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B-Pro Show 2022
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Instant Wonderland

Project details

Programme
Cluster RC12

As the metaverse will be an entirely synthetic virtual environment, how will it address our relationship with nature? Instant Wonderland proposes a virtual park that exists as a 1:1 digital twin of the Olympic Park in London. The wonderland grows and responds to activity in the physical world, with the procedural generation of the virtual landscape encouraging physical activity and communal gathering in the real-world park. Different activities such as walking a dog, riding a bicycle through the park, working out or having a picnic, all create unique procedural forms in the Instant Wonderland as an evolving record of activities within the park, transcribed into a unique form of virtual nature. Players can create their own ‘flora’ to represent themselves, with each individual who experiences the park being embodied through the unique natural elements they generate in the wonderland. The project examines how the Metaverse and the aesthetic qualities of virtual worlds could be used to encourage new behaviours in our physical world, establishing a productive, symbiotic relationship between a public space and its virtual twin.

01

The Park and the Park

Instant Wonderland: Game Trailer

Instant Wonderland: Game Trailer

The Instant Wonderland in Context

A view of the Instant Wonderland overlaid onto the Olympic Park in London, showing how this Metaverse environment becomes a digital twin to the physical park.

Super Social Nature

Instant Wonderland reflects the activity of players within the Olympic Park, constantly changing as forms of virtual nature grow, change or shrink depending on behaviours in the physical world.

Split Screen World

Split Screen World

The game is experienced as a split-screen where the real-world park is portrayed on the left, and Instant Wonderland is seen on the right. As players interact in the real-world they can see the virtual nature growing in response to their actions.

Player / Flora

Players can design and embody their own unique plant, with their activities being left as traces of growth patterns in the flora they have designed for themselves.

Players as Virtual Nature

Players as Virtual Nature

As players log into the game they are able to create their own avatar, which acts as a marker of their activities in the physical world through growth patterns created in Instant Wonderland. Each player's place in virtual nature is unique.

Prototyping the Wonderland

Analysis and tests towards using Unreal engine to create a digital twin of the Olympic Park. Prototypes include agent simulations tracking visitor movement in the park, systems for generating procedural flora and AR interfaces within the game.

Tracking Testing

Tracking Testing

Testing activity tracking in the game. As people use the real-world park, their activities and movements are tracked and used to generate the virtual nature of Instant Wonderland, with growth defined by speed, location, social interactions and more.

02

Inside the Instant Wonderland

AR Nature

A visitor exploring the Instant Wonderland through an AR interface witnesses the virtual nature of the Metaverse park projected into the physical park.

View into the Wonderland

In-game screenshot showing an Instant Wonderland generation created through the tracking of park visitors.

View into the Wonderland

In-game screenshot showing different flora elements within the Instant Wonderland, each of which corresponds to a unique visitor and their behaviour, from talking with friends, to walking their dog or cycling.

A Metaverse Amenity for London

Instant Wonderland suggests a new form of public space in the Metaverse as a virtual amenity. This can be used to encourage an unconventional use of public space in the physical world.

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The Bartlett
B-Pro Show 2022
27 September – 7 October
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