VR Manchester is a community focused on the technology and applications of Virtual Reality. We hold Meetups and other events to bring VR professionals and enthusiasts across the Greater Manchester (UK) region together to talk about the current state of tech, where it’s going, and what we can do with it.
We began in early 2016, when Manchester resident Si Lumb realised he didn’t have any friends that appreciated VR the way he did. After speaking with local VR dev Luca Mefisto, they decided to set up a meetup group. Expecting 7 people in a room chatting about Snow Crash, they were blown away when 40+ turned up to hear Si talk about his work at BBC R&D and play with a Vive pre-edition.
More meetups followed, with UX Architect Rob Scott joining the organising team in mid-2016. The events went from strength to strength, bringing in local voices alongside big companies (Unreal, Sony, Magic Leap) and further expanding the organising team to include 3D Artist Rosie Summers, Filmmaker and Developer Adam Williams, Archivist Photographer Emma Gibbs and Cybersecurity Specialist Luigi Renna.
Coming together in real life to share our love for all things immersive was a real highlight of our day-to-day, especially as many of us have day jobs that don’t directly involve VR. Naturally. the pandemic put a halt to our in-person events and left us feeling a bit of a gap in our lives.
Thankfully, we’re now back doing virtual events (for now at least) and aim to bring more people together to talk about VR (perhaps not just from Manchester either!). If you want to hear about our events, make sure you sign up to our mailing list.