The traveling virtual reality film festival that started in Portland Oregon and made its way to 9 other major cities in North America has selected a Jury Prize winner.
The Kaleidoscope VR Film Festival event series exclusively featured only virtual reality films made by independent artists, and there were a ton of them. VRScout was able to check out the event in a couple cities and it would have been tough to select just one winner out of all the top-notch creations.
But the Jury Prize is in today, and the award goes to TOMÁŠ MARIANČÍK for his piece SIGHTLINE: THE CHAIR, a surreal experience that demonstrates VR’s ability to view to a multitude of dream like worlds, transitioning between each environment just by shifting your gaze.

Sightline: The Chair
The jury was made up of six industry figures in the field of motion picture entertainment (where are notable VR creators within this?) and the prize was developed by Broad Green Pictures to recognize the work of these amazing VR filmmakers.
The jury included Ramin Bahrani, (Filmmaker, 99 Homes), Victor Moyers (President, Production, Broad Green Pictures), Shari Frilot (Chief Curator, New Frontiers, Sundance Film Festival), Carolyn Giardina, (Contributing Editor, Tech, The Hollywood Reporter), and Lucy Walker, (Filmmaker, Buena Vista Social Club: Adios).
The Audience Award went to Arjan van Meerten’s SURGE experience, which festival attendees voted on as the overall winner by festival city tallies.

Arjan van Meerten’s SURGE
“To bring virtual reality to new audiences across North America has been an incredible experience and we are thrilled with the success of our inaugural year,” said René Pinnell, co-founder of Kaleidoscope and KVRFF. “We were honored to include over 20 outstanding films in this year’s program. Sightline: The Chair and Surge exemplify the cinematic achievements possible in this new frontier of filmmaking.”

Floor of Kaleidoscope VR Film Festival in Los Angeles
The Kaleidoscope Virtual Reality Film Festival presented by Vrideo, was a great introduction for many attendees to the world of VR content and cinema. With event talks and demos from filmmakers all over the world, we are looking forward to seeing this continue next year.
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