Where to imagine: Virtual Production & Immersive Futures 2032+

28 practitioners from the field of virtual production and the immersive sector, along with others from related fields, were invited to attend a series of innovative worldbuilding workshops, both online and in-person, to consider what the sector might look like in 2032. For these workshops a new research methodology was devised, based on the extensive immersive storytelling experience of Punchdrunk Enrichment in collaboration with researchers from StoryFutures/Royal Holloway University of London. This process involved the reconfiguration of physical models, representing a town as a metaphor for the future.
Our domain experts addressed 2032 futures in the following ways:
• Technology: Collaboration and skills supply in the town of Virtualis is facilitated through democratised AI, blockchain capability-matching engines, dispersed IP ownership, and a ring-road of 5G connectivity.
• Business: The new balance achieved between ownership and the democratisation of IP will help to remove roadblocks to labour market mobility, and promote levelling up and creativity in the sector.
• CreaTech: The open play-zones of Virtualis have helped create innovative tailor-made R&D for virtual and immersive productions, driven by open access to the Library of cultural IP, a hotline to investors, 5G, Web 3.0, workflow translation tools and a
more integrated approach to standardisation and confluence.
• Education: R&D leadership informs policy on growth, backed by industry, reinforced by smart on-boarding, academy-style courses test pressure points and security on low-risk digital-double studio projects, and cross-domain communicational practices taught at The Virtualis School of Languages bridges traditional mindsets.