Virtually Infinite.

As part of my selection of Christmas gifts from Karli, she cleverly picked up a pair of tickets for the award-winning Space Explorers: The Infinite virtual reality event currently being presented in Vancouver. Located at the Rocky Mountaineer Station, The Infinite presents an immersive experience of the International Space Station from a wide range of perspectives and viewpoints. 

Arriving at the location at our appointed time, the event staff set us up with what's essentially the same Quest 2 VR headset that I have at home, with a networked sensor add-on to the front of the unit, a bar code (presumably for the tracking ID) and enhanced earphones.  The experience uses a simple system - the rest of your group appears in VR as a yellow avatar, other guests are blue, and cast members are green.

Once equipped with a headset, you are introduced to a shadowy ghost of the ISS, populated with glowing spheres.  

By touching a sphere, you can activate a virtual reality movie clip showing various aspects of life on the space station, such as donning space suits and working on the outside of the station, along with commentary from the astronauts on the station*.  There are also periodic changes of setting, displaying breathtaking orbital views of and from the station in the overhead area.

To transit the guests out of the VR space, the experience ends with a seated panoramic view of the ISS in space, after which the headsets are returned and you exit the VR environment.

I enjoyed the freedom of being able to actually walk around in VR, something that my home usage hasn't permitted. That being said, it was surprisingly crowded, to the point that it was a bit challenging to avoid other avatars.  I suppose that logically, dumping a couple of dozen people into the actual ISS wouldn't leave that much extra space either.

Sadly, I fell prey to a couple of technical issues that shut my headset down due to heating problems, so I did miss a few minutes of the show.  In both cases I was quickly assisted by staff members, full points for rapid response in a time-sensitive situation.

Although I found The Infinite to be an amazing experience, I would liked to have interacted with a more fully rendered version of the ISS interior.  (Which certainly exists, as per the ISS program that I have loaded on my personal headset.)  However, I can appreciate that the star of the show is the actual VR footage of astronauts on the ISS, both inside and outside - better to see the real thing than a simplified rendering.

Minor issues aside, The Infinite offers a spectacular perspective on the ISS and its daily activities.  If you're looking for a unique opportunity to experience life in space, I would fully recommend picking up tickets to the show - but don't wait too long, it's a popular event, and it's only available until March 19th.   

- Sid

* In one of the clips, Canadian astronaut David Saint-Jacques comments that the ISS is "like camping in your backyard.  Mars is our Everest."  I'm sorry, David, but at best Mars is a week at a provincial park - let's save Everest analogies for when we eventually get out of our own solar system.