The CircumFictio project questions the notion of 360° narration by distinguishing between fun and fictional approaches. It aims to propose an original immersive experience accompanied by an analysis of the process in order to lay the foundations for a narrative grammar of immersion.
The idea is to combine all theoretical, practical, creative and hermeneutic dimensions within the same project, paying particular attention to new virtual reality and mixed reality devices.
WINNER OF THE CALL FOR RESEARCH PROJECTS 2019
Three regional laboratories :
- L’AMo (University of Nantes)
- AAU (ENSA Nantes / ECN)
- l’ESAD TALM Angers
in partnership with the École des arts numériques, de l’animation et du design (UQAC – Montréal) and Silvertrace
CircumFictio is co-funded by the Région Pays de la Loire (West Creative Industries), Nantes Métropole, the University of Nantes, Ensa Nantes and TALM Angers.
The development of immersive technologies continues to experience significant technical progress, with a ceaseless renewal of products, constantly replaced by new ones with new functionalities. Beyond the technological prowess and the interaction functionalities available, creators have appropriated these new virtual and/or mixed reality media to produce new content.
Objectives and Methodology
The first objective of the project is to describe the potential of the 360° medium to produce a structured narrative. Indeed, the possibility of understanding an entire environment poses a number of novel challenges to the narrative structure, including the absence of off-screen and the question of camera view point.
The originality of the project resides in its ambition to link narration and construction of physical environments dedicated to 360° capture. Constructing a space dedicated to narration, as is done naturally in the cinema but extremely rarely for 360° immersive technologies, raises most of the questions and issues that a narrative grammar can help to solve.
The second objective is to show that narration in immersion allows us to play with space and time in an original way by using the possibilities offered by technology. The immersive medium allows for taking on these multitemporalities for narrative experiences that fully exploit the potential of a panoramic vision. To this end, texts already published will be used or new stories elaborated.
The third objective is to move away from dependence on the “bubble” imposed by the classic 360° immersive format to investigate the free and open spaces offered by new headsets such as the Quest or the Cosmos.
Perspectives
The project leaders aim to submit an ANR (French National Agency for Research) application following the CircumFictio project.
Calendrier
Duration: three years, from 01/02/2020 to 31/01/2023.
Contacts
- Jacques Gilbert, Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Nantes and researcher at L’AMo – jacques.gilbert@univ-nantes.fr
- Laurent Lescop, Professor at Ensa Nantes and researcher at the CRENAU – laurent.lescop@crenau.archi.fr
- Christophe Le Gac, Professor of Art and Video Games at the ESAD TALM Angers – legacpress@icloud.com