[OPLIN 4cast] OPLIN 4cast #359: Interactive animated storytelling

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OPLIN 4Cast

OPLIN 4cast #359: Interactive animated storytelling
November 6th, 2013

Windy Day hatOwners of the Moto X smartphone from Motorola Mobility got 
an unexpected treat last week. A red hat appeared on their screen, and 
if they touched it, an animated story was launched. But as the user 
moved their screen around, the story changed. Their phone became a 
window into an animated world where the story was unfolding, and the 
events they saw depended on how they moved their phone. If they looked 
away from the phone, the action paused and waited for them to look at 
the screen again. As you might suspect, this clever little app is just 
the first look at some new technology that may become very common in the 
near future.

  * Google channels Pixar to change storytelling as we know it
    <http://www.wired.com/business/2013/10/motorola-google-mouse/>
    (Wired/Steven Levy) "Motorola is concocting what it hopes will be
    much more than an odd and expensive interactive cartoon. The company
    has set out to build a new platform that uses contemporary
    technology - powerful computation, smart sensors, vivid mobile
    displays - to reinvent the age-old practice of narrative itself."
  * Motorola debuts 'Windy Day' on the Moto X: A beautiful, interactive
    short story from a Pixar director
    <http://thenextweb.com/apps/2013/10/29/motorola-debuts-windy-day-moto-x-beautiful-interactive-short-story-pixar-director/>
    (The Next Web/Nick Summers) "It's a wildly unorthodox piece of
    fiction. Motorola says it's not a film or a game, and on initial
    inspection we think they're probably right. This is interactive
    entertainment, blending augmented reality with a moving graphic novel."
  * Spotlight Stories: Windy Day was just the start of Motorola's
    interactive storytelling
    <http://www.geek.com/android/motorola-spotlight-stories-1575651/>
    (Geek/Russell Holly) "The technology component to all of this is
    perhaps the most impressive. The animation is completely rendered in
    real time, and smart enough to pause the active bits when you are
    looking away without making it feel like you've done something
    wrong. The music keeps playing, and the animations all continue as
    though you never left when you get back."
  * Moto X owners get a 'motion-controlled' interactive story by a
    former Pixar artist
    <http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/moto-x-windy-day-motion-controlled-story-app>
    (Digital Trends/Andy Boxall) "The app is the first to use the mobile
    version of a Pixar animation technology called OpenSubdiv, developed
    by experts at custom design firm DigitalFish and Motorola, which
    fully exploits the talents of the quad-core Adreno 320 GPU inside
    the Moto X. In an interview
    <http://www.fxguide.com/featured/pixars-opensubdiv-v2-a-detailed-look/>,
    one of the lead developers from Motorola's Advanced Technology and
    Projects division, said of /Windy Day/, 'We're investigating how a
    mobile device can permit stories to be told in a more immersive,
    interactive way. This is not a flat experience.'"

*/OpenSubdiv fact:/*

OpenSubdiv is an open source version of software that Pixar began 
developing in 1996 and made freely available to everybody last year, 
hoping that it will become an industry standard. For those who want all 
the technical details, fxguide has posted a long article 
<http://www.fxguide.com/featured/pixars-opensubdiv-v2-a-detailed-look/> 
on their website.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
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