Star Wars: The Force Awakens brought to life in “Holo Cinema” by ILMxLAB

ILMxLAB will be bringing a new “Holo Cinema” Star Wars experience to Sundance that’ll transport users to a galaxy far, far away with projections. We’ve seen just glimpses of this technology before, ILMxLAB here working with their own software tool Zeno to create such magnificent feats of graphics greatness as the squid-face of Davy Jones in Pirates of the Caribbean. With Zeno and ILMxLAB’s own virtual production renderer, common citizens will be able to virtually step into Star Wars – without the need of a full virtual reality headset.

The demonstration Sundance attendees will be able to see has, in at least one scene, a set of droids – C-3PO and BB-8 amongst them. You’ll be on the desert planet Jakku from Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and you’ll be immersed in the experience.

While this isn’t the first time this technology has been seen by anyone outside of ILMxLAB, it is the first time the public will be able to get up close and personal with it.

This experience includes a set of projection-friendly surfaces and a pair of tracking glasses. The glasses are tracked by a set of cameras above the screens, and images are projected on to the screens with information based on where ILMxLAB’s computers see your head turning and your eyes looking.

No matter which way the glasses-wearer is positioned, the perspective in the 3D space they’re in will be situated according to them.

The video you’ll see above comes from Nick Rasmussen of ILMxLAB. He and his compatriots are setting up their demonstration for Sundance 2016. Rasmussen is one of several inventors of a technology patented as “Apparatus and method of simulating the movement of elements through a region of 3D space”.

That’s one way to say what they’ll be showing at Sundance. This patent is assigned to Lucasfilm Entertainment Company Ltd., ready to roll for Star Wars content of all sorts through ILMxLAB.

Photo by Diana Williams of Lucasfilm Story Group

Above you’ll see a couple of pairs of the head-tracking glasses that’ll be used in the presentation. Also there is a basic control setup on an iPad, as well as a Wii controller with some trackers on it.

Above: Straight from ILMxLAB, “The droids are ready to meet you.” You’ll see a participant wearing the tracking glasses here in the foreground.

The Sundance event at which this will be shown is called “The Holo-Cinema” and includes collaborators John Gaeta, Hilmar Koch, and Nick Rasumussen.

The event is described thusly:

This new scenic design and experience theatre allows participants to step into iconic story moments while spatially perceiving the performing characters and exploring worlds. As they portal inside a fully immersive media environment, they experience 4-D viewing as if walking through film sets in the real world.

Now if only we could have this set up in our living room.

We can only cross our fingers and wish and pray.

Until then, have a peek at this: for Star Wars, live motion capture is the future.