Category: Immersive Technologies

How the Virtual Reality Content Distribution Conundrum Was Solved

by John Cleave

The SweetRush SPARK team came up with a brilliant solution to the virtual reality content distribution challenge.

Picture this: You and your best friend get together every weekend over the summer to make marmalade. You buy fruit at the farmers’ market and you meet at your house to make the jam. Then you give it away to your family and closest friends, who all come to love the sweet treat. One day, you both decide to make a profit off your now-famous jam. Once the jam is ready, however, you face a big problem: How do you get it to your potential buyers?

Distribution, as you can probably guess, is a big deal when you offer any kind of product, even if it’s digital. With virtual reality (VR) experiences for Learning and Development (L&D), SweetRush’s SPARK team – which focuses on emerging technologies – discovered VR content distribution was a significant hurdle impeding the adoption of this new and exciting technology.

VR has reached an inflection point and there is tremendous industry interest. Vendors in the L&D industry are creating VR experiences for clients, and exploring the value of emerging technologies such as VR, augmented reality (AR), artificial intelligence (AI), and custom apps.

Here’s an example: A prominent hospitality brand, committed to providing their employees with highly engaging learning experiences, saw VR as a unique tool for workplace learning because it’s a fully immersive experience, in which learners interact in a simulated environment. It completely captures learners’ attention, which leads to higher levels of engagement and retention.

In this instance, VR offered the perfect next-level learning experience. It allows corporate-level workers to experience the reality—environment, needs, pressure—that hands-on hospitality workers deal with daily. The net result was that it achieved the desired goal of fostering empathy.

However, when it came time to deploy the app, the size and nature of this global enterprise created a major distribution problem, much like our jam at the beginning of this article. How could this organization distribute their virtual jam to their worldwide enterprise?

Identifying a Challenge

“VR experiences are made up of heavy files,” says Esteban Cascante, Project Manager at SweetRush. “You can’t run them from the cloud; you need to install them on your hard drive. That creates a level of complication for our clients. If they need to install the VR app on five computers in five locations, that presents a logistical challenge given the file sizes.”

The complications do not stop there. As Cascante explains, if our team developed a newer version of a previously installed VR course, we would need to reinstall the whole package of files—we’re talking about 5 to 10 gigabytes in most cases, sometimes more—in each machine manually.

This is a less-than-ideal scenario. To distribute VR, one would need to download and setup files, and figure out how to launch the VR experience. One would also need to do so all over again for each new version of the VR course. This is arduous, time consuming, and a significant hurdle to the adoption of this otherwise innovative technology.  

A Gaming-Inspired Solution

If you play games, you are likely familiar with Steam, a game distribution platform developed by Valve Corporation. Steam solved the same distribution challenge for game developers and players. A similar distribution platform for virtual reality could solve this major hurdle for organizations wishing to integrate VR into their workplace.

After looking at the market and not seeing an easily available alternative, SweetRush decided to develop its own tool for distribution, the SPARK VR Platform. In it, users can log in and browse through their available VR experiences. From there, the steps are rather intuitive and simple. Users simply click the download button and wait for the download and installation process to complete. Then, they can launch the VR experience from the platform itself. They can also use it to launch previously installed experiences while they download new ones. Now clients can easily distribute VR anywhere in the world with ease.

The interface is consumer-focused and user-friendly, with a rolling carousel and an intuitive front end. Users can easily monitor the progress of their download.

Another great feature is the smart download. This feature speeds updates by downloading and replacing only necessary files, rather than doing a full reinstall every time there’s a new version.

All of us in the L&D industry are all excited about the potential of virtual reality and how a fully immersive experience can be leveraged to increase learner retention and enable performance improvement. Solving the VR content distribution challenge is an essential, building-block challenge that was inhibiting the momentum of this truly exciting new tool all of us are eager to engage.

Here’s to immersive engaging and immersive learning!

Are you interested in learning  more about emerging technologies? Check out this resources: 

 

 

Presence in Virtual Reality: Get the Virtual Bang for your Real Buck

by Danny Brenes

Presence in virtual reality is vital to create immersion, but you also need to manage your budget and invest it effectively

Do you know what the Virtual Boy is? It’s a 23-year old reminder that when you craft presence in virtual reality (VR) programs, what you decide to invest in (and use your budget for) really matters.

Let’s dig deep in the vaults of gaming history. In 1995, Nintendo released a 32-bit table-top video game console called Virtual Boy. It consisted of a head-mounted display, similar to various current-day VR headsets, except it wasn’t fully portable. Players would place their head against the eyepiece, which rested on a surface, and see a red monochrome display. The red-and-black screen was capable of creating the illusion of depth; it was, in fact, marketed as the first gaming console capable of doing so.

Presence in virtual reality

The Virtual Boy wasn’t VR, but it was a primitive ancestor, an attempt to produce an immersive virtual environment. Not only that, it was the first mainstream approach to VR in gaming, developed by one of the medium’s historic powerhouses.

It was also a complete disaster. Critics tore it apart and the console sold poorly. There were a few reasons for its demise. Ultimately, though, failure came down to one thing: the Virtual Boy experience didn’t offer a worthy immersive experience.

The original plans for the console were very ambitious. Nintendo wanted to use state-of-the-art technology to develop a real VR experience. However, over the course of four years of development, the company down-scaled the console technology due to high costs. In the end, the Virtual Boy hit the market as an unfinished product.

Even before reaching stores, Virtual Boy was dead already.

Keep an eye on your virtual reality production costs!

What’s the lesson here? Developing a VR project is exciting. There are so many options from which to choose, from 360 video to 3D environments. Where and how do you invest your money? This is an important question for any company developing VR, but especially for learning and development (L&D) departments creating VR for learning, that are more often than not working with limited budgets.

At the end of the day, what’s important is creating a great experience for the learner and achieving your learning objectives. How do you avoid “shiny object syndrome” and invest where really matters?

First, it’s important to understand what we mean by “presence” in virtual reality. In an article recently published by Training Industry, Danielle Hart, director of marketing at SweetRush, wrote that in VR programs, “designers and developers are constantly striving to achieve —and elevate— the feeling of being in and experiencing the virtual environment they have created. In VR terms, this is called presence.”

As a matter of fact, VR is such a unique and exciting learning tool for the workplace in big part because of presence: the feeling of “being there”, which in turn leads to higher levels of engagement, is intricately linked to retention. “You can’t do that with any other medium: experience what it’s like to do something first-hand,” says John-Carlos Lozano, chief creative officer at SweetRush and head of SPARK, the company’s emerging technology group.

Presence in virtual reality

Presence, nevertheless, is a delicate thing. Many factors can disrupt it. In a VR environment, your brain is on the lookout for details that don’t feel real and make you think “I’m not really here”. Yet, the issue of feeling real is complicated. “While some things can disrupt our sense of reality, other seemingly non-real items can be acceptable, with our brain filling the gaps,” writes Hart.

Therefore, crafting effective VR learning programs is all about balance, and that starts with careful consideration of where to invest in quality and detail. In Hart’s article, Virtual Reality for Learning: Balancing Budgets and Presence, you’ll find valuable lessons that will help you maximize your program’s virtual bang for your real buck.  

Learn from Nintendo’s Mistakes

Nowadays, owning one of the 770.000 Virtual Boys ever sold is quite the privilege: it’s the fifth worst-selling console of all time, and each surviving unit is considered a worthy collectible.

But you know who’s not happy about it? Nintendo. The Japanese company threw away their money in a project that was ambitious, but didn’t deliver on its promise.

Now, you have the chance to learn from their mistakes. Make sure your VR program delivers presence—without killing your budget in the process.

Read the full article: Virtual Reality for Learning: Balancing Budgets and Presence

Interested in how SweetRush can help you with your VR project? Visit our SPARK page and learn more about our services.

VR as a Medium for Empathy: What Aerosmith Got Wrong

by Danny Brenes

I was a kid when I first watched the 1993 music video for Aerosmith’s rock ballad “Amazing.”

Remember that one? A lonely, geeky-looking guy plays a video game in which he has sexy adventures with Alicia Silverstone, with whom he gets a bit obsessed (it was the nineties: of course he was obsessed with Alicia Silverstone!).

To make his experience more realistic—and his relationship with the girl more physical—he puts on gloves and a headset and, essentially, steps into virtual reality (VR), a digital environment in which he can have his dream girl for himself.

That was my first “encounter”—if you can actually call it that—with VR. Little did it matter how goofy or inaccurately the video actually showcased the technology; that was the first time I thought to myself, “Wow, it’d be cool if we could walk into a video game.”

25 years later, we can actually do that. It’s pretty amazing to ponder the potential of VR beyond the hormone-filled, futuristic dreams shown in Aerosmith’s video. VR, along with other forms of technology—such as augmented reality and the Internet of Things—are making a splash not just in entertainment, but in other areas as well, such as Learning and Development.

Now imagine instead of Aerosmith’s lonely, isolated guy using VR to hook up with a virtual, made-up girl, it was a male professional walking in the shoes of his female counterparts and experiencing situations of bias and discrimination. It might be tougher to fit with the song lyrics, but we can envision this take having a more meaningful impact, especially today.

And, the band would be highlighting one of the most compelling uses of VR: using the technology to create and build empathy.

In an article recently published on Training Industry’s site (Developing Employee Empathy Using Virtual Reality), author Taryn Oesch details how organizations like the United Nations and The New York Times have recently used VR to stimulate empathy.

The article then asks, “Should companies do the same for their employees?” John Carlos Lozano, Chief Creative Officer at SweetRush—who was quoted on the article—believes so.

Lozano shared the story of a VR project developed by SweetRush for a client who needed a virtual hotel for its corporate employees. In the VR experience, people could actually experience what working in a hotel is like.

“(Corporate employees) don’t understand what those people’s jobs are like, yet they are making decisions for those people day in and day out,” said Lozano. By virtually working at a front desk or cleaning a guest room, employees were able to develop empathy for their colleagues and, as a result, make better decisions in the future.

In other words, VR gives users the unique experience of actually walking in someone else’s shoes. Users can then have a better understanding of what others go through, thus developing empathy toward them.

For empathy to develop, however, virtual reality has to be done right. To learn how to build effective, VR experiences that align with strategic business objectives and to read more about SweetRush’s approach to VR, check out Taryn’s article and read more about VR on our website.

Lessons Learned in Developing VR Training: A Client’s Perspective

by John-Carlos Lozano

These three valuable lessons learned will help you develop VR training.

Virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and the Internet of Things (IoT) may still sound futuristic to some, but to say these emerging technologies are the future would be incorrect: They are already here. We are only scratching the surface of their potential, and who knows where these technologies might take us.

At SweetRush, we’ve made it a mission to make the most of these emerging technologies, applying them to our work in eLearning, training, and learning and development (L&D). That was made clear with SweetRush’s recent acquisition of IDEA Workshop, a Costa Rica-based company that specializes in VR, AR, and IoT. IDEA is being absorbed into our newly formed emerging tech group, SPARK, and IDEA’s cofounder, Adrian Soto, is our new Director of Future Technologies.

Developing VR training is somewhat like being pioneers in the Wild West: The territory is largely unknown, and much of the focus of this new technology is outside of learning. The technology itself is changing at a rapid pace—just when you think you have a good handle on the options, new equipment is launched in the market. While many of the foundation principles of user interface and user experience apply, moving into a 3D virtual space introduces a whole new set of opportunities and considerations for designers.

The vast amount of details that VR developers are working with is staggering. It’s a whole new (virtual) world. This makes user testing absolutely essential. The goal is to create an environment that is simple and intuitive for the widest spectrum of learners—from those who have picked up a video game joystick only a few times to more experienced gamers.

During the post-implementation review (a project debrief that is a regular part of our process), we spoke with one of our clients who is new to VR, and validated some already-known lessons learned, which we share with you below. (For reasons of confidentiality, our client chose to remain anonymous.)

Here are three important lessons learned that will help you make the most of your VR training…

3 Valuable Lessons Learned in Developing VR Training

Lesson 1: When choosing your VR environment, consider your audience, learning objectives, and the complexity of the environment itself.

In virtual reality experiences, the environment is one of main characters in the story. When you put on the headset, where will you be taken to?

Often the choice of environment goes hand in hand with reinforcing the learning objectives and understanding the audience. After all, our mission here is not just to transport people to another world, but to have them learn something in the process. In the upfront stages of working together, we often spend time brainstorming with our clients and advising them on which of their training needs is the right fit for VR.

One of the frequent questions that comes up: When does it make sense to re-create a real environment as a virtual 3D environment within VR? The simple answer: it depends! Here are a couple examples to help illustrate this.

Let’s say you want to train hospitality workers how to clean guest rooms. You’re in a hotel, and you have access to hundreds of guest rooms, and it’s easy and safe to show them how to clean a room live and in person. Bottom line: not a good use of VR—there’s no need to re-create a real environment that you have readily available in person.

Now let’s say you want to onboard new people working at corporate HQ about what it’s like to be a hospitality worker and clean those rooms. These new people develop all the policies and procedures that affect the people who work in the hotels, so it’s important that they really understand how complex those jobs are, and have empathy for those workers.

But, sending your corporate team to hotels means a lot of coordination and disruption for the hotel staff, not to mention it’s time consuming and expensive. Now you’ve landed on an objective and an audience that makes sense for VR.

This was, in fact, a real project we developed. To give that audience a real feeling for what it’s like to work in a hotel, we re-created several hotel environments—the front desk, a guest room, and the kitchen—and learners complete tactile, hands-on activities in a virtual 3D environment based on the real thing. And indeed, this experience helped them understand the physicality and complexity of hotel jobs, and, having “walked in their shoes” in a VR environment, they had more empathy for the staff. We received feedback from people in various corporate roles who said things like, “Wow, I didn’t realize how hard this job actually is, and I’ll consider that as I do my job and create policies that affect them.”

The lesson learned here is you absolutely can re-create a real environment in VR—but the key is to make sure that your proposed VR training is actually a good use of VR.

So, if you are going to re-create a real environment, the next factor to consider is complexity. To help your VR developer assess this, provide good-quality photographs of the real location from many different angles.

As our client cautions, “You need to remain aware that the more complex the location, the more hours and effort required.” And she’s right: The greater the size and scale, and variety of objects and textures, the more time consuming it will be to build.

We’ve also found that a high level of detail and quality can result in stakeholders needing some education about what they’re seeing!

“Because the quality of the 3D objects was so high, people assumed they were photographs and would then miscalculate the amount of effort and work that goes into creating each scene,” said our client.

Be prepared to provide supporting explanations for the process of building the objects and environments in 3D. But if people mistake your 3D for photography…well, that means you’ve really nailed it in terms of quality!

Lesson 2: Create a minimum viable product (MVP) to win over stakeholders and strengthen the business case.

For many organizations—and the vast majority of learners—VR training is a completely new concept. Within L&D, there are pioneers eager to put the technology to use and create engaging, effective learning, and others who, understandably, have some fear and concerns when determining if the investment is really worth it. How can they try out a smaller piece before biting off something larger? Enter the MVP.

In our experience, the definition of an MVP may vary depending on the project, but often it only needs to be a small portion of the overall experience—for example, one room or scene, or one activity—developed as a nearly fully finished product. This allows stakeholders to see the level of detail and quality that’s planned for the full VR training.

As our client explains, “In essence, doing an MVP means proving the effectiveness of the application of VR in certain learning interventions.” It helps achieve buy-in with stakeholders, who can personally go through the experience and see that more should be invested, and it also helps you gain insights from your learners (via pilot testing) on what works and what does not.

Before embarking on this journey, think about the following:

  • What are the minimum essential features, design, and functionality needed?
  • Do you need to gain further insight into what will work with the target audience that can only be achieved by building out a more polished example?
  • Do you know how you will build it?

Once you’ve defined what will be included in the MVP, the next step is to manage stakeholder expectations. Prepare them for what they will see and experience, and be specific about what type of feedback will help you at this stage.

In the recent project we mentioned, our client encountered some challenges with stakeholders who seemed to focus on the wrong things, because it was created in 3D rather than film. This highlights the importance of preparation to avoid distracting from the true purpose of the MVP. She explains, “When people are immersed in it, they forget that it’s not actually real. And it’s human nature to pick out every little detail, especially when they stand out against the known reality.”

That’s true: It is natural to compare the VR environment to the real environment, particularly if your stakeholder works in that environment day to day. If your stakeholders get stuck on the details, acknowledge them, and gently help them move on through the activity. After testing, you can review and see which details are most important to correct.

What we often find is somewhat the opposite: Stakeholders are so blown away by the level of detail and quality that they spend time looking around and commenting on different features in the VR environment!

Lesson 3: Design for your audience and onboard them.

At this point in time, the vast majority of learners have no prior experience using VR equipment. However, with regard to their past experience with video games, there is a big spectrum, from those who play games infrequently to more avid gamers.

Since the VR controllers share some similarities with game controllers, this is an important factor in overall user experience design. Our goal is to make it as intuitive as possible for both non-gamers and gamers alike.

So we start first with the controllers themselves; this is where user testing becomes crucial. Seeing how people interact with the controls and which buttons they find challenging is eye-opening.
For example, with one project in which the Oculus Rift was used, seeing first hand how learners interacted with the controllers, our team realized that they needed to remove the Rift button functions and reprogram it so the trigger button does everything, which made the experience easier for learners.

Another aspect that needs to be considered is instructions and how learners are “onboarded” on how to perform actions in the VR environment.

Our client put it best: “To be truly effective—and not confuse learners—you need to both explain and demonstrate what they need to do before you give them permission to do it.” Without the proper flow of onboarding, learners may press every button to try to perform the action.

In our experience, the best practice is to provide very short onboarding activities directly before they have to perform that action in real activity. Show them how it’s done, and then let them do it. Some learners—particularly those with little to no video game experience—may still need a little help from a live facilitator, but with proper onboarding, most will pick it up right away.

As our client said, “What all of this underscores is the importance of testing the VR training with your learner audience before you officially launch.” We agree!

Conclusion

Let’s wrap up with a few more thoughts from our client:
Working with virtual reality in learning places you at the cutting edge of the industry. And being cutting edge means adding risk, complexity, and, yes, at times stress. It also means that every day brings new challenges and new lessons to be learned. Working with VR is also a lot of fun and unique experience. Make sure you stop every now and then to remind yourself what a great opportunity this is!

These are great insights, and, agreed, working at the cutting edge of the industry means taking some risks! Remember that there are methodologies such as MVPs discussed above, as well as proofs of concept and prototypes that can help reduce risks and gain buy-in.

Working with VR opens a whole new world of possibilities for our industry. One day, I predict we’ll look back and find it hard to remember a time when it was not mainstream, as I am sure my five-year-old daughter will when she thinks about cell phones and possibly even self-driving cars.

We’re excited to keep pushing forward and finding new ways in which this emerging technology can help us evolve and improve the performance of our clients’ employees. I’d like to thank our client for sharing her experience and providing her perspective.

This is only the beginning for SweetRush and our clients in developing VR training. Stay tuned for many more insights from SPARK about emerging technologies.

Are you interested in finding out more about using emerging technologies and VR for learning?

John-Carlos Lozano is SweetRush’s Chief Creative Officer.