34 VR Profile
A NEW REALITY FOR WOMEN There seems to be no shortage of talented women in VR. Mikkelsen points out that, in common with most of the industry, the field is still dominated by men, but that there is a higher percentage of women excelling in VR. “I honestly think it’s because VR demands so much multi-tasking. There’s no doubt that male brains and female brains work dierently. I think females prove stronger in a field that requires multi-tasking. If you mess up VR, it’s completely obvious. It’s not something you can fudge and say it’s a creative choice.” Mikkelsen says she sees the same thing in science. She helps run the Starmus Festival, an annual intersection of astrophysics and music whose guests have included Neil Armstrong, Stephen Hawking, Jean-Michel Jarre and Brian Eno. “The whole festival is about science and communication, in both writing and music. I run the festival’s Morning Programme. We had a team of girls from a Norwegian university building the world’s fastest electrical race car – it was only girls. And I’ve found in the Morning Programme 70% of the speakers are women. I didn’t specifically go out to find women. I just tried to find the coolest projects, but they were all run by women. Maybe they are able to see the bigger picture? Or maybe it’s just because it’s a new avenue and there’s no one standing at the door to restrict access? I don’t know, but it’s a really exciting future.” Mikkelsen seems driven to work at the cutting edge, and one wonders if her beginnings as a world-class speed skater aren’t somehow the precursors of world- class work in filmmaking tech.
on, you tend to commit a time to it. In my experience, if people sit in VR for the first 20 seconds, then they’ll sit there for 20 minutes. “VR is also a scary entertainment because it envelops you completely. I think that can be addictive if you get a sense of self-worth from what happens inside that content. The future painted in Ready Player One is a scary idea, but you know, we could easily end up there.” Mikkelsen believes that creators have a moral responsibility, like journalists, to make sure that the content they make serves the common good, not just the bottom line. “I think as a filmmaker you have the power to aect people and get them to question their existence. I love to make films that inspire in some way. Maybe there’ll be something that will make them happy or remind them of these amazing moments we have in life, diving with whales or sharks, or being on the stage experiencing music or being that rock star you always wanted to be.” IF PEOPLE SIT IN VR FOR THE FIRST SECONDS, THEN THEY’LL SIT THERE FOR MINUTES
AWARD WINNING Mikkelsen received an Imago Award for Extraordinary Technical Achievement in 2017 to go alongside the two Advanced Imagery Society Lumiere Awards she picked up
“Maybe it’s OCD. You know, how we skate in a circle: straight ahead, turn left, straight ahead, turn left, woohoo – and that’s what drives you for eight hours a day. It wouldn’t be far o comparing working in 3D to that – they’re both pretty tedious! And of course VR takes place in a circle! “Maybe I am an adrenaline junkie, I don’t know. You don’t skate to fall or wipe out, you just push it as far as you can.”
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