The Power of VR Documentaries

Rough Cut

Immersive Experiences of Shared Wisdom

What kinds of stories are best told in virtual reality? Why is VR so effective, and how can emerging filmmakers get started with VR? The founders of WisdomVR speak to these important, but often overlooked questions about the nature of VR & 360 video.

Gary Yost and Adam Loften lead The WisdomVR Project, a library of VR documentaries and experiences. One of their latest projects, Inside COVID-19, was nominated for an Emmy Award in 2021.

I was inspired to connect the dots between The Video Consortium and WisdomVR to produce this episode of Rough Cut in order to build awareness amongst the filmmakers in our community of virtual reality as an artistic medium with real, unique storytelling power for documentary. My hope is that listening to Gary & Adam may lead to the conception of some new doc projects for VR that would otherwise have been developed for the 2D screen.

Adam Loften is a documentary filmmaker producing award-winning 360/VR films and multimedia stories that highlight pressing social and environmental issues. His projects have screened at film festivals around the world and have been featured on PBS, National Geographic, Emergence Magazine, The Atlantic and the New York Times.

Gary Yost led the team that invented Autodesk 3ds Max, the world’s most popular 3D visual effects production system, and is an award-winning filmmaker with unique expertise in the combined fields of computer imaging, filmmaking and immersive storytelling. He founded the WisdomVR Project in 2018 with Ram Dass as the inaugural subject and is the president of the board of directors.