Engine Visual Wave joins ETRI's 'Virtual Performance Technology Development Consortium'

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Hye-seon] Next-generation special visual effects studio Engine Visual Wave announced on the 7th that it will participate in the consortium of linked research projects under the Korea Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI)'s '2022 Culture, Sports and Tourism R&D - Global Virtual Performance Core Technology Development Project'.

The ETRI consortium's R&D projects, aimed at realizing a national-level virtual performance by 2025, consist of five projects: metaverse performance platform technology development, interactive audience avatar generation technology development, virtual production technology development, performing arts production collaboration platform development, and digital music and video copyright protection technology development. The government-supported R&D budget amounts to approximately 25.3 billion KRW. The project led by Engine Visual Wave, 'Interactive Audience Avatar Generation Technology Development,' has a budget of about 4.1 billion KRW. To this end, Engine Visual Wave has formed a consortium with Hongik University and KT and is conducting joint research and development.

As non-face-to-face (untact) cultural consumption becomes routine, virtual performances are gaining attention as platforms capable of creating new added value. Accordingly, demand is increasing for advanced interactive audience avatars that enable communication between artists and fans, and among fans themselves within virtual spaces. Song Jae-won, head of LAB51, Engine Visual Wave's R&D research lab, said, "Audience avatars that actively interact with artists and stage direction are one of the core elements of entertainment content to complete more dynamic virtual performances," adding, "Through continuous linked project cooperation with the ETRI consortium, we will develop technology that allows virtual performances to be enjoyed more realistically."

Meanwhile, Engine Visual Wave is a visual effects (VFX) business subsidiary of the content media group NEW (Next Entertainment World).

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.