What do your shoes do? On today’s episode we’re stepping into the future of footwear with Ian Harrison, creative disruptor, innovation catalyst, XR futurist and the Co-founder of SneakAR. SneakAR transforms your sneakers into a dynamic digital canvas with their revolutionary AR experience, turning your shoes into an interactive masterpiece with jus…

Dominique Wu is the founder of XReality Pro, where she designs, builds, and teaches immersive technologies that empower creators and transform how we interact with XR and AI. She has consulted for industry giants including Meta and Walmart’s Store No. 8, and is the author of Spatial Design: Breaking the 2D Paradigm. With over 500 speaker events hos…

What’s everyone excited about at AWE 2025? What’s still needed as we build the future of XR? 🎧 Listen in for quick-hit insights from leading XR innovators, direct from the expo hall floor. Featuring: Cognitive3D - Build Better XR Experiences with 3D Spatial Analytics VR Chat Avatar Marketplace - The First Avatar Marketplace Inside VRChat Convai - C…

AWE USA 2025 delivered on its promise of feeling spatial. Not only was the mantra XR is Going Mainstream, AWE founder Ori Inbar optimistically declared 2025 as the year of the Master Builder - passionate domain subject experts creating XR solutions for their community filling in diverse content gaps that are shifting the balance between big brands …

XR pioneer Avi Bar-Zeev has been at the forefront of Spatial Computing for over 30 years: from launching Disney’s groundbreaking Aladdin VR ride in the early 90s and crafting Second Life’s 3D worlds to co-founding Keyhole (Google Earth) mirror-earth spatial browser, co-inventing the Hololens AR headset in 2010 and leading the Experience Prototyping…

On today's show we're spotlighting our AWE day one itinerary. Elevate your conference vibe with our AWE playlist ! Heading to AWE USA 2025 next week? Road to VR readers can still get an exclusive 20% discount on tickets: https://geni.us/7ijTS - BEN LANG JUNE 10 ITINERARY HIGHLIGHTS 09:00 AM - 09:25 AM AWE USA 2025 Welcome Keynote - XR Is Going Main…

How can we create XR experiences with purpose and why does it matter? Last week's MeaningfulXR conference at UC Davis and in VRChat brought together a dynamic XR community from across the globe to explore the answers and featured some of the latest academic research using XR across disciplines including education, psychology, design, AI, health and…

Today’s bite-sized episode is a quick shout out to the Meaningful XR conference happening Thursday May 22nd and Friday May 23rd at the UC Davis International Center and virtually in VRChat. On Friday at 12:30pm I’ll be joining the panel, Creating platforms and apps to better people's lives Led by Carsten Becker Faculty, Media Design and Extended Re…

It’s Game ON with GDC in San Francisco at the Moscone Convention Center, March 17th through the 21st. On our first episode of 2025 we’re checking out The Top Game Developer Trends heading into GDC 2025 The Meta Horizon Start Guide to GDC XR events and other happenings featured on gdcparties.com Find out why you don’t have to have a GDC pass to enjo…

Happy New Year's Eve! Before the clock strikes midnight I'm sharing a quick message of thanks and appreciation to all of my guests this year and to you, the listeners, who've downloaded episodes in 37 countries across the world. Our top listeners are from the U.S., Germany, Australia, Canada and the UK. Our Top podcast episode of 2024 is: Retail Th…

I recorded this episode on the afternoon of Election day in the US... During the storms of change and chance I take shelter in making VR, buying vinyl and listening to The Cure. So I’m in the midst of making a creepy crawly experience based on Lullaby from The Cure’s Disintegration album to match my post-halloween haunted garden. However, on today’…

Since 2018 Virtuleap has been at the cutting edge of combining neuroscience and virtual reality to help increase attention levels, and address cognitive illnesses, disorders, and learning challenges. On this episode, Amir Bozorgzadeh, Cofounder and CEO of Virtuleap is back to tell us all about the release of Cogniclear VR, an immersive cognitive sc…

Former NASA AI scientist turned VR creative director and producer, Nathalie Mathe, has been pushing the boundaries of VR since the early days of the Oculus DK1 and DK2. From creating visual effects on blockbuster films like Total Recall, Fast & Furious6, Skyfall, and The Dark Knight Rises to directing and supervising cutting-edge VR projects for Go…

GameDriver enables video game developers, testers, and producers to automate playtesting; improving time to market, test coverage, and overall quality and revenue. The company brings over 30 years of test automation expertise to the massive gaming industry, as well as Enterprise - where next-gen user experiences are built using gaming technologies …

In just a few short years, mobile gaming has exploded, now accounting for almost half of all gaming, with the market worth an astounding $90 billion dollars. According to Statista, by 2026 the mobile AR market is predicted to reach $36 billion dollars in revenue. As mobile AR gaming evolves beyond Pokemon Go, one company is going all-in to redefine…

Apple Vision Pro doesn't have anything I really need, just everything I want. They're the coolest goggles on the planet. While hot takes about the price, the returns, the meaning of this moment continue to light up our news feed, I’m still integrating the 3 days I spent with The Vision Pro. Using Apple's spatial computer for the first time consumed…

It's Apple Vision Pro Day! Will it be as paradigm shifting as the first iPhone? If Apple is hedging its bet on spatial computing, did oculus/Meta do the hard excavation work to prove there is an innovative market for XR? Does an early adopter really need another headset in their vast collection of goggles, glasses and gadgets? These are some of the…

The Apple Vision Pro presale on Friday Jan.19th was a resounding success, erasing any doubt about Apple’s ability to capture the public’s imagination - and their wallets, with its first spatial computer. The Vision Pro marks a new day in the XR industry, or rather, a new tune that has the potential to transcend the friction and failures of the last…

"The new era of spatial computing has arrived." Our first episode of 2024 brings you a readout of last week's proclamation from Apple CEO, Tim Cook on the news of the highly anticipated Apple Vision Pro launch, which is just hours away from pre-sale, on Friday January 19th at 5am pacific. Vision Pro will be available in the U.S. on February 2nd. Ar…

This holiday we’re celebrating our 25th episode of Zero to Start with a very special guest, Kent Bye, host of the Voices of VR podcast. Since May 2014, Kent has published over 1,300 Voices of VR podcast interviews featuring the pioneering artists, storytellers, and technologists driving the resurgence of virtual & augmented reality. Kent is an oral…

Are you game for a full-body haptic suit? HaptX Inc. takes us one step closer with the imminent launch of their G1 Glove. HaptX invents and builds wearable technology that simulates touch with unprecedented realism, enabling haptic interaction in virtual reality and robotics. Joining me to explore the magic of the HaptX G1 glove and the future of h…

In the few days since OpenAI's board of directors removed its co-founder and CEO Sam Altman, the future of the company and what it means for the race to AGI Artificial General Intelligence is anyone’s guess. Joining me to put this fast moving saga into perspective is Avi Bar-Zeev founder and president of Reality Prime an independent consulting serv…

On December 10th XRSI will kick–off their 4th annual Metaverse Safety Week - XRSI’s flagship conference, an annual occasion to meet industry leaders and discuss the challenges of safety, privacy and artificial intelligence in spatial computing. Kavya Pearlman, Founder and CEO of XRSI, X Reality Safety Intelligence, a leading non-profit organization…

Prepare to be amazed and inspired by special guest Michaela Ternasky Holland, Emmy Award-Winning XR Director, Creative Strategist and Impact Producer leading equity and social change in XR and the Metaverse. A pioneer in VR journalism and experience design, Michaela shares the evolution of her unique industry journey and how her latest immersive fi…

XR Pioneer Robin Moulder, Founder and CEO of 3lb Games and 3lb XR joins the podcast to share details about their latest releases including VR Workout and Grokit, a hand tracking multiplayer mixed reality game aimed at rapid fire interactions focused on fun while giving newer headset players more confidence - perfect for introducing your friends and…

"What if I could make an app that could change an entire play area into a horror game?" That's what David Montecalvo, Founder and President of VirtualGo LLC asked himself when he saw the black and white pass-through on the Meta Quest 2, inspiring him to create Hauntify, one of Quest 2's earliest mixed reality games that combined the headset's new e…

Web AR and social impact is a powerful combination that fuels dynamic connection, community building, awareness and action - at scale. On this episode of Zero to Start, Sarah Porter, Director of Innovative Philanthropy at Hope for Haiti joins me to share the nonprofit's mission, how they started their immersive journey and how you can join 8th Wall…

Discover how Cognitive3D’s SDK for Unreal and Unity empowers immersive creators to unlock player behavior and build better 3D experiences with Calder Archinuk, Developer Evangelist at Cognitive3D. Designing for Player agency in virtual environments is one of many challenges in VR development, yet player agency is also what makes VR an essential med…

Dive into the power of Neuroscience and VR to improve brain health with Amir Bozorgzadeh, the cofounder and CEO of Virtuleap. Brain health as you age affects each and every one of us. Caring for your cognitive well-being is essential for living an independent and fulfilling life. Virtuleap combines neuroscience and virtual reality to help increase …

Stepping into the Spotlight is Sadah Espii Proctor, XR & Experiential Designer Composer & Spatial Sound Designer On our 8th and final spotlight episode, recorded on January 2021, Espii shares her philosophy on creating narrative VR experiences for theater, music and art - and how the pandemic is ushering in new ways to experience live performance. …

Stepping into the Spotlight is Kai Frazier, Founder and CEO of KaiXR, the most inclusive and accessible VR platform for kids where they can explore, dream and create! On our 7th spotlight episode Kai shares how she radically changed her life as an educator to a solo nontechnical founder in the highly volatile world of VR entrepreneurship. Find out …

Stepping into the spotlight is Lauren Frazier, Cofounder and CTO at Ramen VR, a Y Combinator VR game studio and makers of the award-winning Conjure Strike. On our 6th podcast episode Lauren fills us in on Ramen VR’s upcoming game, Zenith, a cross-platform massive multiplayer for VR funded in part by Oculus. She shares how Y Combinator prepared Rame…

Stepping into the spotlight is Jasmine Roberts, an accomplished software engineer who has worked at pioneering companies including Unity, Sony Playstation and Google Creative Lab in New York City where she developed and launched, Lines of Play, a Google experiment AR app highlighting the features of Google’s new AR Core Depth API. Jasmine was a 201…

Stepping into the spotlight is Richard Duck, Store Operations Manager at Oculus. On this episode of Zero to Start Richard talks about how his team helps guide developers as they prepare for publishing their titles on the Oculus Store. Richard highlights the importance of testing all aspects of your VR title and how testing helps create community ar…

Stepping into the spotlight Kathryn Hicks, AR/VR Designer at the Danse shares how the Savannah College of Art and Design led her to virtual reality, igniting the creation of her first animated 360 film, Tall Tales of the Aerona Temple. Kathryn fills us in on her latest project working alongside Memphis developer Justin Palmer on Mend, a cross-platf…

Stepping into the spotlight Clorama Dorvilias, Product Manager at Oculus shares her first ah-ha moment in VR, her previous experience building VR training solutions to reduce bias in education, new Oculus product releases, tips for aspiring VR product managers and her quarantine playlist. Happy installing! Follow Clorama on Twitter @CreativeClo Sub…

Siciliana Trevino is excited to bring you her new Zero to Start Spotlight series featuring insightful conversations with VR creators and industry leaders about how you can break into VR, brought to you by Oculus from Facebook. Now in its fifth year Oculus Launch Pad is an essential VR developer program designed for promising content creators from d…

Our 7th episode finds us in another Mercury retrograde, over 100 days since Berkeley announced its shelter in place and reminiscing about Berkeley's annual Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast last January. Melanie takes a 3D scan of her garden using the Display.land mobile app by Ubiquity6 (which is now discontinued), succeeds in building her first Un…

Ten weeks ago the Bay Area began sheltering in place. Learning how to build an oasis in VR has never been more profound or essential, if not disorienting as we face a staggering loss of life from Covid-19 and outrage over the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. As we learn how to turn on the lights in the virtual world we’re building with Unity,…

We're back! Thanks to Berkeley Community Media, Melanie has a new VR-ready gaming PC and is all set with Unity Hub and the Oculus Rift CV1. On this episode we reflect on my early days in VR (way back in 2015) and my first GearVR project, how VR development keeps you on your toes, we dive into Melanie's new PC and the VR experiences she's been explo…

We're on lock down! Last week on March 15th Berkeley, then two days later, the state of California issued a Stay at Home order that moved us from the basement of the matrix and onto Zoom. What is an essential business and does it include cannabis clubs? Will social distancing increase VR adoption or will the supply chain limit VR to industry and ea…

As COVID-19 changes life as we know it and has industry scrambling to prioritize public health and employee safety by minimizing travel, canceling GDC and SXSW among many other high profile events, Social VR takes center stage in conversations about working remotely and collaborating at a distance. The challenge is, how accessible is VR outside of …

We're ready to blame the stars for the blues, snafus and surprises we encountered in the basement of the matrix this week. Whether or not you believe in Mercury Retrograde, when technical difficulties are at their astrological peak (happening now through March 9th btw), Unity development is a moving target that will have you retracing your steps ju…

Welcome to the basement of the matrix! We're kicking off our first episode with the basics of setting up your PC for VR development including installing Windows updates, clearing up the drives and installing Visual Studio 2019. We outline our project goals and talk about the benefits of making a VR portfolio to submit to the Oculus Start Program fo…