XR Experience at SXSW2024 !

At South by Southwest 2024, during the three days from March 11th to 13th, the XR Experience at SXSW2024 exhibition was held. This was an exhibition where you can experience new creative content, mainly virtual reality video works. The Farimont Hotel, located next to the Austin convention center, is the venue for a conference where XR technology developers and content creators will be speaking, and the XR Experience exhibition will also be held in the same hotel.

The dimly lit venue was lined with about 30 booths, where you could actually experience the XR works nominated in the Film category. However, since the number of people who can experience VR video works is limited by the number of headsets, it was so popular that all the reservation slots for that day were filled up immediately after the opening. Unfortunately, there was a lot of content that I was not able to experience, but I will introduce some interesting works based on the experience.

Let’s take a look at a sampling of exhibitions from the XR Experience at SXSW2024.

1. Soul Paint

There is a psychological approach called body mapping, in which you recognize the connection between your mind and body by coloring an illustration of a human that resembles your own body. It is one of the mindfulness techniques to deepen self-understanding, such as which part of the body your consciousness and emotions are connected to, and what colors run through your body when you feel pain or joy.

In this exhibition at XR Experience at SXSW2024, you can experience body mapping by painting a life-sized avatar. It offers a 20-minute healing experience aimed at deepening your understanding of your own body and emotions objectively, suggesting the potential of VR works that go beyond mere entertainment. This work was awarded the Special Jury Award in the XR Experience category.

2. The Imaginary Friends

This VR work tells the story of becoming an imaginary friend of Daniel, an 8-year-old boy who has become withdrawn after losing his mother, and helping him. In the VR world, the viewer takes on the form of an imaginary animal with wings, and must carry out tasks such as chasing away ghosts that appear in the boy’s room and trying to make the depressed boy smile.

It’s an interesting idea to use VR to simulate the experience of childhood, when the distinction between reality and fantasy is unclear, as an adult. The experience booth was equipped with chairs with wings, and from the outside, it was an interesting exhibit to see adults trying their best to flap their wings.

3. NÂ TÂU TSÍ Á (SISTER LIN-TOU) VR

This is a horror film based on the traditional Taiwanese ghost story “Sister Lin-Tou” in VR. It tells the story of a woman who commits suicide after being betrayed by her husband and then becomes a ghost to get revenge. It is a fairly well-known old story in Taiwan.

Taiwan is actively promoting its artworks and creators overseas, but it also seems to be putting a lot of effort into VR production, with several works lined up at this year’s SXSW. The exhibition booth was equipped with a large chair-shaped machine that rotated automatically, moving automatically in accordance with the progress of the content, creating an amusement-like viewing experience that stood out in particular at this year’s exhibition venue.

4. The tent

This is a mixed reality video experience viewed through an iPad camera rather than VR. The story asks viewers about the difficulty of being a good person through a mysterious tent set up in a home’s garden. It is divided into two parts: the first half is viewed from outside the tent, and the second half is viewed from inside the tent. An actual tent was set up in the exhibition booth.

Rather than making VR spaces more realistic, one possible direction for future XR content may be to blur the boundaries between reality and the virtual world by creating a physical viewing environment that matches the story and then creating an MR experience.