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FirstStage is an innovative VR creation tool that is hooked into Unity. Using FirstStage you can rapidly create prototype scenarios and move to full production as a team online
About
Moviestorm is a developer/publisher from the UK. We make affordable and easy to use 3d animation tools. We also provide film previs and bespoke development services based upon our IP.Founded in 2003 by Cambridge entrepreneurs, in autumn 2005 Moviestorm received investment from a consortium of private and institutional investors in order to build the Moviestorm Filmmaker tool and community. Since release in 2008, Filmmaker has attracted over 450,000 amateur filmmakers, teachers and students, and businesses, looking for a low cost and accessible tool to tell stories, teach and create commercial films.In 2019, Moviestorm successfully delivered a EU Horizon 2020 Research and Development project called First Stage aimed at the use of natural user interfaces to intuitively provide creatives with greater control of their previsualisation process. Since then we have been productising that research and have released ‘FirstStage’ to critical acclaim, a real-time collaborative content creation platform for all types of creative productions.
Key Benefits
Why VR for creative productions?Virtual Reality (or VR) provides the perfect environment for creative production exploration and planning, and FirstStage has been developed to fully exploit VR's potential to deliver tools that are as good as working on a real stage, and in many ways even better!Based upon the outcomes of over €3m and 343 expert person-months of R&D into natural user interfaces for previs, FirstStage delivers a pioneering, naturally accessible and intuitive tool for use by non-technical creatives.Interaction isn't acheived via deep desktop menus and complex 2d timelines, it uses the visual benefits of 3d and VR to deliver a natural user experience with virtual world enhancements.A Natural User InterfaceThe research outcomes have informed the many design decisions that have been incorporated into FirstStage, from colours and user interface presentation, through to the movement required to access and utilise tools, or negotiate virtual space.Fundamental to all those decisions has been to make the tool:easy to use, through a natural 3d approach to accessing information, creating and editing, unlike the complex menu-driven approach of current 3d engine tools.efficient, making the process of previsualising scenes faster than exisiting methodseffective, by ultimately offering an appropriate level of precision and controlThis has resulted in a tool that can be used inside any small room space, that offers traditionally 2d user interfaces in a visual 3d, minimises game controller interaction methods, and where possible encourages the user to use their hands and body movement to do things.No matter what technical skill level, this is a tool for anyone to naturally use, and enjoy the benefits of a physically active software interface.
Applications
The cost and weight of VR kit is reducing significantly and the solutions are getting more user friendly, and those trends will continue.VR provides a solution to remote collaborative working, does not demand large spaces to be practical, and provides a more healthy and physical approach to traditional software solutions.Some stats:Global augmented or virtual reality (AR/VR) spending projected at $12bn in 2020, set to grow to $72.8bn in 2024.Unit shipments of VR headsets forecast to reach 12.5 million in 2020.Experts suggest that due to the efficiency improvements that VR offers, industrial use is forecast to be three times larger than that of consumers by 2023.By 2023, the global business uses of extended reality (XR) technologies is forecast to increase to a spend of $35bn in the manufacturing and construction industry alone.35% of business executives surveyed had adopted AR/VR technology into at least one business unit, with 13% having adopted the technology across multiple units.Source: StatisticaLowering costs, remote working and minimal space requirements, combined with workflow efficiencies and physical benefits are pushing huge growth adoption in extended reality (XR) technologies for industry.