The Immersive Tech team is very pleased to welcome you to the Innovate UK Immersive Tech Awards Reception 2024! Below you will find a timetable for this evening’s event, as well as a floor plan and rundown of our finalists.
5:30pm – 6:00 pm: Arrival & Networking Drinks
6:00pm – 6:55pm: Winners announced on stage
7:00pm – 8:30pm: Finalists’ project showcase
8:30pm: Reception closes
View our floorplan – ground floor and first floor
If you would like to be put in touch directly with any of the finalists, or have any other queries about the event, contact immersive@iuk.ktn-uk.org.
Best Immersive Game
Mostafa S. Ebrahimi & Meghna Supriya Saji – Ooh La La! London College of Communication, University of the Arts London – The Presentation Suite
Ooh La La! is an XR experience that merges two distinct worlds: a Virtual Reality playground and a Mixed Reality musical orchestra, paired with interactive toys. Its primary goal is to destigmatise societal taboos surrounding wellbeing, acting as an icebreaker while providing entertainment for users. Content Warning – viewer discretion is advised.
Zhenghao Du, Kun Yang, Haodong Zhang & Ruiting Zhang – Blind Samurai – University of Bristol – The Clubhouse
Blind Samurai is an innovative VR game that immerses players into the world of a blind swordsman, driven by audio gameplay. Players rely on their hearing to perceive their environment and enemies, engaging in precise action interactions to overcome various challenges.
Creative XR Storytelling
Paul Baule – Passeri Polyphony – Royal College of Art – Meeting Room
Passeri Polyphony is a prototype for an immersive experience portraying a shocking reality about the state of our planet: the once vast orchestra of life, the soundscape of the natural world, is turning silent. The audience is invited to engage with a ‘living’ data visualisation, an emergent Murmuration of 17000 ‘flying’ audio waveforms that statistically represent 17 of the UK’s most endangered songbird (or Passeri) species.
Mostafa S. Ebrahimi – Etidrohpa – London College of Communication, University of the Arts London – The Presentation Suite
Etidorhpa transforms storytelling into a virtual reality adventure, merging narrative text with interactive VR environments to elevate the reading experience to new heights. With the use of eye-tracking technology, it creates an engaging narrative realm within VR, where the story unfolds through events, sounds, visuals an environment that respond instantly to the words the user focuses on.
Sensory
Artemis ZJ Weng and Bethan Hancock – Consciousness in The Landscape – Royal College of Art – The Presentation Suite
The format is an interactive game built in UE5. The player explores a route through a forest landscape, which gradually evolves into a city landscape using Anthropocene imagery. The game is inspired by films such as Annihilation (2018), where nature evolves as the explorers traverse the landscape.
Chaojing Li – Echoed Grin – Lonely No More – Goldsmiths, University of London – The Presentation Suite
Echoed Grin – Lonely No More is a virtual reality immersive journey designed to address the pervasive feeling of loneliness, using the metaphorical setting of an undersea world to explore the power of connection and the impact of positive attitudes.
Technical Innovation
Hanju Seo – Being a Giraffe – Royal College of Art & Imperial College London – The Clubhouse
Being a Giraffe tackles the alarming decline of the giraffe population with an innovative VR experience, crafted to bridge the empathy gap between humans and giraffes. Users are equipped with a custom controller that mimics giraffe movements, offering an immersive glimpse into their world.
Joshua Davies, Nathan Thomas-Benke, Jake Boulton, Mai Ye & Hwanjoon Jang – BeatBoxVR – Goldsmiths, University of London – The Clubhouse
BeatBoxVR, a virtual reality drumming experience, offers players an unparalleled immersive musical journey. Utilizing VR technology, it places users at the center of a virtual drum kit, where they can play, learn, and enjoy music in a fully interactive 3D environment. The game combines realistic audio responses, visual effects, haptic feedback, and physical interactions to simulate playing an actual drum set, enhanced with educational modes for learning and practice, as well as play mode/ challenge mode for entertainment and skill testing.
UX & UI Design
Sarune Savickaite - Exploring Neurodiversity through Immersive Experiences – University of Glasgow – The Presentation Suite
Exploring Neurodiversity through Immersive Experiences is designed to investigate individual differences in perception due to neurodiversity, specifically focusing on individuals with autism and ADHD traits. Through Virtual Reality (VR) technology, the thesis aims to understand and address the unique needs of neurodiverse populations, enhancing communication and creative expression, which started a new way of assessing perceptual and cognitive differences and sparked further research in the field.
Ayesha Williams-Bhatti – Sepsis Collab – Birmingham City University – The Presentation Suite
Sepsis Collab is a unique virtual reality simulation for training doctors, nurses and paramedics to identify and treat sepsis. The simulation makes use of Machine Learning for individualised user experiences and allows for a multi-user experiences where clinicians from the different disciplines can collaborate seamlessly via VR either remotely or in-person.
Career Breakout Showcase
Tim Limon – AR Phonics Soundboard – The Clubhouse
The AR Phonics Soundboard acts as a conduit for literacy, fusing contemporary accessible hardware and web resources with the wider cultural skill base/awareness of social media etiquette.
Chipo Mapondera – Futuristic Pagan – The Presentation Suite
Futuristic Pagan is a virtual reality experience connecting fashion, nature and spirituality, in a Zezuru traditional dreamscape. It presents the fashion collection, designed using 3D modelling techniques, to elevate the traditional Hanga and Retso fabrics.
The virtual reality experience explores our connection to the ancestral realm through nature.