Oculus mini-documentaries expand virtual reality beyond games

Pairing his voice with abstract, computer-generated renderings, the documentary, broken into a series of short videos, creates an experience that makes you simultaneously feel Hull’s joy as he listens to the angelic voices of a church choir and his heartbreak, knowing his eyes can now only see the singers’ faces as indistinguishable points of light.

“Notes on Blindness” is one of several virtual reality documentaries and games that Facebook-owned Oculus VR is highlighting this week as examples of why virtual reality could become the next big storytelling medium.

Discovery Channel is releasing short VR versions of the network’s “Deadliest Catch” reality TV series, which documents a fishing crew in the Bering Sea.

Oculus this week showed reporters the documentaries, which transport the viewer into the point of view of the subject in a way that’s not possible with standard photos, movies or TV.

In particular, “Notes on Blindness,” which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival, puts the storytelling potential of VR in its best light.

The series of short videos tells the story of Hull, a British writer and theologian who developed cataracts as a teenager, suffered a series of retinal detachments and became totally blind in 1983.

In the VR experience, you sit on a virtual park bench as Hull describes the scene, including the playful steps of young children, the rustle of a newspaper to his left and the winds blowing through trees behind him.

The “Notes on Blindness” VR series will be released in advance of a regular feature film by writers-directors Peter Middleton and James Spinney this summer.