Now that the first standalone Virtual Reality Developers Conference is in production, organizers would like to celebrate what sets the November conference apart from the games & entertainment-focused VRDC track of talks at GDC in February 2017.
While VRDC got its start earlier this year as a sibling event to GDC 2016 in San Francisco, it quickly proved so popular that organizers spun it off to become a standalone show. We expanded its remit beyond VR/AR in games and entertainment to encompass subjects such as healthcare, journalism, travel, manufacturing, retail, live events, real estate, training, and so much more.
VRDC will continue to be held alongside the Game Developers Conference (GDC) in 2017, the world’s largest professional game industry event. VRDC at GDC will continue to focus on creating amazing, immersive VR for games and entertainment.
To match the scope of the standalone VRDC's ambitions, the November conference will feature four different tracks of talks: Games & Entertainment, Brand Experience, Innovation and Partners.
So while VRDC attendees will be able to sit in on talks about the best practices of VR and AR game design, they'll also have the opportunity to see how NASA is using VR to train its astronauts and learn how a video game developer created an interactive VR documentary about Chernobyl's radiated Exclusion Zone.
This expanded focus merits a a new advisory board for the standalone VRDC, which will also host a special vendor area showcasing the latest demonstrations, innovations and advances in VR/AR hardware and software. If you're interested in sponsorship opportunities, learn more here.
And of course, VRDC talk submissions remain open to creators from now through July 8th. If you'd like to pitch a talk that might fit in well at both the standalone VRDC event and the VRDC track of talks at GDC, organizers would like you to know that proposing a talk for the standalone VRDC does not prevent you from proposing the same talk for GDC's VRDC track of talks next year.
For more details on the talk submission process and guidelines for submitting your own talk proposal, head over to the VRDC Submissions hub.
Further details on both VRDC and GDC sessions will be shared in the near future, so stay tuned!
The second edition of VRDC will be held November 2-3 at the Park Central Hotel in San Francisco, providing a more intimate setting for networking with VR innovators and vendors. For more information on VRDC 2016, visit the show's official website and subscribe to regular updates via Twitter and Facebook.
Gamasutra, VRDC and GDC are sibling organizations under parent UBM Tech.