The Power of Being There
Is it possible to usher people from awareness into action within just a few minutes? In this conversation, we hear from award-winning creative producer and co-creator of the UN’s Virtual Reality initiative, Barry Pousman. Our chat takes us from a Syrian refugee camp to the Gaza Strip, revealing techniques and strategies for creating immersive media that has the power to make people feel, in order to prompt them to act.
Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite platform.
Key Insights & Takeaways
Content that has an optimistic, hopeful tone is more likely to incite action than content that is shocking, tragic, or feels hopeless.
Creative work that is approached with an experimental mindset allows the creator to experience a transformation themselves. When you don’t quite know the outcome of what you are creating, it makes it possible to discover outcomes that would not have otherwise been possible.
When a person puts a VR headset on, they might feel vulnerable, because they no longer have full control of their environment or body. This could lead to people not feeling entirely open to what they might experience, and therefore the content creator should also design the pre-experience to better prime people prior to putting on the headset.
Content that feels like you are disembodied (cannot see your own hands, edges of your face, etc.) helps you focus on the environment and situation that you have been transported into, rather than be distracted by your own self.
It might be more effective to allow people to simply observe the person that we want them to empathize with, rather than literally transporting them into the person’s shoes. This is more likely to foster empathic concern rather than empathic distress.
VR has the ability to make people feel empathy, by transporting you into someone else’s reality.
Barry’s Levers of Empathy:
Physical Memory: Create scenes that register in the audience’s memory as if they experienced the scene in reality. Leverage real physical gestures and movements when possible (ex: waving to someone).
Personal Connection: Shoot content from a human perspective, so that the person experiencing the film can make seemingly true eye contact with characters in the film. Consider additional layers of personalization, such as avatars that know your name.
Accessibility: Speak across cultures and to a broad audience without depending on spoken language through relatable body language, shared objects, etc.
Reinforce Humanity: Emphasize real human details over statistical platitudes that are hard to grasp.
About our guest
Barry Pousman is an award-winning creative producer focused on the future of media, art, education, and social change. Barry is currently the COO and Lead Producer at LightShed.io, an immersive production company unparalleled in the social impact space. Barry is also a research fellow at Johns Hopkins University's Immersive Storytelling and Emerging Technologies lab where he leads creative workshops, develops new courses, and advises on student projects. Before moving to Seattle, Barry worked with the Institute for the Future, the world's leading strategic foresight think tank to develop and implement digital strategies, content initiatives, and global events. Prior to the Institute for the Future, Barry was co-founder and CEO at Variable Labs, a VC-backed immersive technology lab focused on creating tools for corporate learning and development. Variable Labs' clients include Google, XPRIZE Foundation, Deloitte, Facebook, AAUW, and other top-tier organizations creating and consulting on Virtual Reality content, platforms, and activations.
Barry is formerly a Chief Digital Strategist at the UN where he helped implement effective new media initiatives around the promotion of the Sustainable Development Goals. In his work with the UN, Barry created seminal Virtual Reality experiences and viral video campaigns, organized UN General Assembly exhibitions, and facilitated international summits and workshops. His work has created measured real-world impact and has screened at the World Economic Forum at Davos, the White House, Sundance, won the Interactive Award at Sheffield Doc Fest and been written about in The New York Times, Vice, the BBC, and beyond.
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