#Labyrinth 2 2015 series
There are two major electronic components to Door into the Dark: an optional heart rate monitor and a series of iBeacons that trigger slow, soothing narration in the headphones when you hit certain points. As I felt my way through the door, she put my hands around a thick, soft rope. I took off my shoes and put on the mask, trading my vision for an intimate familiarity with the floor. In the waiting room, the woman helped prepare me for the trip, while I listened carefully - I’d been told to remember it for the person after me. I wasn't sure which direction I was going, or how far I'd gone For participants who are used to navigating by sight and sound, it can create a sense of being perpetually off-balance, limiting the world to an arm’s reach. Door into the Dark is immersive in another way. It refers to a sense of "being there," of having your senses hoodwinked by a powerful illusion. The term "immersion" is thrown around a lot in virtual reality. Over the course of a few days, Bristol-based creative studio Anagram turned a bare fifth-floor room in the film festival’s downtown hub into a labyrinth, which visitors explore almost entirely by touch. But it’s unquestionably the most elaborate. Next to projects like the virtual reality-based Machine to be Another or a "personalized documentary" that mixes your own browsing habits into a web series, it’s the least obviously high-tech. After debuting at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival last year, it made another appearance last week as one of several interactive installations at New York’s TriBeCa Film Festival. Door into the Dark co-directors Amy Rose and May Abdalla.ĭoor into the Dark is a piece of theater where the stage is the only real character.