Co3 The Inside

In early 2021, Frame Labs was approached by Co3 Contemporary Dance and its Artistic Director, Raewyn Hill, to collaborate on an experimental VR work that blended contemporary dance with immersive technology. The project became The Inside, and it debuted at the 2021 Perth Arts Festival, later evolving into a key engagement activity for CONNECT 2022, an in-school dance residency and workshop program.

A significant part of the challenge was ensuring the experience felt consistent and “show-ready” across multiple headsets simultaneously. For this project, I built a synchronised network playback system that allowed up to eight HTC Vive Focus headsets to play back real-time 3D animation in lockstep, perfectly aligned with an external 7.1 surround soundtrack. The goal was simple: hit play and have every headset stay in sync, reliably, for an audience-facing installation, without the drift and timing issues that can quickly break an experience built around music and choreography.

My work on the project included:

• Designing and implementing a multi-headset sync and control system for playback

• Building networked timing logic to keep real-time animation aligned across devices

• Integrating the experience with an external 7.1 surround audio setup (Triggered via QLab)

• Supporting deployment and stability for festival and education-based installations