Creative forward thinkers – from digital artists to virtual producers – are built at UF’s Digital Worlds Institute

Dec 2, 2024
A Digital Worlds field trip to Vū Technologies in Tampa.

 
_{UF Digital Worlds students standing on a virtual production stage at Vū Technologies in Tampa. Photo by Justin Martin.}

The boundaries between design, communication, and technology are blurring to create new career possibilities in the digital age, and the Digital Worlds Institute at the University of Florida’s College of the Arts is at the forefront of this shift.

This was illustrated during the spring, when students in the program packed their warmest winter gear and boarded a bus from the Swamp to spend a “snowy day in the mountains” in Tampa, Florida. There, they learned how to digitally create a chilly landscape in a warm southern city, blending their classroom learning with hands-on experiences in virtual production.

Though not known for its tundra, Tampa is home to a 35,000-square-foot virtual production studio operated by Vū Technologies. Vū (pronounced “view”) specializes in all-in-one production for filmmaking and metaverse/immersive experiences, using digitally rendered 3D visuals as the backdrop for live-action storytelling. The Vū client roster includes Apple, Disney, ESPN, and the NFL, and Gators fans will recognize SwampVū productions for UF Athletics.

“We wanted to do something that was not native to Florida to sell the fact that ‘Hey, you can do this anywhere,’” said Nathan Lontz, a spring 2024 Digital Worlds alum and founding officer of the institute’s new UF Virtual Production Club, who designed the Florida snow day at Vū. “Just a couple college students throwing together a snowy environment and seeing how fantastic it looked on the screen."

The field trip, spearheaded by Digital Worlds lecturer Darius Brown and the Virtual Production Club, gave UF students a chance to test-drive their own creations on Vū’s state-of-the-art virtual production stages. In virtual production, green screens are replaced by high-resolution LED volume walls that display visual environments created on Unreal Engine — a 3D computer graphics engine that was developed for video game development in the late 1990s and has since made a steady ascent in filmmaking projects like the 2023 Hollywood blockbuster “Barbie” and “The Mandalorian” series on Disney+.

“The highlight was utilizing our own environment on the LED volume — how breathtaking it looked, even without being optimized,” Lontz said about the experience at Vū.

The trip exemplified the Digital Worlds Institute’s mission to give students real-world experiences in digital arts and sciences professions.

Read more to learn how to become a BADAS at the Digital Worlds Institute.