For anyone that’s checked out VR porn, it’s not really being overly mean to say that the production companies are phoning it in a bit when it comes to variety.
Almost without exception, what you get is a POV shot of a man stood, sat or lying down, and somewhere between one and three women, all getting up to a bunch of fun stuff. For a lot of people, that’s probably enough – but it’s hardly a truly immersive experience.
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You get essentially one point of view, and yes, you can change exactly where you’re looking but checking out the furnishings isn’t really the point of the VR videos that exist today. It’s easy to see why that might not be massively appealing to women for more than a few minutes of novelty.
That’s exactly what Sssh‘s first female-friendly (‘made by women, for women’) looks to balance out. Director Angie Rowntree says:
“While the VR environment does pair well with the first-person perspective (POV), it’s also limited in a lot of ways. Once you free the viewer’s perspective from being locked into what the ‘protagonist’ is doing, so to speak, it enables the viewer to more completely explore and experience the full environment. It takes the viewer from being a passive observer to allowing them to actually experience the movie more fully.”
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So the aim with Rowntrees approach is the make it an immersive, but not necessarily interactive, experience.
It’s an approach she calls “Dynamic Storytelling” (also an approach used in game design, incidentally) and one that she says requires a different approach from the director.
“From a director’s perspective, it’s really inspiring to shoot VR content, because it forces you to adopt a new mindset and try things which would never occur to you when shooting for a flat, two-dimensional presentation.”
Just don’t go expecting that POV shot, OK?
The first movie is wrapped and ready to be released next month, and will ship with the title of ‘Empowering Ava: A Virtual Reality Experience.’
