Kelso's Keyframes for HIE

This year, as you know HIE moved to a new home on HG Safari grid and got a facelift with a new auditorium on a 3x3 VAR that allowed us to have everything on the same sim, rather than four separate ones. 

Another huge change was the way that the speakers and presenters were animated. This work was done by Kelso Uxlay who developed a special set of scripts and HUDs to make it happen. Why was that needed?

Kelso Uxlay:  We needed something more reliable and dynamic to replace the antiquated, ugly poseballs used in the first years of HIE. 

Thirza Ember:  What was wrong with them?

Viva Subtitles!

From the very first Hypergrid International Expo back in 2017, we have been using a unique system to allow our audience to follow the main points of the talks being given, even if they don't understand the spoken word. It's a Subtitle system using Group Chat. You join the inworld group for your language, and during the event, the group Chat will light up with paragraphs of text that reflect the things being said onstage. 

Loru Destiny - our first speaker at HIE 25

Making these subtitles ahead of time involves a series of steps - getting the speakers to submit the main points of their talk, editing these for length, and then translating them into different languages. Of course, AI can help with that to some extent, but it takes the eye of a native speaker to check that idiomatic expressions, the jargon of virtual worlds, grammar, syntax, and the context of the talk are all respected. This year's team of translators and subtitleists included Rosa Alekseev for the Portuguese, LadyKa 007 for the French, Tosha Tyran for German and Spanish, plus Lux Tergeste and Snowbody Cortes. Thirza Ember worked on the Italian translations, as well as the editing, formatting, of the subtitles, and organized the team. 

Subtitle Group joiners in the Expo Park.
During the conference, subtitles appear in Group Chat.

But what was the experience like from the point of view of these volunteers? Would they recommend it to others? Lux Tergeste has been helping with subtitles for at least three years now, and has often also helped with translating from Italian to English. 

HIE 2025 French Session

The second session of this year's Hypergrid international Expo was the French part, once again three presentations on three different themes. 

Minord Loup peeps out at the crowd during Nadir Rae's talk

To introduce the French part, Minord Loup and LadyKa 007 did an absolutely delightful  conversational that set the mood for a great session.