First, we needed to come up with a creative idea for the experience. We identified a music artist with five band members that had a Holiday/Christmas Album launching in December, 2016. Because the brand gave us the ability to create fictional "characters," we decided to create an animated experience where we turned all five band members into characters that were easily identifiable to this particular brand. The animated experience would then take the user on a holiday themed journey where they would join the five band members who would sing to them through a winter wonderland. This winter wonderland would be constructed of items that were all completely contextual and relevant to the brand in a perfectly organic fashion.

Because of the creative approach that we took, we now had the freedom to distribute and promote the content across every channel imaginable, each optimized in a different way from the same set of assets.

We created a 2D version that was edited/directed and implemented into a major US network television special featuring the band, which garned over 7 million viewers.

We created a 360 video version that was uploaded to the band's YouTube and Facebook Channels, as well as the brand's channels. This has resulted in over 5 million total video views.

We also created a Virtual Reality experience, whereas, when the consumer put on a headset, they could literally be transported into this fantasy world with the band.

Overall, this content reached millions and millions of people, with the best part being that consumers experienced it in three unique ways.

The 2D video had over 7 million viewers tune into the television network special on December 15th.

The 360 video had over 5 million views and significantly outperformed previous 2D videos that this brand had created.

The VR content could be viewed in over 15k retail locations including Best Buy, T-Mobile, AT&T, Sprint, etc. including an 11 city mall tour.

Over 70,000 views on VR devices requiring headsets, a sizable feat considering the nascent state of the market.

There were over 42 posts on social media from the band about the collaboration with the brand, resulting in over 500k likes and 12k comments

The overall impact brought millions and millions of dollars of media value to the brand, and wildly exceeded the expectations of all involved.

This work demonstrates how a music artist and brand can work together to create an exclusive piece of content that brings a high qus, compelling and organic entertainment experience to fans. Further, we showed how this content could be adapted and optimized to work in 2D, 360 degree video, and virtual reality environments to give fans three different ways to experience the content.

Because we needed this experience to work in 2D, 360 degrees and Virtual Reality environments, it was important to build the experience using game engine technology so that we had this flexibility. Thus we created one set of creative assets and produced three separate experiences - 1) an edited/directed 2D version; 2) a 360 video version for YouTube, Facebook, etc.; and 3) A Virtual Reality version for PlayStation VR, Oculus Rift, Gear VR, etc. that required a VR headset

Because we used game engine technology, we had the flexibility to use the assets in different ways to output three unique experiences for the consumer.

In short, the brand wanted to innovate with a VR experience without the experience being restricted to only VR platforms.

Initially, the brand was interested in creating a piece of exclusive content with a music artist that was optimized for virtual reality platforms. However, because VR usage is still relatively small, they also wanted a way to extend this content to more traditional channels (eg Television, YouTube, etc.).

Thus, the overall objective was to build a compelling piece of exclusive content that integrated the brand with a music artist, yet still enabled viewer consumption across 2D, 360 degree video and Virtual Reality platforms - where each platform presented a unique experience.