• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar

IRL Experience Design

  • Blog
  • My Work
  • About
  • Immersive Austin
  • Unique Austin
  • Weird Austin
  • More Austin
    • Austin Halloween Guide 2022

Paths to Immersive

January 21, 2022

There’s a lot of very different things being called “immersive” these days. Everything from VR to restaurants have been called immersive and there’s a lot of people who say they work in immersive.

But when a word means a lot of things to a lot of people you can get a lot of misunderstandings.

I find it useful to understand where the creators are coming from and what’s important to them when they say “immersive”.

This helps you know what to expect from the experience of their work, as well as how you might work with them. 

Here’s some of my own interpretations of how to categorize the different interests in “immersive”.

From the Theater World

  • Their most important value: Story
  • What do they want to create in an immersive world: A play of performance in which the audience plays a role.
  • What does an immersive world look like to them: The set is usually in the physical world, maybe on a stage or an entire room or building or city block.
  • When they think of immersive they first think of: The actors often interact with the audience. The interactions’ impact on the story can be anything from inconsequential to meaningful

From the Video Game World

  • Their most important value: Gameplay
  • What do they want to create in an immersive world: Challenge in the form of competitions, missions, scoring, and other gaming mechanics.
  • What does an immersive world look like to them: Elaborate explorable worlds that attempt a realistic look or – if not realistic – an internally consistent look and feel. Usually filled with things that are not possible in normal reality.
  • When they think of immersive they first think of: Instead of the traditional 2D screen, the game is played in 360 degrees. “Normal reality” is not visible on the margins.

From the Art World

  • Their most important value: Self-expression
  • What do they want to create in an immersive world: A world of discoverable, surprising, wondrous, imaginative, inspiring art.
  • What does an immersive world look like to them: A real life physical space to explore as they might a cave system of funhouse. Typically manifests as a colorful psychedelic sort of world, experimenting with materials and mediums. Space and “other dimensions” are popular themes. Through-lines are secondary to individual creations.
  • When they think of immersive they first think of: Meow Wolf.

From the Maker World

  • Their most important value: Making things.
  • What do they want to create in an immersive world: They want to create things that inspire a wonder about the making of the thing or show of their maker prowess.
  • What does an immersive world look like to them: There’s less of a focus on the end world to them than on the making. They want something people will enjoy and appreciate, but it’s more about their individual contribution and skills than the full end world.
  • When they think of immersive they first think of: All the tools and materials they will get to play with and experiment when making something. It might be LEDs, sensors, screens, and the latest technology but it could also be of a more traditional craftsperson trade like crochet or carpentry.

Different Backgrounds, Different Needs

If you keep these backgrounds in mind when working with people who say they do or like “immersive” stuff, you’ll be able to reduce misunderstandings and find common ground. Or find the right people to work with in the first place.

If you decide to be a low-budget operation, then your artist types might relish the creative limitation but your maker-types may be frustrated that you don’t have the resources to do anything they consider fun or rewarding.

If your project is a challenging game-like experience that doesn’t involve much story you might excite your people who have a video game background but you’ll drive a theater person crazy. And if you want to involve actors on a stage you might put-off the gamer-types. After all, those are most interested in pushing IRL human interactions out of the picture with 360 degree worlds.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)

Posted Under: Experience Design Tags: #CreativeProcess

Primary Sidebar

About Me

I make awesome experiences for people. Read More

NEW CONTENT 2+ TIMES A WEEK

  • IRL Experience Design
  • Amazing Experiences
  • Fun Weird Sh*t

See My Favorite Books

  • For IRL XD
  • For Learning
  • For Getting Things Done

@IRL_Experience_Design

instaglogo

RSS Feed

rss logo

Secondary Sidebar

VISIT MY BOUTIQUE IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCE

SEE MY AUSTIN EVENTS WALL CALENDAR

Austin Events 2023 wall calendar cover

Search My Blog

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors

Filter by Category

  • Experience Design (189)
  • Productivity (65)
  • Everything Else (105)

FILTER BY DATE

March 2023
M T W T F S S
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  
« Feb    

Read My Recent Posts

  • Possible Small But Important Changes That AI and Chatbots Will Bring: Making Us Better At Email.
  • Digging Into Online Stats to Identify Issues
  • Google Analytics Update
  • Eureka Room Update 3/14/2023
  • Eureka Room Updates 3/10/2023
  • Eureka Room Update 3/7/2023
  • “What a waste of time”
  • Meditation Benefits (Actual Concrete Examples)
  • Bookeo and Google Analytics Tracking (Take #2)
  • IRL Experience Designers Professional Group
  • Eureka Room is Hiring!
  • Eureka Room Update
  • Eureka Room Update 2/10/23
  • Brainstormingitis
  • 1000 Days of Meditation
  • Déformation professionnelle
  • Eureka Room Update 1/27/2023
  • Introversion and Extroversion
  • The Joy of Knowing Things Exist
  • Why I Prefer Books With Few Anecdotes

  • Contact
  • About