This abc.net.au article reports “actors working in real time from remote locations have been beamed onto a stage where they performed with live,in-the-flesh actors,US researchers say.The broadband-enabled experience allowed the audience to watch a seamless,3D performance,according to the University of Central Florida.The technology could mean future theatergoers might attend plays where one or more actors are working outside the venue,even in a different country,or from their own homes.”We are not talking about holograms yet or the kind of imagery that requires funky glasses,”says Professor John Shafer,a member of the cast”.Further,”Shafer was hooked to a receiving and transmitting broadband-connected computer that can pull 130 megabytes of data in an instant.Although he performed in Florida,his body was ‘beamed’ onto a stage at Bradley University in Illinois,where he performed ‘with’ live actors there,as well as with actors beamed in from the University of Waterloo in Canada.Both 3D and 2D sets consisting of multiple screens and special-effects lighting that helped to give the impression that all the actors, remote or not, existed in a single space.To further link the performances, the actual live actors were also sometimes featured on screens.At one point, a virtual actor even appeared to hand a live actor a cigarette.”People have been incorporated into the digital world before.Lord of the Rings used live-time actor digitisation on the set,” Shafer says.”Ours, however, does it with real-time,live actors at a distance,right where you can come and see it.You get the human contact that film and computers alone cannot provide.”

Virtual actors take to the stage