Here Be Dragons (formerly known as Vrse.works) is a virtual reality production company co-founded by Patrick Milling Smith, Chris Milk and Brian Carmody. In December 2014, Chris Milk and Spike Jonze captured the Million Man March in NY which protested police brutality for Vice News. Here Be Dragons premiered its first VR experiences on the Within (formerly known as Vrse) app platform at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival including Evolution of Verse, a photo-realistic CGI-rendered 3-D virtual reality film, and Clouds Over Sidra, a virtual reality short documentary made in partnership with the United Nations which follows a 12-year-old girl's life in a Syrian refugee camp. After the Sundance launch, Here Be Dragons captured Saturday Night Live’s 40th Anniversary special in VR and created '‘Catatonic'’, an immersive journey through an insane asylum in which the audience, bound to a wheelchair, undergoes a sensory shocking horror thrill ride.
In April 2015, Here Be Dragons produced Walking New York, a VR experience made in partnership with the New York Times which follows JR (artist) and his making of a 150-foot-tall portrait of a recent immigrant to NYC that was wheat pasted across the Flatiron Building Pedestrian Plaza for less than 24 hours. Here Be Dragons followed with Nike's The Neymar Jr Effect, which takes viewers into Neymar's POV as he plays soccer and an experiential film for Toms Shoes that gives users the chance to participate in a Toms Giving Trip to Peru. Here Be Dragons continued its partnership with the United Nations to create the VR experience Waves of Grace’' in October 2015. The film transports viewers to West Point, the most populous slum in the capital of Liberia, and follows the experience of Decontee Davis, an Ebola survivor who uses her immunity to help others affected by the disease.
Here Be Dragons created a virtual reality music video for the band U2’s ‘Song for Someone’. In this globe-spanning reimagining of the music video, the experience takes singers from all walks of life and harmoniously blends them with U2 inside the VR space. The studio followed with another music video, Muse’s first foray into VR. The 360-degree immersive experience, directed by Guy Shelmerdine and crafted for Muse’s track ‘Revolt’, is set in a dystopian future where rebel women fight against cold cyborg police.
In 2015, Vice News VR and Clouds Over Sidra were nominated for Individual Documentary Episode and Mobile App Music respectively at the Webby Awards. The Within app was also nominated in the Experimental Mobile category. Evolution of Verse and Clouds Over Sidra were shortlisted for Original Branded Content at the 2015 Cannes International Advertising Festival. Apple Insider named Vrse as the best VR app/player for iPhones in August 2015.
Here Be Dragons continued its partnership with the New York Times, creating ’The Displaced’, a film VR that tells the stories of three children from Syria, Ukraine and the Sudan whose lives have been upended by conflict and follows them as they move forward, trying to rebuild in the aftermath of earth-shattering events. Over a million subscribers to the New York Times received a special edition Google Cardboard on November 8 to experience the film. ‘The Displaced’ was most recently awarded The Cannes Lions Entertainment Grand Prix, Best in Show at AICP’s Next Awards and was nominated for a Creative Arts Emmy.
Shortly afterwards, the studio collaborated with NYT again with a piece celebrating this year’s best actors for their annual Great Performers issue using VR. Created by Daniel Askill, ‘Take Flight’ is inspired by some of the most memorable airborne moments in cinematic history and lifts viewers up into a strange and beguiling night-sky tableau. Amongst the actors viewers get to fly with are Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wig, Benicio Del Toro and Rooney Mara.
At the 2016 Sundance Film Festival, Here Be Dragons showcased two new VR experiences and Chris Milk’s immersive installation, Treachery of Sanctuary as part of the New Frontier program. ‘A History of Cuban Dance’ is a 5-minute minute visual feast charting the exuberant and spontaneous dances that embody Cuba’s rich cultural heritage directed by multi-award winning documentary filmmaker Lucy Walker. The film takes the viewer on a chronological journey through Afro-Cuban Santería, rumba, mambo, cha-cha-chá, salsa, breakdancing, and reggaeton, with documentary voices offering some lyrical insights into the story of the Cuban people as revealed in the moves. ‘The Click Effect’ follows journalist James Nestor and filmmaker Sandy Smolan, also two renegade marine science researchers, as they attempt to free-dive a hundred feet below the ocean’s surface in a single breath, to capture the “click” communication of dolphins and sperm whales—the world’s largest predators.
Continuing its conservation efforts, Here Be Dragons created ‘Valen's Reef’, a new 360-degree short film for the environmental organization Conservation International. The film follows West Papuan fisherman-turned-conservationist Ronald Mambrasar and his 8-year-old son Valen as they explore the protected Bird's Head Seascape, one of the most biologically diverse reefs on the planet.
In July 2016, Here Be Dragons debuted a 13-minute virtual reality experience at Comic-Con for Mr. Robot. Written and directed by creator and showrunner Sam Esmail, the experience takes viewers on a flashback journey with lead character Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek) as he remembers an early encounter with his dealer-turned-love-interest Shayla (Frankie Shaw). On Thursday July 22, fans, including a large crowd at Comic Con, got a chance to watch the experience when it was briefly made available for viewing through the Within app. The Mr. Robot virtual reality experience captures the atmosphere and sensibilities of the show and brings it into an entirely new medium — and then pushes into territory that television would never allow.
The virtual reality studio most recently created the official immersive music video experience for OneRepublic’s new single “Kids”. Directed by Hal Kirkland and filmed in Mexico City with the Nokia OZO, the VR experience follows the story of two teenagers, a boy and girl who live across the street from one another in the city and witness to each other's lives through their windows.
In 2016 the company's product lead Joe Chen created a virtual reality map of the triathlon bicycle route for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics to help American triathlete Gwen Jorgensen train.