Sensory technician, summer job and the future of cinema
Over the summer I worked as a sensory technician for a local community festival called the Shuffle Festival who hosted a programme called ’The Feelies’ where guests would enter a virtual reality through a multi-sensory screening.
The initial idea was to experiment on how all the senses- touch/smell/see and sound (excluding taste for obvious reasons) combined, effects how amerced an audience can be. There were 2 short 6/8 min screening, both documentaries produced by Chris Milk: 1. Walking New York and 2. Clouds over Sidra, shot on a 360 degree camera for the Samsung Oculus rift head sets.
As a sensory technician, the most important thing was making sure that what the guests were watching was in sync to what we can see (on an iPad) this is so that the guests are fully amerced into what they are watching. So for example, in screening room 1 (Walking New York) after the headsets would go on and all the technical things were dealt with the screening would start, the ‘multi-sensory’ is all coordinated by the technicians so when the guests hear ‘glue’ they can smell fresh glue and when there was a scene which is outside in the cold streets the guests would feel a cold breeze and in the scene of the helicopter the guests could smell fresh air. This all heightend the experience for viewers and made them feel as though they are actually in New York, when in reality they are in a tiny room with technicians floating around everywhere.
Every day after my shift I’d leave awed as to what technology can do, the conventional 2D/3D cinemas. The future of cinema will definitely develop more than it already has, the vast technological developments will make it possible for our generation to see an increase of 4D cinemas where with 1 click of a button (without hard working technicians) would feel, smell (possibly taste) in direct correlation with what they can see and hear.
