Tom Cruise and Russia Want to Shoot Movies in Space, but These VR Filmmakers Got There First - IndieWire

Since January 2019, Felix & Paul, the VR studio launched by Montreal-based virtual reality directors Félix Lajeunesse and Paul Raphael in 2013, have been assembling 360-degree footage shot on handmade cameras by 10 astronauts from a revolving crew.

With more than 200 hours of footage to date, the material has so far fueled the first two episodes of the four-part VR series “Space Explorers: The ISS Experience.” The result, co-produced by Time Studios, provides the most advanced way to date for audiences — at least, those in possession of VR headsets — to experience what it’s like to live in zero-gravity in the 21-year-old space station, which orbits 250 miles above the surface of the Earth.   .

This summer, they expect to go one step further, by collaborating with astronauts on a spacewalk for five days of filming in the dark, perilous vacuum outside the station.

“When you work in an environment like this, you really cannot improvise,” Lajeunesse said.

“At the end of the day, you have just a few human beings in space, and they are in a dangerous environment — the most hostile environment known to man.”.

A few projects have been shot at the ISS over the years, with IMAX cameras used for 2002’s “Space Station 3D” during the ISS’s early days, while space tourist Richard Garriott directed an amateur short film in 2012.

However, the VR cameras currently in use for “Space Explorers” represent a huge step forward for immersive media, just in time for the privatization of space to stimulate renewed interest in a rising low Earth orbit economy.

“The culture of what happens in space is going evolve and transform,” Lajeunesse said.

“Our cameras are in-house tools that are not really products, so that on its own adding months of conversations with NASA,” Raphael said.

That helped encourage the astronauts to let the cameras run during some of the humanizing moments

“We tried to focus on the kind of content that made the audience feel like they were just caught in the moment,” Raphael said

With the recent attention to NASA’s Perseverance lander arriving at Mars — including a landing video that went viral — the potential of VR cameras in space is just getting started

Lajeunesse said the studio was in early talks with NASA about getting involved with the upcoming ARTEMIS missions, which are designed to bring astronauts back to the lunar surface for the first time in over 40 years

“It’s essential to document the next big milestones in space exploration through immersive media,” he said

“It feels very organic to me, this transition from space exploration being completely owned by national space agencies to opening the door to the private sector,” Lajeunesse said