Dock10, a television facility and home to iconic television shows including the Voice, Who Wants To Be a Millionaire, Blue Peter and Countdown, has announced a major expansion of its virtual studio capability.

The facility now enables creative directors to use any of its 10 studios as a virtual environment where they can seamlessly combine physical, virtual and augmented reality elements to create otherwise unachievable photorealistic worlds. Using the latest graphics processing technology, the photorealistic virtual environment is generated in real-time, enabling creative directors to see the combined ‘finished’ output live as it happens – either on a screen in the studio or via secure remote viewing.

This next-generation technology is a powerful creative tool for delivering even greater on-screen value, enabling much more innovative and content-rich sets to be created. Existing sets, built in any 3D modelling package, can be imported into the system and a wide range of pre-made assets can be easily sourced, adapted and added into the design. Absolute realism is achieved through small but essential details such as shadows and reflections, while even the thinnest physical objects, such as strands of hair, are interwoven with the virtual space so as not to shatter the illusion of reality.

All 10 studios at dock10 have been enabled to run the virtual studio technology, giving creative directors the flexibility to choose the right sized space for their productions.

Andy Waters, head of studios at dock10, says, “With the success of our virtual studios for Match of the Day and BBC Bitesize Daily, we had enquiries from creative agencies wanting to take advantage of the technology for advertising shoots, live events and corporate films. However, creative directors also wanted the flexibility to work in different sized studios to include a wider range of live performers, physical sets and mixed reality. To meet this demand, we took our experience of deploying a virtual studio into a standard studio and supersized the possibilities by adding that capability across all of our studios – enabling producers to choose the right sized space for their production.”