Rock ‘N Roll Fantasy: How Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality Can Transform Live Entertainment

Metallica’s WorldWired tours, for example, make heavy use of drones from Verity Studios, “flying lights” that are programmed to become part of the production and light up the stage in an agile, immersive way. 

Verity Studios’ head of productions Federico Augugliaro explained that it can take about three months to integrate the light drones into a production, factoring in things such as artist involvement, formation and number of drones. Asked for a ballpark figure as to price, he said “it starts in the six digits.”

While lights and production can augment more traditional tours, hologram and VR aim to re-create legendary artists no longer with us.

Hologram tours such as Eyellusion’s Frank Zappa and Ronnie James Dio productions are just that — full productions rather than hologram gimmicks.

And, of course, the holograms are faithful, family-approved representations, with Wendy Dio involved with the Dio show and Ahmet Zappa for the Zappa show.

After showing a video displaying the realistic computer models used for both Dio and Zappa to Production Live! guests Feb. 11, Eyellusion’s diretor of creative development Chad Finnerty explained that 15-20 artists put together the models that will become the on-stage hologram, using the same special effects technique as the mad titan Thanos from the latest “Avengers” movie. “It takes a huge army to create these kinds of effects and bring it to life,” he said, adding that it roughly takes a half a year to get a hologram road-ready.

Base Hologram’s Roy Orbison show is similarly approached, with close involvement from the Orbison family and Base Hologram CEO Marty Tudor saying, “We approach them like we’re producing a full Broadway show.”

While those panelists discussed the here and now, Digital Nation Entertainment CEO Craig Evans talked about things a little more sci-fi, such as volumetric rendering, essentially extremely high-resolution images but with 3-D depth. He says the technology could be used to literally put fans into a room and expect to feel the image when they reach out.

“At the end of the day we hope to expand beyond the walls of sold out stadiums and shows, and create a long lasting memory of an immersive experience,”  Evans said. “A concert is said to be two hours of a live memory creation. We’re trying to create those memories in a digital world.”