The Secrets of Avatar Design for Social VR

Brett G. DurrettCEO, IMVU

• 16 years experience with avatars in social experiences

• 5 years in virtual worlds

• 11 years on the leading Social 3D product

(lots of professional experience with avatars)

Why is Brett talking about Avatars?

IMVU is the LEADER in SOCIAL 3DOver 3 million Monthly Active Users

World’s largest catalog of UGC 3D objects – more than 20 million 3D assets

iOS Top 15 grossing in Social

Android Top 10 grossing in Social

(IMVU is all about avatars)

[ NEED IMAGE FOR SLIDE ]

SOCIAL

“We’re making a long-term bet that immersive, virtual and augmented reality will become a part of people’s daily life.”

Mark Zuckerberg, CEO Facebook2014 announcement of Oculus VR acquisition

"We're working on VR because I think it's the next major computing and communication platform after phones...I think we'll also have glasses on our faces that can help us out throughout the day and give us the ability to share our experiences with those we love in completely immersive and new ways that aren't possible today."

July, 2015 predictions about the future, Business Insider

"For virtual reality to really cross into the mainstream, it's gotta be more than just really awesome, killer games. What is the Twitter or Instagram of VR? By that, I don't mean having tweets in VR or having filtered photos in VR — I mean that it's native to that platform, it's born of that platform and would not have existed without that platform."

Nick DiCarlo , Samsung’s VR Vice President

“Seeing other people is incredibly engaging and that's one of the drivers that made us partner with Facebook -- social communication. Not social newsfeeds but actual face-to-face seeing multiple avatars in a play experience, that's going to be a very big part of the future in VR.”

Brendan Iribe, CEO Oculus VR

social |ˈsōSHəl|adjective1 [ attrib. ] relating to or involving activities in which people spend time talking to each other or doing enjoyable things with each other

• liking to be with and talk to people : happy to be with people

• of or relating to people or society in general

SOCIAL REQUIRES PEOPLE - IN VR, PEOPLE ARE AVATARS

DELIVER EMOTIONAL CONNECTIONS

DELIVER EMOTIONAL CONNECTIONS

READ THIS BOOK!

BEWARE THE UNCANNY VALLEY

DEPTHS OF THE UNCANNY VALLEY

UNIQUELY EXPRESS YOURSELF

UNIQUELY EXPRESS YOURSELF

UNIQUELY EXPRESS YOURSELF

THE AVATAR MUST BE ESSENTIAL

THANK YOUBrett G. Durrett, CEO, IMVU @bdurrett