01 / The Launch
In VR, people wanted a place of their own
We built modular worlds people could customize and share with friends. People loved making a place their own, but each new environment took significant time and money to produce.
VRB 2015–2017
VRB Foto
We turned early VR experiments into a popular social platform for 360 media, leading to VRB’s acquisition by Samsung.
VRB Foto
Spatial inbox
The starting point
VR hype was real, but consumer headsets were not
Developer headsets were in the news (aka. Oculus DK1 ), but no consumer headset had launched. Google Cardboard was the only accessible path to an audience.
The Launch was an experiment built around the interaction limitations of gaze and one button. The industry was still defining best practices for rendering quality, locomotion comfort, and complex interactions.
The Launch showed us how much people loved spaces they could make their own. Foto turned their 360 photos and videos into those worlds.
My role As co-founder and CEO, I led the company and set the product direction from the first Cardboard experiments through VRB Foto and the Samsung acquisition.
The story
Finding product market fit in early VR
02 / The pivot
We turned a photo into a place
Building worlds helped us realize that a 360 photo could become a personal place in VR. Gear VR and consumer 360 cameras had arrived, but there was no place to view and share what people were capturing. Foto gave that media a home. People could fully customize their 360 photos and videos, then share them with a couple of taps, all within the headset.
03 / Native interaction
Customize from inside the world
From inside the headset, people could change how a photosphere looked and behaved, add spatial effects and targeted animations, or leave funny voice notes. Foto made 360 media something you could shape and respond to, not just view.
04 / The product
Make those worlds easy to share
Photos are meant to be shared, and worlds even more so. People uploaded their photos and videos from their phones, then customized them in VR. They could post to a public feed or send a personalized world directly to a friend. Foto made sharing a world feel as familiar as sharing a photo.
Outcomes & learning
We built an Instagram for VR
We shifted from producing each world ourselves to letting people turn their own 360 photos and videos into personal VR spaces.
Foto launched as the Oculus Store’s only 360 photo viewer and editor, was frequently featured, and helped drive Samsung’s acquisition of VRB.
People valued spatial environments they could make their own. Turning their own photos into VR worlds preserved that feeling while removing the burden of modeling 3D experiences.