Transitioning into states of immersion: transition design of mixed reality performances and cinematic virtual reality

ABSTRACT Cinematic virtual reality (CVR) experiences are increasingly expanding their use of additional media outside the VR headset, including scenography, spatial sound, and live performance, to successfully transition their audience into the experience. As such, they promote a heightened interest in transition design to secure experience continuity. In this paper, the authors argue that returning to the Human–Computer Interaction (HCI) concept of trajectories provides a fruitful starting point for considering transition design in CVR installations. However, explicit explorations of transitions and their design in HCI literature are limited. This contrasts with a strong design focus ‘in the wild’ across immersive genres including performance art, theme parks, video games, and live-action roleplay. Therefore, this paper advances the trajectory framework by returning to existing case studies with a transition design focus in order to discuss two existing design strategies and to mark future directions for research in the context of CVR.