Jeremiah in Virtual Reality by Judah Mantell ‘19, Yeshivat Frisch

The following piece by my student Judah Mantell, cross-posted from Midnight Coffee Inc, is an update on his Virtual Reality Tanach Project which is funded by the Jewish Education Project's Student-Driven Solutions grant.

Rabbi Pittinsky AKA TechRav experiencing Tanach in Virtual Reality.

In my project, Jeremiah VR, students and teachers can walk through a museum environment and explore the verses of the Book of Jeremiah. At the present time, I am creating a beta version of Jeremiah, Chapter 1. The user is fully tracked in 3D space, allowing him/her to walk around the physical space available or teleport using the tracked motion controllers.

The controllers each have multiple buttons including a thumbstick, two triggers, and a full touchpad. By pushing up on the thumbstick in either hand, the user can then point to where he/she would like to teleport to. Pointing at and selecting the text of the verses will trigger some sort of interaction. Depending on the verse, this might be a map, animation, speech bubbles, or a recording.

This is only the beginning, and the project will continue to be iterated into a fully interactive experience. In the future, objects will be able to be held and inspected up close, the environment will be full of other chapters from Jeremiah as well, and there will be full sound. This will allow the user to experience the world of the prophets gaining a tangible impression of the world of the prophets.

Watch my video demonstration below.