Amazing Day Today -- 107% of Goal!
almost 6 years ago
– Sun, May 27, 2018 at 10:50:09 PM
Greetings CrowdExplorers,
Since we met our goal yesterday just before midnight, we've had a stellar day -- now we're at 107% and we are about to break $30k! Wow!!
Thank you to Dr. Jean Hunter of Cornell who donated $500... she used to run the MDRS crewmember food study and I remember all of the great research she was doing about 4-5 years ago with us. Then she went to help found the HI-SEAS program with NASA in Hawaii, and they are doing some amazing work there. Thank you Jean for the generous donation to our project. We will be crediting you appropriately in the VR environment.
I've had a lot of great meetings today both at the ISDC conference and with other interested partners and supporters. We will be announcing some great partnerships soon! Some of the things I saw today and talked about with potential partners were truly mind-blowing, I can't wait to share more about them!
We still need help getting to our first stretch goal of $35,000 so we can have additional terrain, the GreenHab mission content, and a laptop/car sticker for ALL BACKERS.
A big THANK YOU to all of our backers. We could not have gotten here with you! Please continue to up your pledges and give generously to this very important project. http://bit.ly/MarsVR1 I'll see you on Mars (in VR!)
MarsVR Reaches Goal / New Stretch Goals
almost 6 years ago
– Sun, May 27, 2018 at 01:17:03 AM
Greetings CrowdExplorers,
I am so happy to announce that earlier tonight we reached our Kickstarter goal!! Thank you to Sacha Greer who purchased a crewmember seat for MDRS Crew 197 this October!
The Expanse gets saved and MarsVR reaches its goal in the same weekend! Amazing! Now the serious planning work begins, and we are already making plans to send our team out to the MDRS next month to start the photogrammetry scans. It's going to be a busy summer for us!
Now we are announcing our stretch goals for the Kickstarter. Let's keep pushing and ensure that our Phase 1 environment is the best it can be!
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If we raise $35,000, we will increase the amount of terrain we will have in the Phase 1 environment by 25%. That means instead of one (1) square mile, it will be 1.25 square miles. We will also include an additional crewmember training scenario (likely growing plants in the Greenhab). Finally, we will send a large round sticker of our Mission Seal to ALL BACKERS. This would be a great sticker to apply to a car, or laptop.
- If we raise $45,000, our terrain coverage will go up to 150% of the planned amount -- so one and a half square miles -- this will allow us to do an additional 2-3 EVA sites at a minimum! We'll also include two (2) additional mission scenarios including repairing a space suit inside the RAM module, which is a highly technical process that we have talked about, but that we were hesitant to commit to building in VR. But if we raise $45k, we will figure it out one way or another! Also, if we reach this level we will provide some additional rewards to ALL BACKERS! This will include a special online workshop event where we debut the beta environment and help train everybody on how to set things up, as well as a special training area of our website to include more documentation and materials on how to learn about MarsVR, Unity, and VR in general.
Now that we are a successful Kickstarter, let's keep up the momentum! Tell all of your friends and colleagues about our project and please pledge generously!
Thanks,
James Burk
Program Manager, MarsVR
More Press... Front Page of Mars Daily Today
almost 6 years ago
– Wed, May 23, 2018 at 05:09:12 PM
Hi all,
Looks like we made the front page of Mars Daily today.
Very exciting!
We also are now just under $5000 remaining towards our goal! Please consider increasing your pledge to help us close the gap. We only have 8 days remaining...
If you add $20 to your existing pledge, we will send you an embroidered patch of your choice (there are three different designs below). If you increase your pledge to $50 (or more) we will send you a Metal Medallion reward. If you are already at the $50 level, and would like to receive another Metal Medallion, just increase your pledge another $45 and we will ship you two of them!
Also, if you REALLY want to help us -- consider purchasing a seat at the MDRS Crew 197 in October. If we got just 1 pledge of this, it would instantly put us over the goal line.
Thanks all for your support thus far, this has been an exciting project to work on but it's only the beginning of our journey with Virtual Reality to tell the story of sending humans to Mars. We have a lot planned for the future so stay tuned!
We'll see you on Mars!
-James Burk
Program Manager, MarsVR
100 Backers!
almost 6 years ago
– Mon, May 21, 2018 at 03:36:15 PM
Greetings CrowdExplorers,
We just received our 100th pledge of support for MarsVR Phase 1 on Kickstarter!
Thank you to Thomas Manson who pledged at the $50 level to receive the Metal Medallion reward.
I just received some of the first samples of these from our vendor (Logotags) and they are awesome! I’ll be posting a Program Video Update soon showing one of these and how it glows in the dark.
Thank you to all our backers! Please tell your friends and colleagues about our project and help us make our goal by May 31st. As of this writing we are at 74% and climbing!
-James
Meet our "Dream Team"
almost 6 years ago
– Mon, May 21, 2018 at 03:35:53 PM
Greeting CrowdExplorers!
Today The Mars Society has announced via Dr. Robert Zubrin our “Dream Team” of VR & photogrammetry experts, 3-D game developers, and a former astronaut! They are going to help us make our dream of VR for search research, STEM Education, and broad public outreach a reality.
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Shannon Norrell, formerly of HP and one of the founders of the HP Mars Home Planet initiative which has several VR components. Shannon is a key participant in our VR development effort for Phase 1. (Note: HP is not an official supporter of the MarsVR Program)
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Az Balabanian, a Filmmaker, Virtual Reality documentarian, and the Founder of azadux, a Creative Productions agency. Az is an expert on the cutting-edge 3D mapping technique called Photogrammetry, which produces eerily familiar reprojections of real-world places. We intend to leverage Az’s expertise for creating the MDRS VR environment, assets, and terrain textures.
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Dr. Greg Chamitoff, former astronaut, professor of practice in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Texas A&M University, and head of the AeroSpace, Technology, Research and Operations (ASTRO) center at the university. He’s a founding member of the Mars Society and has been working with a team of students for the last two years on SpaceCRAFT VR, which has many similarities with MarsVR. We’re working with Dr. Chamitoff to find ways to share common elements between MarsVR and SpaceCRAFT VR.
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Jeff Dillon, senior engineer at Unity Technologies, which is the leading framework for creating 3-D environment for Virtual Reality and has broad community support as well as multiple devices supported. We see Unity as a key partner in MarsVR, and as Jeff is a Mars Society member already, he’ll be a key collaborator with us to get what we need from Unity to build great VR experiences.
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Robert Madsen, co-founder & Studio Director of Synaptix Games, and a Mars Society member who has presented on VR at our annual convention. Robert & his team have experience with VR and photogrammetry, and they are only an hour away from the MDRS in Grand Junction, Colorado, which is also a key advantage.
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Stuart Spence, a Unity expert and educator, and creator of an open source game called Martian Agora, among other projects. Stuart has provided some great advice to us on how to approach the creation and open sourcing of our VR tools to ensure their use for STEM education.
In our latest Program Video Update, you can learn more about each of these folks, as well as a preview of what’s to come in Phases 2 and beyond.
Please increase your pledge to help us reach our goal! And tell at least 5 friends/colleagues about us today! Only 10 days remaining!
