Towards socialVR: evaluating a novel technology for watching videos together

Social VR enables people to interact over distance with others in real-time. It allows remote people, typically represented as
avatars, to communicate and perform activities together in a shared virtual environment, extending the capabilities of traditional
social platforms like Facebook and Netflix. This paper explores the benefits and drawbacks provided by a lightweight
and low-cost Social VR platform (SocialVR), in which users are captured by several cameras and reconstructed in real-time.
In particular, the paper contributes with (1) the design and evaluation of an experimental protocol for Social VR experiences;
(2) the report of a production workflow for this new type of media experiences; and (3) the results of experiments with both
end-users (N = 15 pairs) and professionals (N = 22 companies) to evaluate the potential of the SocialVR platform. Results
from the questionnaires and semi-structured interviews show that end-users rated positively towards the experiences provided
by the SocialVR platform, which enabled them to sense emotions and communicate effortlessly. End-users perceived the
photo-realistic experience of SocialVR similar to face-to-face scenarios and appreciated this new creative medium. From a
commercial perspective, professionals confirmed the potential of this communication medium and encourage further research
for the adoption of the platform in the commercial landscape.