The idea for the project was born in the context of the second Corona winter, when clubs are closing again and socializing is at a minimum.
Inspired by projects like Club Quarantine, which simulates locations of Berlin's club scene in VR, we want to create a party experience where you can party with others from the comfort of your own room.
Our VR experience starts at night in an industrial area outside a fictional club. But instead of being let in by the bouncer, we shrink to microbe size and enter his nostril - where a crazy microbe party is already in full swing!
In a humorous way, we also want to question our human self-image, which is based on individuality and self-determination. Because to every human being belong not only the "own" body, but also trillions of different microbes, without which we often would not be able to survive, and which - not only in the case of the Corona virus - can massively influence our lives.
We also comment on the pandemic-related trend towards more self-knowledge through the journey to oneself with a twinkle in our eyes - inside ourselves it may not be as Zen as everyone thinks.
We make the utopia of partying together possible in the here and now by exchanging our human perspective for a microbic one.
Basing our concept on the scientific premise that we are not one lonely soul but rather a conglomerate of micro-organisms, we build a virtual club inside a human body. We try to engage the viewer by having him experience a total change of perspective, being sucked into a body through the nostril of a real-to-life size bouncer in front of a club. After starting in a rather dark and more naturalistic scene, this sets a more playful and humorous tone for the experience. This is reinforced by the fun and colorful design of the nostril-club and it's micro-organism inhabitants.
Getting inspiration from the fantasy landscape sculptures from Verner Panton, as well as cartoons characters, toys and plushies we build a cosy representation of the human microbiome, that can hopefully help us to feel more at peace with then scared of the millions of creature to whom we serve as a home. The aim is of course for the experience to be entertaining and offer a realistically place to host the DJ sets everyone has been missing out on the past two years.
We built most of the assets using Blender, Nomad and Fusion360 and then gave them life in Unity.
You are invited to the Microbes Party!
