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The Interview


ITP - Multi-sensory Storytelling




BACKGROUND

I was fortunate enough to work with Shannon Hu and Eric Kalb, who have complimentary skillsets to my own. For the most part, we brainstormed as a group, but Eric took the lead on fabrication and Shannon assisted with testing. Coming into this project I had zero experience with Unreal Engine but this project was the perfect excuse for me to get my feet wet. Somethings that I learned in Unreal include: how to set up a VR project, how to implement hand tracking on the oculus quest as well as just the basic inner workings of Unreal. Big shoutout to Just2Devs, whose tutorials were a huge help throughout this project!





Users are touching a fabricated tree designed to feel like candy Some users were eager to get their hands on the tree!



Our environment created with 3D-scanned candy


USER EXPERIENCE

Our user journey for this project starts before the headset has been put on. The user is greeted by 3 employees of Mr. Wonka’s candy factory and is welcomed to their job interview. The employees go on to say that this interview is designed to evaluate how the user interacts with candy in a “non-eatable” environment and the user is encouraged to look at, smell and touch the candy that can be found within Loompa land. The user even signs a mock NDA to help immerse them into the story. Once the user puts on the headset, the “factory worker” guiding the experience instructs them to hold their hands in front of their face. This not only initializes hand tracking but also gets the user familiar with hand tracking. From there the user has free reign to interact with the candy tree. Since hand tracking is enabled and the hands were set up as physics objects, the candy moves when the user’s hands collide with the candy. In addition, when the user touches certain parts of the tree they are able to feel an actual object that has a similar texture to the candy. Throughout the experience, one of the “factory workers” is holding some candy to the user’s face to allow them to smell the scent of candy. The user is abruptly stopped and pulled out of VR as an end to the experience. The “factory worker” instructs the user that they “got a little too handsy with the tree” and lets the user know they will not be receiving the job.


The Interview - Pitch Deck