Capturing Reality Pt. 6

Adding on to the last post of Learning in a Virtual World, we will be adding the finishing touches to our virtual environment. Assets and materials will be imported from the Unity Store into our scene, helping to recreate the classroom used during the beginning of the series. We will be also speaking about the repeated narrative of a covid classroom while analyzing it with the reality virtuality continuum.

elow is a short tutorial on how to download, import and place assets from the Unity store, into your own environment. Make sure to log into the account that is currently building the environment, so that downloading and importing the assets is seamless.

Throughout the series, we got to see various types of media, ranging in order from photography, videography, 360 photography, to AR and lastly VR. The reality virtuality continuum is a scale which ranges from a reality to virtuality. Reality is something completely real, and virtuality is something completely virtual. Photography, videography and 360 photography would all fall at the beginning of the continuum, under reality. Next on the continuum would be AR. AR mixes a real environment with virtual objects. An example of this would be Snapchat filters on a person’s face. The last technology that we used was virtual reality. In virtual reality, everything is a virtual object, meaning not real.

 We have now added all the small details in the classroom and it is almost ready to be explored.

Capturing (Virtual) Reality

In this virtual environment, a virtual reality headset would allow us to experience what it is like being in a covid classroom. We would be able to view the classroom from the standpoint of all of the other students that have been in that class. A better idea of what the environment is like would be the technology used at the beginning of the continuum as it only uses real things, but a better understanding of what it feels like would lay at the end of the continuum, virtual reality. We would be able to experience what the students were feeling in virtuality, but would only be able to see it in reality.

Throughout the series, we explored the different ways of capturing reality, starting from photography and videography to capturing virtual reality. Each technology has its own advantages and disadvantages, catering to different kinds of needs. In the posts, we see a repeated environment of a covid classroom, ranging from complete reality to complete virtuality. When exploring all the spaces, my personal favourite has to be virtual reality. Having a 3D model of a room creates a more immersive and interactive experience than just looking at a photo, in my opinion. In virtual reality, you are also able to modify and fix things in the environment that you might not be able to change in reality. This alters the reality, but in virtual reality when you put on the headset, you no longer become an observer, but an active participant in the virtual classroom.

Part 5 – With Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter in Crisis, A New Generation of Apps Emerges

by Ariel Aarenau | Feb 23, 2023

With Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter each in a state of disrepair, it should be no surprise that competitors are not just emerging but taking off. The first and most prominent competitor is TikTok, an international version of Douyin, which was released in the Chinese market in September 2016. TikTok was then released worldwide following a merger of its parent company with Musical.ly on August 2, 2018.

Part 4 – A Little Birdy Told Me Twitter Is Lost

by Ariel Aarenau | Feb 16, 2023

I write this post amidst ongoing chaos at Twitter HQ. It is November 21, 2022, and a few dozen more Twitter employees have flown away from the nest. Elon Musk is the company’s “Chief Twit”, and his latest decision to reinstate former President Trump’s Twitter account has the world chirping. Since Musk’s ownership, Twitter has shed 60% of its employees between layoffs and attrition, cut 80% of its contractors, and experienced a humiliating Twitter Blue product reconfiguration.

Part 3 – Can We #ThrowbackThursday Our Way to the Old Instagram?

by Ariel Aarenau | Feb 9, 2023

Founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, Instagram was an instant success. The app reached over one million users just two months after its release and reached ten million users in its first year. In some respects, its success should have been anything but a surprise: Mark Zuckerberg was an early courter, Jack Dorsey was an avid user, and Marc Andreessen and Chris Sacca had advised from the sidelines.