Mad Max: Fury Road (http://www.madmaxmovie.com/)

Artistically I want to create a world that feels very different to the present and modern society we currently find ourselves in, having watched ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’, a movie where the main plot exists in a world where resources are few and far between and is set far in the future, this meant I began to have ideas around visually what I would be looking for in terms of the VR world as well as imagery to be used within the website and promotional material.

The general tone for this digital master piece originates from tribal ideology and present day desert environments. Mad max is a life or death situation and not a world that you would want your children to grow up in, therefore it becomes a perfect example of research to justify a similar existences 100 years from now, within my own project, if countries like China and India eventually burn up the remaining resources within our planet. But more importantly the running theme of fighting over energy resources suggests what future we could be facing if nothing is done to control the energy consumption and usage within current developed and developing countries, are we in fact heading for a Mad Max future but sooner than we think?

In terms of colour tones and style, Mad Max: Fury Road sets a good starting point for colour experimentation around contracts and design within the VR world. Crucially this piece of work adds insight into what tones, textures and vision to choose within ‘Goobye100’ to make my VR future accurate and impressive. Therefore blues, yellows, cream and pastel colours tend to add to an artistic presents within post-apocalypse worlds. Also looking at certain shades of lighting to create the level of detailed required, meaning dark lighting in nighttime scenes, bright and faded lighting during the day, this will create the shadows and hopefully ‘burned out’ look a world with little green and a lack of energy may appear.

The cinematography and special effects within the movie was the original brain child to project ‘Goodbye 100’, and although fictional, I couldn’t help but feel ‘what if’ at the end of the movie, ‘what if’ that is our future and ‘what can’ we do about it to ensure either way it is not. Publicly the film has received praise from its target audience and media professionals alike, which demonstrates if you create a fictional (or not) world correctly, then it can only be taken seriously. Becoming a perfect platform for a series message and educational output to push the need for understanding and action.

Project Syria: An Immersive Journalism Experience (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yku27o7Z4Bo)

Leading on from initial research into the Oculus Rift, I wanted to find some examples of similar work based around my own post-apocalyptic world that had already been attempted with or without success in VR. My research led me to ‘Project Syria’, a virtual reality idea set around allowing journalists to experience the harsh reality of the ongoing civil war in Syria, from the safety of  VR headset.

The idea around this comes from creating the idea of total immersion, losing your own knowledge and whereabouts, whilst letting yourself completely absorb the sights, visions and in this case horrors of a war torn country. Virtual reality can take anyone to a place that they may not feel safe and tell the story of what is happening and why it is happening, therefore showing links between ‘Goodbye 100’ and immersive journalism in the area of educating and informing first world consumers about what impact certain actions can have either presently or in the future.

This section of work interests me because it utilizes the technology, but to create something beyond an entertainment project, but instead convey a message, which is partially what my project in attempting to do. The level of design and complex creation that does into ‘project Syria’ is something that would need to be recreated within ‘Goobye100’ for the project to appear believable. It come down to envisioning a world where you could become totally emerged and practicing building an almost simulation designed to shock and ask questions to the select audience or player.

Syria itself sadly becomes a great example of fieldwork to study to create ideas for how a world 100 years from now may look. The badly damaged country is now little more than bleak colours and ruined buildings. As much as this is disturbing it can become the basics of object ideas around 3D modelling and set design when building in the Unreal Engine 4, therefore photographical work around ‘Project Syria’ and other photographers work has proven to be extremely useful in initial sketches, ideas and modelling practice.

Importantly this digital flagship helps bring political and academicals awareness to a problem using VR. Journalism is often required to help spread a message for change, meaning ‘Project Syria’ perhaps has begun creating a portal for the world of VR to be understood and used within education, whilst being heavily publicized and developed as a commercial project,  hopefully bringing ‘Goobye100’ along with it.

Initial Approach:

Initially the project brief was very broad I decided to research the industry areas listed with the European Youth Awards category’s for an idea of what to develop, at first I thought about creating some kind of digital art, purely around entertainment reasoning, as this is an area that interests me within digital media. However creating an artistic piece, although fun, didn’t justify the projects brief enough for me, instead I want to explore an area than could make a real long term change or difference.

I looked into the ‘Going Green’ category and thought what could I develop that hasn’t already been done, climate change has long been educated and projects have attempted techniques on how to stop, raise awareness and resolve such problems. Furthermore energy consumption in first world countries has long been discussed, however there does appear to be a gap in the market for the education of the serious global contributions towards a polluted world, being developing (third) world countries. Therefore I looked towards ideas around themes of energy consumption awareness and global preservation, specifically looking at what countries were contributing the most to what is an international energy crisis, research suggesting China and India as large contributors. This themed area came to me through research looking into the site: (http://10unsolvables.org/ ) and studying what problems were yet to be addressed with any kind of political, experimental, ethical or moral change and attention.

Exploring these problems I came across a common theme that contributed to at least 5 of the issues listed and if this theme was correctly addressed then perhaps the impact of each individual problem would be lessened. Therefore it all comes down to education and awareness for looking after the earth and ourselves, “Goodbye 100” wants to drive change in the attitudes, insights and public knowledge of why we are destroying the world around us, who is most responsible and therefore needs to change quickly to their approach and specifically how individually we can make a difference. The projects long term goals is the extend to the international nations to take it upon themselves to improve their respected country in tackling problems like energy burning, landfills, oil rigs, fracking, nuclear waste and fossil fuel resources, therefore hopefully ‘Goobye100’ ca be the stepping stone into complete change.

My thought process around the brief was to design something that went beyond a simple campaign or piece of information, many environmental awareness projects have revolved around internet videos or social media pages that rarely take off because the interaction the subject matter becomes quickly stale and uninteresting. Therefore initially research led me to propose an installation piece and accompanying website catering for the educational side of ‘Goodbye 100’,  on discussion with my tutor however an installation piece although interesting, may not be the most engaging of design ideas to raise awareness to the issue, therefore further research has led me into exploring virtual reality as a design platform through examples demonstrated using the ‘Oculus Rift’ and ‘Gear VR’ prototypes, meaning the project could now be something that is both educational, internationally attention grabbing and entertaining through VR.

• Oculus Rift (https://www.oculus.com/en-us/rift/)

The first review of work that inspired me was what started as Kickstarter campaign project that has now received international attention, excitement and global funding. Leading the way for virtuall reality and a new generation of gaming, entertainment and design ideas, the Oculus Rift. Simply put, the Oculus has made the future of media enjoyment and interaction a now present and very real product on innovation.

The development of Oculus has become the next generation of technological advancements within the media industry, with the first commercial shipments coming this year. However the reason for using the Oculus as not just a digital creation for inspiration, but also a functional piece of equipment within my own VR ‘Goobye100’ world stems from the realism and total immersions already seen in previously released oculus titles.

Titles including Solar System Explorer, VR Cinema and UR4 Roller coasters have already proven popular within the Rift and gaming community, but this popularity doesn’t come from the game itself, be all 3 titles resembling a simple idea, that on console would quickly become tedious and boring, but the element of being involved in this virtual world and feeling like you are actually experiencing a roller coaster ride, or you are exploring deep space. Therefore it could be suggested that an attention grabbing and educational message seen within my own project may only have the intended impact if the world feels ‘very real’ and therefore the problem becomes ‘very real’.

Furthermore the global success of Oculus and later other VR headsets from different developers must be at the forefront of justification for the ‘VR world’ side of the ‘Goodbye100’ project. The Oculus development kit 1 and 2 (pre commercial release) has already sold over 175,000 units, therefore adding a new title off a VR world 100 years from now to an international success train couldn’t help but raise further awareness and understanding the problems presented whilst also paving the way for the digital advancements in technology being the center front for my project, showing my idea to be harnessing the most modern techniques to educate and inspire.