Interview: Caroline Stedman

Innovative Technology For New Age Storytelling

1. You are building your consuming that story and career in a unique cusp of what level of immersivity is broadcasting technology, required. This determines communication, which medium is most and designing while suitable to convey that attempting to bring these story effectively. Newer, together. How do you more tech heavy mediums balance this interplay? aren’t necessarily better as a rule. If I am cooking in The three are all very my kitchen I want to listen strongly related - to content in audio format technology and design - I can’t look down to read, are both integral to look up to watch 2D TV communication and the content, and I certainly storytelling process. can’t don a headset and It is important to be immersed - that is a understand that sure way to burn dinner! technology is the medium, Radio or podcasts and not the message, audiobooks will always otherwise, it will fall into have a place as will print the realm of gimmick. and 2D media. Technology should be When you have a story used either to elevate the to tell, you have to think viewers’ experience or to “When and where will my streamline and improve audience be consuming the production process. my story? What medium is the most suitable?” 2. Storytelling is an You have to write for the important ingredient for medium in a lot of cases good content, how does and adapt your story using the right medium accordingly. There is no impact this storytelling concept of a ‘one size fits element? all’ script - adaptations from one to the other have When you have a story, you to take place, or a medium have to think about when has to be picked and and where the audience is content created within the limitations, and potentially presented by that format.

3. Can you share an example where you saw a story communicated more impactfully, with the use of AR/VR compared to conventional mediums?

VR for good is a great example where social and environmental issues are communicated to the viewer. The immersive nature of this medium, and the way it enables the audience to see through that protagonist’s eyes, heightens the sense of empathy and challenges the viewer to see things from a different perspective. AR in advertising is worth a mention, as is gamification - there are loads of studies that show interactivity increases revenue and being able to try makeup, glasses, and clothes on or place furniture and home decor in real world environments is a no brainer in terms of effectively selling products. Sports, NBA, boxing, ice

hockey, and more can easily be covered in virtual reality and effectively bring the audience closer to the action. However, sports like cricket or golf, where the action is far away are more challenging. Vader Immortal is another fantastic piece of VR content, based upon Star Wars, as one gets to interact with their favorite character from the series. It is a completely new form of content, where you become a character in a story and get to interact with your favourite characters from your favourite movies.

4. Will storytelling need to be changed with the usage of new broadcasting mediums? What are some of those changes?

Storytelling will change in that it will become hyperpersonalised. With object based media workflows coming in and ancillary on demand content and AI generated content, viewers will be able to dive deeper into the stories they are interested in and skip over the bits they care about less, and focus on characters they like. Content will be able to fit into time frames that suit the viewer and a lot more options will be available given the tools of real to those with accessibility world physics modelling, issues like impaired collision boxes which hearing and sight. Content trigger actions in virtual makers will need to sets and graphics, approach production in simulated real weather a completely new way to and lighting, and non enable this personalisation. traditional environments The stories we are telling which would never have may not change, but the been possible back when way viewers consume we were limited to physical them will. A wider variety fabricated sets or on and greater quantity of location shoots. content will be created engine technology like interactive environment and designers are being and the subjective value Designers need to adapt of quality will be the filter and resell, just like when we through which viewers moved from hand drawn decide what to watch - and scalpel and art board and when I say quality I typesetting into computer am referring to quality design (I remember my of experience and not graphic designer father production values which navigating this change will only improve as new when I was a child) or tech becomes available when 3D CAD software and affordable. became available. Now we are moving into the 5. AR, VR, and MR are used age of the metaverse, to communicate a story the blending of the digital well and create a unique and the physical, and the user experience. How does possibility to step out of design play a role in these reality. Designers are the mediums? ones who will be visualising Design has moved there has never been a beyond aesthetics with more exciting time to be the advent of game working in this field. Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 6. Are there unique being used for movie challenges while and tv production as well designing new channels as immersive content for the Indian audience, production. Now we can compared to western immerse presenters in an audiences? these new worlds and

Availability of hardware and scalability are the biggest challenges. Also quantity of content - there is the classic chicken and egg challenge, which is even more apparent in countries where English isn’t the first language, where consumers aren’t buying hardware as there is not enough content to consume, and content creators aren’t creating content because there are not enough hardware owners to consume the content at scale.

It is my hope broadcasters and film production houses will take the lead and invest in content to kick start the XR ecosystem which we all know has been slow to make the move into the mainstream. In India, there is huge potential for Hindi and regional language based content and culturally relevant content due to the sheer size of our population here and in communities across the globe. If we look at smartphone adoption rates and screens in homes in India in general, we can see the numbers soaring, especially with the advent of Jio and affordable and free data in that respect we are ahead and leading but obviously, coverage and for events, and content. infrastructure has to How has the use of a new improve greatly along broadcasting medium with hardware availability shaped content and its and affordability for us to impact on consumers? achieve true scale. environments and objects. bringing graphics and being a conceptualizer, technical & creative We are really just at the 7. What are some of the start in terms of XR being exciting innovations a new medium. Broadcast that are upcoming in the is very much driven by field of AR, VR, MR, and factors of scale, whereas broadcasting? events have limited and The use of Epic Games’ controlled environments Unreal Engine for virtual where to some degree, studios and AR graphics access to hardware on air is one of the most can be provisioned for. exciting developments of Broadcasters aren’t in a recent times. The ability position to provide a 6DoF to leverage AI/ML for VR headset to millions, so gesture recognition and until mainstream adoption optical tracking as well as of XR hardware becomes a HMDs and mixed reality reality, content in the new views, which enables medium will be restricted presenters to see as well to POC, and impact to as interact with virtual consumers will be limited. These are changing the 9. What elements of the way we create and use design have impacted the graphics and add layers of usage of these mediums interactivity. and the digital content Volumetric capture is industry at large? analysis into a new era, Designers are upskilling though in sports we are still and becoming proficient in to develop a cost effective coding and visual coding, solution to capture live like Unreal’s blueprints. action, especially in UX and UI design have India where solutions like become ever more Trueview are not feasible. important as experiences 8. You have experience in interactive. specific audiences and become more and more production direction Written by Samiksha B.

Vivek Sabhachandani SVP Product & Design at Disney Star TV Network

With over 15 years of experience across consulting, e-commerce, and payments, he has touched upon various facets of digital domain. He is an expert in leading large cross-functional global teams including product management, product marketing, product development, UX, and project management in a fastpaced work environment.

LinkedIn: Vivek Sabhachandani