How The BizNest Paves the Way for Immersive Narrative

Abstract

This case study will show how the world's first 360VR sitcom, The BizNest, paves the way not just for immersive comedy, but for immersive storytelling generally. It will provide guidance for how to think about telling stories in XR (extended reality), techniques for how to bring immersive stories to life, and new conventions that creatives working in immersive disciplines can apply to their work. Eve Weston (writer/director) will walk the audience through the various processes used and will provide illustrative examples from The BizNest, which is the subject of a devoted chapter in Handbook of Research on the Global Impacts and Roles of Immersive Media [Weston, 2020] and won the DreamlandXR Best Project for Television award at CES 2020. The BizNest, an immersive workplace comedy, has developed a new approach for telling stories in a 360-degree environment, one that is poised to have as much effect on storytelling in immersive media as the invention of multi-cam did on storytelling for TV.