Extending the campaign beyond the seasonal TV epic, MPC Creative – MPC’s in-house content creation studio – developed a groundbreaking interactive VR experience in collaboration with adam&eveDDB and John Lewis. Launching exclusively in the Oxford Street store, this is the first commercial interactive VR experience that allows people to control interactivity with their own hands rather than using physical controllers. The experience – which took 3,000 hours of specialist VFX artistry to develop – allows people to step into the enchanting world of the Christmas ad and not only experience the environment, but interact and play with its cast of characters– and immediately share a unique film of themselves composited into the 3D scene.
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Andre Assalino, Interactive Creative Director at MPC Creative, comments: ‘We wanted to create a premium, fun and authentic installation that would place people directly into an interactive version of the world already established within the TV ad. VR was the obvious medium, as its premise is profoundly simple: fully immersive entertainment allowing people to share a fun moment with the animals, resulting in a uniquely memorable experience.’
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Following adam&eveDDB’s brief, MPC Creative developed an in-store installation idea that positions users on the same trampoline as in the spot, joined by the cast of characters who jump and perform at their command, with 360-degree positional sound effects. MPC crafts industry leading photo-real animals, so MPC Creative’s challenge was to deliver an extraordinary level of animation and realism for VR: ‘We had to push the boundaries of interactive VR to the limits’, Andre explains. ‘Creating a photo-realistic scene with believable furry animals, and natural interactions with virtually no learning curve for the user, were our biggest challenges. Add to that the complexity of making sure everything could run non-stop for the whole campaign in one of the UK’s busiest stores, and things really get interesting.’
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Source: LBBonline