A technician makes last-minute preparations inside NextVR’s production truck prior to the company’s broadcast of a Warriors-Timberwolves game. / James Martin/CNET
In a flash, it seemed Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green was about to come crashing into me after blocking a shot from behind.
Moments later, I saw Green on the run, lobbing a basketball for an alley-oop to teammate JaVale McGee, who appeared from out of nowhere for the slam, ultimately helping the Warriors win their April 4 game against the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Though I was at the Warriors’ home turf, Oracle Arena in Oakland, California, I wasn’t sitting courtside. I was in one of the tunnels. But I was wearing a virtual reality headset and watching the game through a series of cameras installed around the court by NextVR. The company’s mission is to make basketball fans wearing VR headsets feel so immersed in a game that they feel like they’re sitting in the front row, close enough to think they can touch the players.
“In five years our goal is to produce this content so realistically that you will have a hard time distinguishing it from actually sitting in one of these seats,” said NextVR co-founder David Cole. We were speaking at the arena during a behind-the-scenes look at the way his company has learned to broadcast games.
NextVR’s efforts have become one of the biggest selling-points of virtual reality, which in the past couple of years has gone from a hobbyist pipe dream to arguably Silicon Valley’s most-hyped new technology. That’s in part because in 2014, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg spent $2 billion to buy a startup called Oculus VR, and the tech industry took notice.
,
,
CNET’s Brian Tong catches a glimpse of the NBA action in virtual reality.
Now tech giants like Samsung, Google, Microsoft and Sony are battling to sell their own VR headsets, or develop VR applications. There’s plenty of uncertainty though, despite analysts predicting that VR revenues will spike to $75 billion by 2021, more than 10 times the projection for this year.
It’s an expensive gamble, as some experts warn virtual reality still isn’t quite ready for prime time. But that hasn’t stopped companies like NextVR from pushing forward.
The Orange County, California-based firm has just concluded its inaugural season of streaming 25 NBA games, marking the first time any matchups in a pro sports league were broadcast in VR on a weekly basis. Though the company and the NBA both say they’re pleased, there’s been much trial and error along the way.
Initial broadcasts tested the patience of even die-hard fans. For example, there were few instant replays during the late October contest between the San Antonio Spurs and the Sacramento Kings. And it wasn’t until a few games into the season that graphics and stats were meshed onscreen in real-time.
Also, the producers stayed on some camera angles too long, causing viewers to miss some key plays.
The broadcasts gradually improved though, particularly as producers learned to make the cameras track gameplay better. NextVR began adding other features too, like showing player warm-ups and sending a cameraman roving around the arena to capture the sights and sounds in the stands.
“We’ve come leaps and bounds from where we started,” said Josh Earl, a NextVR coordinating producer. “We’re turning our production around much quicker. We’re still learning as we go.”
,
Source: CNET