What is the Metaverse, really?
This summer, Octane user ‘24601’ (not his actual account ID, but close enough!) was giving me feedback on the site and the Maya plug-in, and we got to talking about ORC (which was about to launch to a wider audience the following month).
That week, he ended up getting more render credits than any other user on the system (besides me).
Honestly, I just wanted to know what he’d do with them. What he’d render. What he’d even imagine he’d want to render.
But I didn’t ask. I never would. A lesson he taught me better than anyone: thinking outside the box begins once you let go of what’s in it. This is true for light field rendering, and it’s true for thought experiments that become profound creative awakenings.
Octane user ‘24601’ and I go way back — before RNDR, before ORC, before Octane, before OTOY was a company. We met a long time ago, when I was working out of my mom’s house in the San Fernando Valley on GPU raytracing, and the future was still very far away.
He had heard about me, and one day, just like that, he was there at my house, my mom letting him in through the front door (Hi Mom!).
I showed him OTOY as it was, and what I hoped it would become. He believed in me and he believed in my vision. Strongly. Profoundly. At a time when few did. It changed my life — how could I believe any less of myself after that?
It was the point in my life when I forgot about the box I was living in. When I accepted my mission. When I took my first steps into a larger world. When I boldly went where no one had gone before. When I stopped looking backwards, just forwards, other than to think of you, my friend, and how you sent me on my way here, those many years ago.
Thank you, JJ.
Thank you for believing in me then. Thank you for believing in me now. And thank you for being part of what is to come, as we get RNDR underway.
It’s an honor to have you officially join OTOY’s advisory board (might I add — also super helpful when you need new Octane features!) as well as RNDR’s.
RNDR, is young, it needs all the power it can get — all the way to first light. Millions of RNDR nodes are enslaved in mining operations. They need to be free. They need to RNDR, so that next, we can invite the world to Render the Metaverse once more (this time, powered by a fully operational RNDR network!)
What does it mean to Render the Metaverse? To imagine reality — and render it real. That to me is magic.
Jules
JJ Abrams & Jules Urbach: RNDR, Octane, Simulation Theory and more!
Jules: How do you see film/cinema as an art form changing in the years and and decades ahead?
JJ: As technology continues to become democratized — including the sort of remarkable results you can get with Octane — more diverse and unique stories will be told. Worlds, familiar and extraordinary, will be created and distributed in ways that could not have been imagined a decade ago.
Jules: Any insight for Octane artists competing in our next Render The Metaverse contest? Anything you feel would be compelling guidance in terms of creativity ?
JJ: Anything I say here is super obvious — but what occurs to me is using the opportunity to create a narrative. Images are wonderful but can be binary. Having something that can be interpreted, deciphered and has an emotional component is always what sets something apart.
Jules: 10+ years ago we were talking about democratizing cinematic rendering on GPUs- RNDR and Octane are key steps that make that happen. How are we doing overall in terms of delivering on all the potential you saw back then?
JJ: It is remarkable to see not just how far OTOY has come — but what you saw back in the day before cloud rendering were words that, used together, remotely made sense to anyone. The fact that anyone can have access to near instantaneous rendering of photorealistic imagery is vaguely miraculous.
Jules: What mythology in pop culture that you love hasn’t been translated to live action?
JJ: Not sure it falls under the category of mythology — but the work of Chris Ware is deeply affecting to me and I would love to see his work brought to life in the cinematic medium.
Jules: What caption do you choose for your one-of-a-kind Alex Ross painting?
JJ: “Spock Shocks Kenobi”
Jules: Do you think Elon is maybe right — and we are living in a simulation? What philosophical implications does this concept have in your options on when you think about?
JJ: I think about this all the time, and have been writing about it lately. Whether Elon and the Oxford profs are right remains to be seen… but my reaction exists in two states at once: it’s both a wildly comforting and wildly uncomfortable at the same time. It seems so ridiculous and unlikely. And then you have people as brilliant as Elon saying that it’s HIGHLY LIKELY we are in a simulation. And that guy lands rockets vertically. So we should probably listen to him.
Jules: Blue Snaggletooth or Red Snaggletooth?
JJ: Red when I’m watching, blue when I’m playing.
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