Jay Bolter On the Significance of AR, VR, and AI in Hollywood
Jay Bolter
Professor and Director of Computational Media at Georgia Tech’s Digital Media Department
From the painted ceilings of the Sistine Chapel to the development of the Meta Quest 3, humans have been experimenting with the augmentation of reality for centuries. Jay Bolter, Professor and Director of Computational Media at Georgia Tech’s Digital Media Department, is a leading researcher in virtual and augmented reality experiences. Based in the Technology Square Research Building (TSRB), Bolter’s work explores how emerging immersive technologies are reshaping entertainment, storytelling, and everyday life.
Virtual reality (VR) creates fully digital environments that immerse users in simulated worlds, utilizing headsets or goggles. Augmented reality (AR), by contrast, overlays digital content onto the physical world, blending what we see and hear with layers of virtual information. Both technologies redefine how humans interact with computers, moving beyond screens and keyboards to create experiences that feel immediate and embodied. At the Augmented Environments Lab, which Bolter co-directs inside TSRB, researchers explore these possibilities—developing AR and VR applications that reach beyond entertainment. “There are lots of applications—for therapeutic purposes like treating acrophobia, post-traumatic stress disorder, or even autism,” Bolter explains. The lab’s work pushes the boundaries of human-computer interaction, crafting immersive systems that change how we learn, heal, and experience stories. Bolter is known for his Remediation Theory, which describes how new media forms, such as AR and VR, reshape and recontextualize older ones, including film and television. “One of the things that fascinates me is the way Hollywood reacts to each new technology that threatens its cultural position,” he mentions in his book Reality Media: Augmented and Virtual Reality. His research examines how immersive media compels Hollywood to adapt, driving the development of new narrative forms and audience engagement strategies.
Historically, Hollywood has sought to control the narrative around new media. Cinema created immersive experiences by manipulating sight and sound, while television added the capacity for simultaneous mass broadcasting—delivering news, pop culture, and sports directly into homes. Bolter points out that this cycle of adaptation intensified in the 1990s with the rise of virtual reality, inspiring films like The Matrix (1999), which explored the potential—and dangers—of fully immersive digital worlds. “Hollywood always felt it had a monopoly on immersion,” Bolter says. “VR and AR challenged that by offering a different kind of immersion—interactive and personal rather than passive.”
Today, Bolter sees artificial intelligence (AI) joining AR and VR as another disruptive force—one that raises fresh questions about authorship, creativity, and control. “AI adds another layer,” he says. “It’s not just about the medium changing, but about the machine contributing to the content itself. That’s something Hollywood—and all of us—must wrestle with.” As humanity spends more time addressing these concerns, industries and individuals alike are grappling with the rights, ownership, and regulations of computer-generated content for entertainment. The continuance of these issues has the potential to extend beyond the entertainment industry and persist in the coming years.
Bolter argues that AR and VR are natural extensions of this media evolution. AR, like television, could become a standard part of daily life. A hybrid view of reality where digital content overlaps with the physical world. Watching a television show while observing your children play is already a form of mixed reality. AR takes this concept further, offering new ways to layer information and experiences into the real world.
Bolter’s book traces how Hollywood historically resisted these changes. In his book, he describes how the film industry responded to the early VR hype with cautionary stories. Films like The Lawnmower Man (1992), Virtuosity (1995), and Strange Days (1995) portrayed VR as dangerous—less a threat to Hollywood itself, but more to society at large. These narratives reflected Hollywood’s attempts to maintain control over the cultural impact of emerging technologies.
“I think it’s still unclear how these technologies will impact our society,” Bolter says. “We’re in this interesting moment where they haven’t yet become part of everyday life—but the potential is there.” AI, AR, and VR, collectively, are redefining not just entertainment but human-computer interaction itself, reshaping how we experience narratives, information, and the world around us.
While it is too early to fully measure the long-term effects of AI, AR, and VR, Bolter’s work demonstrates how Hollywood continues to engage with—and attempt to shape—new media landscapes. His research highlights the tension between traditional storytelling industries and the disruptive potential of immersive technologies.