Festival of International Virtual & Augmented Reality Stories

Created, directed and curated by Keram Malicki-Sanchez and working with technical director Joseph Ellsworth, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in the summer of 2015, the FIVARS - an acronym for the Festival of International Virtual & Augmented Reality Stories - featured a selection of virtual reality and augmented reality experiences that focus on narrative or a form of storytelling. The earliest recorded event was the Camp Wavelength music festival in Toronto, August 28-30th.[1] It is considered to be Canada's first[2][3][4] dedicated virtual or augmented reality stories festival, and was the world's first virtual reality festival dedicated completely and exclusively to narrative pieces.[5] FIVARS is operated by Constant Change Media Group, Inc. and VRTO (Virtual Reality, Toronto - a conference and Meetup group. FIVARS then ran its first official festival September 20 and 21 at rock music venue "UG3 Live" in downtown Toronto from 11am to 7pm.

FIVARS returned with a preview pavilion at the VRTO Virtual & Augmented Reality World Conference & Expo in June 2016[6][7] and to Camp Wavelength[8] in August of the same year.

The festival continued in 2016 for a second year,[9][10] September 16–18, 11am to 7pm at MSMU Studios, an abandoned furniture warehouse in west side of downtown Toronto. The program was listed a "Public Event You Should Attend" in the syllabus for the Future Cinema program at York University.[11] The festival featured 30 selections - each enhanced by a haptic backpack created by Subpac[12] FIVARS Festival Explores Human Experience Through Virtual Reality, in addition to a custom 3D Audio Chamber created by David McKevy and an augmented reality art gallery by artist Daniel Leighton and presentation by Joergen Geerds of KonceptVR and Daniel Burwen of Jaunt XR. Ellsworth moved into a tech consulting position.

In 2017, the FIVARS festival featured 35 pieces from 15 countries and was held at the House of VR in Toronto.[13][14] World premieres included "Sanctuary" by Shivani Melukar, "City of Ghosts" from director Olivier Asselin and CieAR, and IN HIS PRESENCE[15] from director Brenda Colonna and producer Philip Plough, among others. In 2019 the piece was covered again in an article The New Yorker about Virtual Reality for beginners penned by Patricia Marx, in which Malicki-Sanchez was interviewed and quoted.[16]

The 2018 took place at the legendary Matador Ballroom - a famous after-hours club and public hall about which Leonard Cohen wrote the song "Closing Time" in 1992. The ballroom was reopened for one weekend, the host the FIVARS festival. The festival showcased 36 new pieces from 12 countries.[17][18] In this third year, Malicki-Sanchez was joined by associate producer Stephanie Greenall.

For its 5th anniversary, the FIVARS festival moved to the Toronto Media Arts Centre in Toronto and expanded to six galleries, showcasing 31 new selections from 10 countries, including Germany, France, China, Netherlands, USA, UK, and Canada.[19] The panels featured talks by Ed Callway of AMD, Thomas Wallner from Liquid Cinema VR Inc, director Brett Leonard (The Lawnmower Man (film)), Nimrod Shanit and Timur Musabay (The Holy City VR) and international sculptor and installation artist Marilene Oliver, among others.[20] Malicki-Sanchez was again joined by co-producer and co-curator Stephanie Greenall.

The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic forced most festivals to become virtual events on the internet, and FIVARS turned to lead JanusVR developer James Baicoianu to help build an online theater for the festival. Malicki-Sanchez and Baicoianu developed a user interface using WebXR, and powered by Amazon Web Services to deliver ultra high definition stereoscopic spherical video in the web browser that had no buffering delay. Baicoianu tweaked the transcoding settings higher than the maximum that Amazon typically allowed. FIVARS build upon a financial grant awarded through the Canadian Film Centre's incbutor to develop their online virtual events. Malicki-Sanchez hosted FIVARS under the same umbrella - Spatialized.Events - as the VRTO 2020 conference. Ultimately they ended up developing the foundations for a new social, 3D platform for the web, featuring many accessibiltiy features as well. These various elements were outlined at length in a Medium article penned by Malicki-Sanchez, and a 2-hour interview with Kent Bye on the Voices of VR podcast.[21]

The 6th edition of the festival featured here are 39 official selections from 16 countries — including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Korea, New Zealand, Poland, Qatar, Spain, and Sweden — chosen from among the more than 200 entries, including a documentary about a restored ship once owned by John Steinbeck,[22] and the world premiere of a new single released by ambient music composer Steve Roach, created by Audri Phillips.

The event was again produced by Malicki-Sanchez and Stephanie Greenall and featured 28 360 video pieces and 10 Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality pieces.

The festival awards prizes for People's Choice in two categories: Immersive Video and Interactive Experience and introduced a Grand Jury prize and Impact award in 2017. In 2019 the festival added additional awards for Best Experience Design, Best Visual Design, Best Audio Design.