'Bees' Wisdom', diving back into Kingspray VR

Two years and a few months ago, when I first picked up my Oculus Rift and Touch controllers, there were a few apps that really sold me on the possibilities of creating art in VR, or using VR as an active prototyping platform. Tiltbrush I had already used on a Vive, but the wnads as input method were really holding me back. Quill was the app that changed my mind, even though Medium has a ton of promise. Kingspray Graffiti I stumbled across accidentally, but is a tremendous amount of fun to come back to every once in a while. 

Jul Frukost

I made this before the holiday for a website and mailer for my company's tech breakfast series before the holidays; then promtly forgot about it. But it's back!

Jul Frukost/Connected Christmas by Matt Connors on Sketchfab

Google Blocks, Back onto Robots

No apologies, but it's been a pretty busy time, with the move to Sweden in the spring, and my computer was in mothballs on a ship for a really long time. Then no internet for a bit except for at work...but I am coming across a bit like Job here. It's kind of the opposite, as I feel like there need to be times that you can rest for a bit, relax and experience life for a bit before diving back into creating again. 

Why not start with a simple bot again, made in my favorite tool, Google Blocks in VR?

This new robot, Gustav, seemed to be in need of a story. He's lost his little pet, Fritz, who is always disappearing to find new and interesting food in the city. Fritz can sense when Gustav is near, though...

Collateral Damage by Matt Connors on Sketchfab

Collateral Damage by Matt Connors on Sketchfab

 Let's make it two of them, for good measure.

(removed the Google Poly link, as they have been shut down by Google mid 2021)

Google poly api for Unity

I had tried the download from the web and import option for Blocks before to Modo and Unity, and it seemed pretty clunky, not offense to the Google VR team, I just saw this as part of the workflow that would sit on the backlog. I have been doing 3d long enough that I just assumed that due to how new the Google Blocks and Poly tools are, that we'd have to wait a while to really see the next stage in the evolution - where we could create and edit in VR, then drop directly into an engine to move the ball forward. But here it is, nested right inside Unity! Granted, there is no scaling to speak of, and the meshes are combined into odd groupings, but the colors are there, and it's a good representation of the models. 

Google Blocks democratizing VR creation

Nov 5th, 'Cross Platform Blues'

Oct 25th, 'Blocksoween' model kit for Google VR

Google Blocks for the Oculus Touch has captured my imagination in a way that no other content-creation tool has in Virtual Reality thus far, in large part due to the fact that nearly anyone can make 3d content in seconds. The robot above is one of a handful of creations that I have made over the last few weeks since Google Blocks was released. While the 3d technician in me wished that the tools in the app were more robust, that detail would come at the cost of complexity, and the low bar to entry is the most appealling part of this app. That makes the UX designer part of me smile, though the interface and use of tool are still a little rough, even compared to other Google VR tools like TiltBrush.

There's only  a certain level of complexity that's possible; even the scale has a upper and lower limit, but I've already found that elements that you've made and saved as a file can be imported as groups. The app is a little finicky about how those groups can be edited; you can change colors and parts of polygons, but you cannot edit the groups or delete elements of a group.