Social virtual reality application Sansar has a new setting you can explore and, for Star Wars fans, it’s a must-have. This isn’t Jedi Challenges either, but a VR gallery that contains reams of lost artwork and props from various Star Wars productions, including storyboards, costume sketches, concept drawings, and models, all curated by prop and set designer Greg Aronowitz.
Although not professionally involved with any of the Star Wars productions, Aronowitz has been a fan for decades and during his professional career has been able to collect various production pieces from the different films. His 30-year collection began by saving rejected design documents from artists who did work on the movies and he’s added to that with purchased pieces from auctions and sales ever since.
Finally solving the problem of how to showcase all of his archived materials without renting an enormous space, he created a virtual gallery of them all within the Sansar application and now anyone can view his entire collection. Most of it is made up of high-quality scans of original, 2D pieces, but there are a number of 3D models and busts of Star Wars characters and props.
For those interested in learning more about the props, there are also audio guides you can enjoy while you walk around the virtual facility. They break down the relevant history of each piece, though, as RoadToVR points out, one of the most interesting guides is the one recorded by Aronowitz, who instills a little more personal detail in the tour.
To celebrate the launch of the virtual medium, Aronowitz and several Lucasfilm Artists attended a grand premiere this weekend just gone, though now anyone can visit whenever they like. If you want to visit the “Lost Art of Star Wars,” yourself, you need an Oculus Rift or HTC Vive virtual reality headset and the Sansar application. If you already have them, the official page has a link which will get you started with the experience.
If you want to get started with virtual reality but don’t have any of the required hardware as of yet, now is a great time to get started. The Oculus Rift has just been discounted to $350 with motion controllers.
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