program’s evolution over its nine-year history.
“In VR … you physically feel you are inside a parallel world and you develop this state of becoming. You are physically engaged with your environment and making decisions on how you are doing that, so it’s like a parallel consciousness. These are stories that are engaging different neurological and physiological networks in your being that just take it to another level.”