The Metaverse – what’s in it for me; what’s in it from me?

While there are many opinions about what exactly the metaverse currently is and how it will evolve, there’s little doubt that it will touch our lives and businesses in many profound ways. We also know that it’s going to be visual to the core.

That will bring about opportunities and challenges for any company active in the larger photo & video ecosystem on the scale of those triggered by the introduction of the Internet and the smartphone ecosystem.

This Spotlight was held March 15, 2022. 84 attendees.

Check out our takeaways article.

Eric is Immersive Media Lead at Meta Reality Labs, and is an award-winning photographer, technologist, producer, and author. As a hands-on executive producer, Eric has supported and produced numerous immersive media projects for VR, including 4 Emmy-nominated films. 

Throughout his career, Eric has straddled his passions for storytelling, entrepreneurship, technology and communication. Before returning to tech, Eric published Wetpixel, the leading underwater-photography community on the web. Eric is featured in 2 episodes of the Netflix series, Tales by Light, (Season 2), which showcase his underwater work with big animals. He has led numerous photography expeditions and workshops around the world, and has given seminars and lectures at events including TEDx, EG, TTI/Vanguard, the Churchill Club, DEFCON, NASA UTM, Photoshelter Luminance, Photographers@Google, CES, NAB, SXSW, AsiaD, Creative Mornings, Tested.com’s Live Show, Oculus Connect, ICCCP, DEMA, and others.

Previously, Eric was Director of Aerial Imaging at DJI and Director of Photography at Lytro. He served on the Board of Advisers of Wirecutter, and is a Field Associate at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, California. Eric is also involved in ocean conservation, and has served on the Board of Directors of Shark Savers (now part of WildAid) and the Board of Advisors of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. 

Eric holds BS and MS degrees in computer science from Stanford University, where he also studied classical cello performance. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife and children. His photography work can be found at http://echengphoto.com.

Alexis Khouri joined Allegorithmic in 2007 and has been deeply involved in the product design and growth strategy for Substance, the industry standard for 3D texturing. In 2019, Alexis joined Adobe as Senior Director of Business Development and Strategy for the 3D & Immersive division.

He was formerly General Manager at Playsoft (Mobile Game Development) and Senior Consultant at Simon-Kucher & Partners. Alexis graduated from ESSEC Business School and has also a strong technical background in programming and 3D production pipelines.

Justin Melillo is co-founder & CEO of Mona, a startup whose mission it is to seed the open metaverse through the creation and use of beautiful, unique 3D Spaces.

Justin has a background of making art, writing stories, and creating immersive AR and VR experiences. His AR lenses have been viewed over 100 million times across Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat. He has worked with a number of clients throughout his career, including stage designs for touring musicians including Drake and CharliXCX.

Previously, Justin was production manager at Magic Leap and worked at DreamWorks Animation in various positions.

Kirby Winfield is a seasoned startup operator and investor, and is currently the Founding General Partner at Ascend.vc, a pre-seed stage venture fund investing in marketplace, e-commerce/DTC, and B2B software startups in the Pacific Northwest.

Early in his career, Kirby was a founding team member and operating executive at back-to-back tech IPOs, with Go2Net (GNET) and Marchex (MCHX).

He is also a two-time venture capital-backed CEO, with AdXpose (DFJ, Ignition) acquired by comScore (SCOR) where he became Sr. VP Corporate Development, and Dwellable (Maveron, VersionOne) acquired by HomeAway (AWAY).

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