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Welcome

Note

Jerry's Place is a non-profit, just-for-fun project. This project and website are not affiliated with, and do not represent Castle Rock Entertainment, Columbia Pictures, Columbia TriStar or Sony Pictures Television. I thank the aforementioned parties in advance for understanding this is a fan project, for the fans!

Jerrys Place 2.0 Released!

I'm proud to annouce that JerrysPlaceVR is now available Oculus Rift CV1/DK2 and the HTC Vive. The lighting has also been updated on the DK1 version. While I was hard at work updating the graphics with baked lighting, VRPill of VRChat.com reached out to me through gmiller.net. I worked closely with him and Mr. Q. (also of VRChat) to get the lighting perfected, but even more exciting: getting JerrysPlace into VRChat! That means multiplayer support! VRPill also pushed me to get over 200 of the small items "pick-up-able" in VR! This required revisiting every model and providing bottom and backside textures - which where omitted in the orignal due to them being static scenery. JerrysPlaceVR is now more exciting than ever!

You can download the Stand Alone versions to the right, and if you have a Vive you can pick up objects in the apartment. (Not available in Oculus). If you wish to hang-out with others in Jerrys Apartment, you can find the Seinfeld room in VRChat.com, which also includes the ability to watch YouTube clips on the TV and play Jenga with friends!

About

I've been a fan of Seinfeld for a long time. After purchasing the Oculus rift I started imagining what my first project might be. I decided to pick a project that would gradually introduce me to Unity without being overly complex. I was not new to 3D modeling, however this would be my first project in Unity. I came up with the idea of recreating Jerry's apartment, in it's entirety for virtual reality. Television is virtual reality in some ways. We make believe that Jerry's place is actually a Manhattan studio and Monks Cafe is just down the street. We suspend the reality that his apartment is just a set in Hollywood, with tons of cameras and lighting dangling overhead. I thought it would be a novel virtual reality experience to take a place that only exists in Hollywood magic, and make it for the Oculus Rift as if it were real. Virtual Reality Virtual Reality.

Development

This project was made over the course of one month, by myself. I used Blender exclusively, and all the 3D models were created for this project. I did not download external models or reuse meshes from other projects. (With the exception of SuperMan) As I mentioned earlier, the engine used for this demo is the Unity game engine, which makes developing Virtual Reality compatible software extremely convenient.

I started by scouring the Internet for screen shots of Jerry's apartment but that didn't yield much. Eventually I resorted to screen-capping streaming episodes so I could get detailed images of the various items around the set. I tried to be faithful to the shows original props and it's era, but some things were near impossible to Google. I did a lot of research and tried to find images of the original products used in the show, and modeled around those dimensions, rather than relying solely on blurry screen shots. I found lots of good footage of the bathroom in the episode "The Barber," during the part that Newman enters Jerry's bathroom to find a hair sample. I feel like the main room and the bathroom are very well created, however I could only find one screen shot of Jerry's bedroom, at the end of "The Chicken Roaster." I used a blurry screen grab to texture the painting above his bed, and was able to recreate the bed, sheets and nightstands accurately. Unfortunately, due to the dimensions of the apartment it seems like it would be impossible to actually fit the bedroom the way the show depicts it. It came out cramped, but I'm happy with it.

If I recall correctly, there are about a dozen references to various episodes hidden throughout the apartment, see if you can find them all!

How you can help

Feel free to email me with any feedback, or help or questions!

One of the most important ways you can help is to download and re-host the project! In case my server get's hammered, it would be nice to have volunteer mirrors so when people Google they can find it!
 

Jerry's Place in action!

Note: the following video is from the first generation, DK1 build of JerrysPlace. The current build has completely overhauled graphics and models!
Thank you Pancho Joshi for your YouTube walkthrough!

Progress Video

I saved many renderings at the end of each work day, and compiled them into this video.

Screen Shots

This demo is best experienced in Virtual Reality, so I only selected four screens. I'll let you discover the details for yourself!
View of the bathroom from the hallway. Click for larger size. View from the far corner of the apartment. Click for larger size.
View of the kitchen shelves, sink and range. Click for larger size. View of the apartment from the kitchen. Click for larger size.

Thoughts & Comments

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