360 Cinematic literacy: a case study

360 degree film making necessitates a new language for storytelling. We investigate this issue from the point of view of the user, inferring 360 literacy from what users say about their viewing experiences. The case study is based on material from two user studies on a 360 video profile of an artist. Interviews were analysed using thematic analysis to understand how users made sense of the video. The sense of presence had a strong impact on the experience, while the ability to look around meant new skills had to be developed to try to make sense of 360 video. Viewers had most to say about a few particular shots, and some themes of note emerge: such as being in unusual places, certainty about what should be attended to and focus points, switches between first and third person views, and close-ups and interest

User experience of panoramic video in CAVE-like and head mounted display viewing conditions

Panoramic 360 video is a rapidly growing part of interactive TV viewing experience due to the increase of both production by consumers and professionals and the availability of consumer headsets used to view it. Recent years have also seen proposals for the development of home systems that could ultimately approximate CAVE-like experiences. The question arises as to the nature of the user experience of viewing panoramic video in head mounted displays compared to CAVE-like systems. User preference seems hard to predict. Accordingly, this study took a qualitative approach to describing user experience of viewing a panoramic video on both platforms, using a thematic analysis. Sixteen users tried both viewing conditions and equal numbers expressed preferences for each display system. The differences in user experience by viewing condition are discussed in detail via themes emerging from the analysis

Effects of viewing condition on user experience of panoramic video

Panoramic video arises at the convergence of TV and virtual reality, and it is necessary to understand how these technologies interact to affect user experience in order to produce useful content. TV and film makers have developed a sophisticated language and set of techniques to achieve directed linear story telling on fixed screens, whereas virtual worlds more often emphasise user led exploration of possibly non-linear narrative and aspects such as presence and immersion in navigable 3D environments. This study focused on the user experience of panoramic video as viewed over two conditions, on a VR headset and using a handheld phone, and compared this to watching on a static screen thus emphasising the differences between traditional and panoramic TV. A qualitative approach to analysis was taken where users participated in semi-structured interviews. A thematic analysis was performed which produced thematic maps describing user experience for each condition. A detailed and nuanced account of emerging themes is given. Subsequently, key themes were identified and graphed to produce user response profiles to the three viewing conditions that highlight differences in user experience in terms of presence, attention, engagement, concentration on story, certainty, comfort and social eas

Infinite barbarians

This paper discusses an infinite regress that looms behind a certain kind of historical explanation. The movement of one barbarian group is often explained by the movement of others, but those movements in turn call for an explanation. While their explanation can again be the movement of yet another group of barbarians, if this sort of explanation does not stop somewhere we are left with an infinite regress of barbarians. While that regress would be vicious, it cannot be accommodated by several general views about what viciousness in infinite regresses amounts to. This example is additional evidence that we should prefer a pluralist approach to infinite regresses

Impact of the innate environment on maintaining memory T-cell numbers in the female genital tract: implications for mucosal vaccine efficacy?

Preventative HIV vaccines aim to elicit long-lived protective immune responses at the site of HIV transmission, capable of responding quickly to HIV challenge, but which remain stable at effector sites of the genital mucosa. The genital mucosa is, however, commonly confronted with innate immune modifiers and inflammatory agents including sexually-transmitted infections, behavioural and hygiene practices. We investigated the impact of mucosal inflammation and homeostatic cytokines on local T-cell phenotype, proliferation, exhaustion and activation

Archives of thrill: the V-Armchair experience

Technology for older people is typically concerned either with health care or accessibility of existing systems. In this paper we take a more ‘entertainment-oriented’ approach to developing experiences aimed at older users. We describe here the design, development and a user study of the V-Armchair, a virtual reality and motion platform based roller coaster experience. The V-Armchair constitutes a blueprint for the digital archiving of physical ride experiences through the simultaneous capture of 360 video, sound and motion. It gives access to thrill experiences to those who may not be able to go on real thrill rides, such as older riders, and it can be considered as a class of technology that could help to support ‘active aging’ as defined by the World Health Organisation. We discuss strategies for capturing and then ‘toning down’ motion experiences to make them accessible for older users. We present a study which explores the user experience of the V-Armchair with an older group (median age 63) using a DK2 headset, and a younger group (median age 25) using a CV1 headset, via thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews and a modified version of the Game Experience Questionnaire, and discuss emergent themes such as the role of the presenter, reminiscence, presence and immersion