For the last 13 years, Robbie Ferguson has been producing a tech education show on YouTube called Category5 Technology, but when the pandemic hit, he found himself unable to meet safely with his cast.

Ferguson’s YouTube channel, with more than 32,000 subscribers, started in 2007 with his wife.

“We started the show as a mechanism to be able to provide free technical support to those who wanted help with the technical devices,” Ferguson explained. “Two years ago, of course, the pandemic hit and everything got shifted on its head because I couldn't have any staff in the studio.”

So, he started thinking outside the box, and came across the Unreal Engine.

“Unreal Engine is a piece of software that was originally designed to develop video games, virtual reality,” Ferguson said. “It started being used by television studios, movie studios to produce video because they realized that the quality that was coming out of it was so realistic that it saves them a lot of money.”

Using Unreal Engine, Ferguson has created a virtual studio and has been able to “beam in” his show colleagues — one of them from New York — and continue the show in a new and exciting way.

“We’re utilizing photo-realistic augmented reality sets and props to place our on-air personnel within virtual environments,” he said.

Category5 Technology TV’s 15th season pilot episode aired on Feb. 23 and is available on the YouTube channel.

“The four people you see in our pilot episode are seen conversing on screen, but none of us were in the same room,” Ferguson said. “What we're doing is we're breaking new ground so that other content creators can realize what is possible,” he said. “It's not just about Category5, I'm also thinking about other companies and how people can utilize this technology.”

To watch Category5 Technology TV, visit https://www.youtube.com/LinuxTechShow.

Shane MacDonald is a reporter for the Innisfil Journal.