VR, XR, Immersive & Interactive Design

I work at RMIT University, Melbourne CBD campus, as a digital media lecturer and digital media course module designer of immersive audiovisual experiences and environments, both physical and digital. A few areas of research and practice I’ve been deep in for years, includes 360 video for VR, spatial modelling in Unity and immersive video installation. A general term that my work in this area falls under is XR, or Cross Reality.

X Reality (XR or Cross Reality) is defined as: a form of “mixed reality environment that comes from the fusion (union) of ... ubiquitous networks and individually or shared online virtual experiences....” It encompasses a wide spectrum of hardware and software, including sensory interfaces (usually merging digital and physical spatial awareness), applications, and infrastructures, that enable content creation for virtual reality (VR), mixed reality (MR), & cinematic reality (CR). With these tools, users generate new forms of experience by bridging digital objects into the physical world and physical world objects into the digital world.

360 Video for Virtual Reality

360 video is a dynamic and evolving medium that offers engaging & interactive forms of storytelling, documentation and visual communication design thinking. Working within a conventional video browsing experience or as an interactive video browsing experience 360 video places more emphasis on environment as a central narrative element to be experienced rather than passively observed.

The Transient Status Project offers a 360 audiovisual experience to be experienced through a browser or in Virtual Reality (VR) It combines stunning footage from Europe and Asia with creative treatment of filters and visual effects. Experience the simple and elegant possibilities of 360 video production as mood, colour, texture and emotion within a 360 video or VR environment. This medium has become increasingly important as a way to provide a virtual experience of being ‘inside’ the presence of place and space. This is especially important for those who may not physically be able to reach those places due to disability, old age or other social or environmental impediments. Also, during restricted access to place and space due to pandemic it can provide an immersive experience of ‘being’ somewhere else.

Musical Experiences in VR

Yaosai, presents here a simple musical experience of duet, consisting of myself & Meng Wang, performing 'Altared Forest - Part 1' at Queens College in Melbourne. VR offers environmental experiences in VR.

Nurobodi - Limbic System Entrainment

Nurobodi is addressing the increasing need to:

• Understand the meta forms/spectrums of light and sound to redefine their presence as seperate or combined mediums for communicating or establishing healthy psychophysiological states or clearly defined mood spaces

• Developing quantitative and qualitative data links between subtle differences in pitch, colour and emotions

• Raising awareness of human and environmental Posthuman ethics and how emerging ethics affect all of our lives, specifically the lives of children entering the world

Enhancing & Augmenting Space & Place

From paintings on cave walls to painting with VR tiltbrush tools, it is clear that we are dwelling more in shelters of light & sound. This has been an empowering process for the cognitive extension of our abilities to visualise & project our fears, hopes and dreams through audiovisual spectrums. However, there are emerging issues that affect our emotional, physical and psychological landscapes. 

Nurobodi Community Development

Nurobodi works collaboratively with communities to proactively educate & redefine the way light & sound integrate within environments of work, play & home life. Our site specific designs create healthier cognitive & emotional atmospheres. Nurobodi also offers production design & operation for events as well as private, government or community project consultancy.

Experiencing Nurobodi customised sound and colour spectrums not only provides a physically relaxing experience for the body it also encourages a form of brainwave entrainment called brainwave synchronisation facilitating a recalibration of the mind & body - a calming of the nervous systems & a sharpening of the senses. Over time this process of entrainment develops a heightened connection between the limbic system (emotional & memory processing) & the autonomic nervous system.

Human Intelligence 2.0

Nurobodi Design was an official scholarship recipient of the Ci2017 Human Intelligence 2.0 awards at the Ci2017 Conference in Melbourne 2017. The focus of the scholarship is to support businesses that fuse next level design principles with community development & social engineering & innovation. In 2018 Nurobodi worked with Knox City council, Swinburne University, RMIT University, Autumn Retreat Wellness Centre and the 2018 Mind Body Spirit Festival to create engaging and uplifting wellbeing spatial designs using sound and light.

Empathy Design for the future

Nurobodi is playing an increasingly significant role consulting and developing educational content focused on preparing audiovisual and interactive designers for increasingly immersive digital experience platforms. Central to Nurobodi’s education focus are the links between colour, pitch and emotions as foundations for developing true empathy important for relationships, soft skills in the workplace and also crucial for design ethics in fully immersive audiovisual environments.