Painting Life: An Immersive Documentary
Lead Engineer & Music Composer | Maku XR | 2018
Project Overview
"Painting Life" is an immersive VR documentary that explores the creative process and internal world of artist Emma Webster. As my inaugural project in the VR space, the goal was to transcend traditional video documentaries by placing the viewer directly inside the artist's canvas. Through a combination of 3D environmental design and spatial audio, the project invites the audience to witness the metamorphosis of a landscape from a physical reality to a vibrant, surrealist oil painting.
Development
As Lead Engineer and Composer, I was responsible for the technical assembly of early virtual reality development tools to create a functional application that bridge between the artist’s work and the VR medium:
Spatial Musical Narrative: I composed an original score specifically designed for a spatialized environment. The music was designed to shift and evolve as the viewer moved through different "layers" of the painting, using leitmotifs to mirror Emma’s journey from observational sketching to full-scale abstraction.
UX for Passive Immersion: Designed the interaction flow to be meditative and intuitive, ensuring the technical complexity of the VR experience remained secondary to the emotional impact of the art and storytelling.
Outcomes & Impact
Foundational VR Excellence: Successfully launched as my first venture into VR engineering, establishing the technical and artistic groundwork for my subsequent work in immersive technology research.
Cultural Preservation: The project serves as a significant archival piece of Emma Webster’s early career, captured just as she began her rise to international prominence in the contemporary art world.
