Tag: vr

Evaluation of Unity’s VR Room Ad Standard

Posted on by Scott Elchison

How It Works

Last week, Unity in partnership with the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Lionsgate announced they are developing the first ever virtual reality ad format called a Virtual Room. The virtual room is a branded experience ranging from 30 to 60 seconds that is inserted into a VR game or app. Players need to opt in by “walking” through a sponsored portal within the game.

Once a player walks through the virtual doorway, they enter a room where a branded experience awaits. Users can interact with different objects, explore the room, and are rewarded with exclusive in game content for participating. The first VR Room ad is being developed to promote Jigsaw, Lionsgate’s upcoming movie in the Saw franchise, and is scheduled to be released this fall.

Make Room For VR Ads

In order for VR to be a viable advertising channel, universal ad standards are a must. The virtual room is the industry’s exciting first attempt at VR ad standards and Unity is building out the infrastructure needed to make it possible. Backed by the IAB, the VR Room is a credible ad unit and gives brands the reassurance needed to start testing branded VR experiences.

One big advantage this new VR ad standard will have right out of the gate is its considerable reach and ability to scale. According to Unity’s estimates, two thirds of all VR content today is built on Unity. and a single Virtual Room ad will be able to reach between 50K to 500K users in VR headsets, depending on planned distribution.

The unit takes full advantage of being built on a game engine, which allows for creative flexibility and advanced tracking unavailable to traditional marketing methods. Entertainment brands such as Lionsgate with Jigsaw are a perfect example of how to leverage this new medium. This room provides them with a way to tell an immersive story where the user is fully engaged in what we all hope is a super frightening escape room.

Room For Improvement

For brands, one of the biggest challenges of the virtual room will be the lack of 3D brand assets. Many brands today do not have the proper 3D logos, products, and branding that will be needed for the virtual room ad unit. Instead, all assets will need to be built from the ground up.

And even if they do have the 3D assets, different brands will have varying brand equity as a draw to get the VR viewers in the door. Unlike an entertainment brand like Lionsgate, QSR and CPG brands have more of a challenge to figure out how to properly leverage this virtual ad unit. The idea of a room plastered with Starbucks PSL’s and iced coffee sounds great in theory, however, in actuality, no one is coming into VR to experience a barista misspelling their virtual name. Plus, it remains unclear at the moment how the creatives will look for the call-to-actions for getting players into the room.

Therefore, developing an engaging room will be crucial to prove the success of the ad unit. The VR industry as a whole is consistently fighting against poor quality VR or even mislabel 360 video “VR”.  If the first virtual ad is a disruptive, boring cube of a room it will be a recipe for disaster.

Final Assessment

Overall, we have faith in the potential of this new ad format and are excited to see how advertisers take on the challenges. The room will live naturally within the pauses that are apart of a game. Users will unlock custom in-game content only available within these sponsored rooms that add value to the overall VR experience. Plus, the in-game rewards that brands will be able to offer to players should help provide the incentives needed to draw the audience in, as long as it is clearly communicated in the call-to-action banner before they enter the room.

If successful, this new VR ad standard should provide developers and creators a way to monetize their VR apps and games. The ability to effectively monetize a game or app increases the incentive for developers to produce VR content. The more content that is produced gives user more of a reason to buy the hardware. This in turn signals to brands that there is a viable audience that can be reached within VR and they will start spending dollars to place ads within the different games, accelerating the entire industry forward.

What Brands Need To Do

For starters, all brands no matter what vertical should be thinking about creating 3D branded assets. These assets will not only make it easier to build VR ad experiences, however, they can also be licensed out to game developers to integrate product indirectly into a VR game, app or experience.

Additionally, looking even further down the VR roadmap and the concept of virtual goods, these branded assets can be virtually sold to consumers for real profits. Last year, $60 million USD was paid out to creators within the Second Life community. Aside from 3D assets now is the time to start developing brand strategies for VR. The industry is young, flexible, and inexpensive, allowing brands to test how they best fit into the virtual environment with minimal blowback.  

 

Header image is a promotional image courtesy of Unity

Event Recap: The Art of VR – June 2017

Posted on by Scott Elchison

Last month, the Lab attended The Art of VR event presented by the VR Society. The two-day event hosted at Sotheby’s NYC brought together leaders in the VR industry to discuss the future of the space from creative, production, media, and advertising perspectives. The day was split between panel discussions ranging from realistic human avatars to the future of media and many different demos illustrating the wide range of VR applications today.

VR’s Growing Pains

It is no surprise that the VR space is still in its infancy. While there has been rapid adoption of the Samsung Gear VR – almost 5 million headsets have been purchased – and mobile VR, overall, the VR space is stilling lacking content and users. As we observed in our 2016 Outlook report:

“While early adopters and hardcore gamers are starting to buy virtual reality gear with the launch of Samsung Gear VR and the upcoming Oculus Rift, Playstation VR, and HTC Vive, creation of content that will spur real adoption is only beginning. It’s a chicken-or-egg problem: Why buy a headset if there’s little content and why invest in content if so few can see it?”

The Indie VR panel only reinforced this point. The industry is starting to gain traction, however, the final format for VR is still unknown. Panelists suggested that there needs to be weirder experimental content to test out what VR can truly be.  

Realistic Human Avatars

One of the most interesting concepts that is starting to solidify are realistic human avatars within VR. Companies like Loom.ai, Wolf3D, Macinnes Scott, and Facebook’s Oculus team are all, already working on the technology. However, it begs the question – who is actually going to use them?           

If we look back, videos games have been offering a level of personalize/stylization for years. Players are able to customize facial features, skin tone, height, clothing, gender and more. Fast forward to October of 2014 and the launch of customizable avatar platform Bitmoji took personalized avatars even further. Now people are able to create human-like social avatars to be shared on different social messaging platforms. Bitmoji was so successful that Snap Inc acquired Bitmoji’s parent company BitStrips for $100M. Looking to the future, Macinnes Scott is looking to create hyper realistic avatars for celebrities and allow such avatars to be licensed out for mind-blowing VR content creation.

Takeaways for Brands

Three major takeaways from this event for brands that is curious about exploring VR:

1). At its current stage, VR excels at storytelling, so don’t expect to sell large volume of products in VR but rather focus on driving brand loyalty and awareness instead.
2). Be mindful in choosing the type of VR content to integrate with — they needs to be able to align with brand products in a natural way.
3). The analytic tools are here today to measure the success of a VR campaign, but brands will need to use their own judgements as to which ones they want to use.

The Lab team have been shouting from the rooftops that the best use case for VR is storytelling. VR is the perfect realm to tell stories and engage with a user in a way that has never been possible before. From a brand perspective, we envision brands integrating into VR experiences where their products fit organically .VR is exciting because the experiences are built within gaming engines that make integrating branded 3D objects simple. Brands can have their product built directly into a game’s environment and allows game publishers to bring this additional layer of realism to their game (as well as generate some extra revenue). Overall it is a win-win scenario for both VR content creators and brands.

Well-placed product ingratiation within a suitable VR experience doesn’t mean anything to a brand unless real tangible insights can be produced. That is where VR analytics companies like CognitiveVR come into play. They allow brands to track a multitude of rich interactions within a VR experience including; how a user moves within the game, gaze (where a person is “looking”), number of branded object interactions and time spent. There is no consensus on what metrics will be the most useful to measure campaign success, which brands will have to decide for themselves on a case-by-case basis. However, the tools are available today to provide real tangible insights for brands.

 

French Bank BNP Paribas Dives Into Virtual Reality With An App & A Pod

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
French banking giant BNP Paribas is the latest company in the financial service sector to explore virtual reality as a tool to improve its customer experience. The Paris-based bank announced earlier this week that it will demo a branded VR app at the upcoming Viva Technology Fair in Paris, which will allow users to virtually access their account activity and transaction records.

In addition to the app, the real estate arm of BNP Paribas partnered with French startup Vectuel & RF Studio to develop “the POD,” a VR experience “capsule,” which aims to help customer visualize their real estate investments by offering virtual tours of the properties, some of which are still under construction, as well as a step-by-step guide through all the necessary steps of a real estate purchase.

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What Brands Need To Do
The dubious necessity of a VR app for checking bank balances aside, BNP Paribas’ VR initiative is notable for the fact it is actually leveraging VR to enhance the service it provides for customers, unlike the experiential marketing approaches that banks like Citi and Wells Fargo have previously taken with branded VR content.

With a slew of VR headsets of various prices became available in the past 18 months, starting with the release of the consumer version of Oculus Rift in March 2016, consumer adoption of VR has been steadily on the rise, with an estimated 11.4 million U.S. consumers having purchased a VR headset by the end of 2016. As more and more consumers become accustomed to VR technologies, brands seeking to stay ahead of the curve will need to start developing a VR strategy and experimenting with VR to improve client experiences.

How We Can Help
Our dedicated team of VR experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners and backed by the media fire-power of IPG Mediabrands, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lab can help you tap into the immersive power of VR content to engage with customers, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: Bank Innovation

Featured image and video courtesy of BNPP Real Estate’s YouTube video

Samsung Announces More Live VR Content From UFC, X Games, And Live Nation

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Following up to its refreshed Gear VR headset unveiled in late March, Samsung is doubling down on its VR initiative with a slate of exclusive content aiming to appeal to mainstream consumers. Users with a VR Live Pass will soon have access to 360-degree live broadcasts from mixed martial arts company UFC, extreme sports event X Games, and live entertainment corporation Live Nation.

https://youtu.be/ad-k__DoAXE

What Brands Need To Do
This isn’t the first time Samsung has leveraged live entertainment and sports content to drive VR uptake. Last summer, it teamed up with NBC to produce 85 hours of VR content from the Rio Olympic Games. By aggressively investing in VR content, Samsung is addressing a key hindrance in VR adoption – the lack of good VR content. According to a recent survey conducted by Thrive Analytics, 55% of VR headset owners say they would like to see more VR content, while 45% of them say they want content of better quality. As VR content continues to diversify, it should gradually attract more consumer attention, which brands should follow with branded VR content or virtual product placement.

How We Can Help
Our dedicated team of VR experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners and backed by the media fire-power of IPG Mediabrands, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lab can help you tap into the immersive power of VR content to engage with customers, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: VentureBeat

Featured image and video courtesy of Samsung’s YouTube

MLB Brings Popular “At Bat” App To Daydream VR

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Major League Baseball (MLB) is bringing its popular At Bat app into VR for an immersive and interactive viewing experience for baseball fans. Soon to become available on Google’s Daydream VR platform, the app lets fans watch live games and simultaneously check up on real-time stats with multiple floating screens that they can turn to and zoom in. Unfortunately, the app is yet to support watching the games in 360-degree video, but there are other 360-degree content produced by MLB available in the app.

What Brands Need To Do
According to ComScore, the At Bat app is one of the most popular streaming services for sports, hogging the top spot on the total-grossing sports app chart in the App Store for years. While the choice of platform may limit its adoption, given the fact that only a handful of Android handsets currently support Daydream VR. it nevertheless underscores MLB’s willingness to experiment with the emerging medium and improve its content delivery so as to let viewers engage with their content more intensively.

Live sports are widely regarded as the last bastion against the declining live TV ratings, but with more and more sports leagues signing deals like this one to make their content available on digital platforms, more and more viewers are migrating to those new platforms as well. Therefore, brands seeking to reach sports fans will need to follow along by adjusting their media mix.

How We Can Help
Our dedicated team of VR experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners and backed by the media fire-power of IPG Mediabrands, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lab can help you tap into the immersive power of VR content to engage with customers, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: The Verge

Fast Forward: Everything Brands Need To Know About Google 2017 I/O Event

Posted on by Lab Team

This is a special edition of our Fast Forward newsletter, bringing you a summary of the major announcements from Google’s 2017 I/O developer conference. A fast read for you and a forward for your clients and team.

The highlights:

  • Google Lens brings computer vision to Google Assistant and Photos
  • Google Assistant receives major upgrades & branches out Into connected cars
  • Expansion of the Daydream VR platform propels VR development forward
  • Android O brings a more fluid user experience, with Android Go targeting the “next billion mobile users”

On Wednesday, Google kicked off its annual I/O developer conference at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, CA. CEO Sundar Pichai took the stage to lead the main keynote address, where he laid out the key developments in several of Google’s areas of interest, including AI, voice assistants, virtual reality, and more. TechCrunch has a comprehensive round-up of everything that Google announced, but we have an exclusive take on what it means for brands.

Google Lens Adds Computer Vision To Google Services

The most significant announcement coming out of this year’s Google I/O conference is the debut of Google Lens, a set of computer vision features that allows Google services to identify what the camera captures and collect contextual data via images. Google has been using similar technology in the Google Translate app (built off their 2014 acquisition of World Lens) to automatically translate words that the camera captures in real time. Now, Google is adding this feature to Google Assistant and, later this year, to Google Photos as well.

Equipped with computer vision capabilities, Google Assistant gains the “eyes” it needs to see what the users are looking at and understand their intent. Google demoed several such scenarios on stage, including pointing the camera at a restaurant’s storefront to receive standard business information and reviews of that restaurant surfaced via Zagat and Google Maps, pointing it at an unidentified flower to ask Google Assistant to identify it, or pointing it at a concert poster to prompt Assistant to find how to buy tickets for the event. Lens allows Google Assistant to tap the smartphone camera as an input source, to inform user intent and create a more frictionless user experience.

For Google Photos, the addition of Google Lens’ computer vision capabilities makes the cloud photo storage service better at identifying the people in your photos and picking out the best shots in your photo library. This facilitates one new feature called Suggested Sharing, in which Google Photos will prompt you to share some AI-selected photos with the people that are in them with a simple tap. Users on the receiving end of the shared albums will also be prompted to add the pre-selected photos to the mix.

One additional feature powered by Google Lens is the Visual Positioning Service (VPS), which works like an indoor GPS, allowing Android devices to map out a specific indoor location and help them find a specific store in the mall or a specific item in a grocery store with turn-by-turn navigation. VPS is already working in select partner museums and Lowes home improvement stores if you happen to have one of two Tango-enabled devices. This advanced AR feature will also appear in the next Tango device, the ASUS ZenFone AR due out this summer.

The introduction of Google Lens brings the search giant up to speed in the consumer-facing AR development. Two of Google’s biggest competitors, Facebook and Amazon, recently unveiled their own take on the “camera-as-input” trend with the launch of Camera Effects Platform and Echo Look, respectively. For Google, the launch of Lens is all the more significant, as it officially branches Google’s core function, search, into the physical real world and opens the door for more offline use cases, which, in turn, massively increases the addressable market of searchable data and creates a virtuous cycle for Google to leverage those image data to fuel its AR and machine learning initiatives.

Google Assistant Grows More Capable With New Features

Beyond the major addition of computer vision capabilities, Google Assistant is getting some other new features to help it stay competitive against Amazon’s Alexa and other digital voice assistants. Among the slew of new features announced on stage, two stood out to us for their versatile uses cases and accessibility for developers.

First up, Actions, Google’s version of ‘skills’ or ‘apps’ for Google Assistant, added support for digital transactions. This allows Google Home and some Android phone users to shop online by conversing with Google Assistant, which will access payment methods and delivery addresses stored in Android Pay for a seamless checkout experience. The feature will launch first with Panera as a third-party partner.

This crucial update will allow more businesses to build mobile ordering and online shopping features into their Google Actions. Previously, Google Assistant could only make orders from partnering Google Express retailers, such as Costco, Whole Foods Market, Walgreens, PetSmart, and Bed Bath & Beyond. It also added the ability to check the inventory at local stores for product availability before users take a trip to the store.

Second, Google Assistant can now respond by sending visuals to your smartphone or TV via Chromecast. Dubbed “Visual Responses,” this important addition enables developers to surface texts, images, videos, and map navigations to user requests. Allowing for a variety of responses helps diversify Google Assistant’s replies beyond voice and add texture to the user experience. Supporting multiple displays entends Google Assistant to more platforms, allowing users to choose the optimal screen to engage with. This new feature comes just a week after Amazon unveiled Echo Show, which also introduced a visual component to Alexa’s voice-based conversational interface.

Beyond these two key updates, Google Assistant is also gaining several other features that make it smarter and more useful. They include:

  • A “proactive assistance” feature that allows Google Assistant to automatically alerts you about travel, weather, and calendar updates by silently showing a spinning light-up ring on Google Home. Users can hear the updates by asking “OK Google, What’s up?” It is unclear when this notification-lite feature will roll out.
  • Hands-free phone calls to U.S. and Canada numbers. It works similarly to Amazon’s recently released Alexa voice calling, but with the added ability to dial real phone numbers. Unlike Amazon, only outbound calls are supported for now because Google says it wants to be “mindful of customer privacy”.
  • New entertainment integrations including the free tier of Spotify, SoundCloud, HBO, Hulu, CBS All Access, and some other popular music and video content streaming services. This allows users to ask Google Assistant to play a specific show or song, provided they have installed the corresponding apps on their devices.
  • Text input for Google Assistant, which allows users to interact with the Assistant on Android devices by typing out their requests instead of speaking them out loud.
  • Google also reminded the audience that Google Assistant will be coming to connected cars, as the company announced on Monday that Volvo and Audi are building new models that will run on Android systems.

Beyond these new features, Google is also aggressively expanding the Assistant to more platforms by announcing it will become accessible on Android TV OS later this year as well as iPhones and iPads via Google’s iOS app. The update to the Android TV platform will be accompanied by a brand-new launcher, allowing users to use voice command to access the over 3,000 Android TV apps available in the Play Store. According to Google, the Assistant is currently available on over 100 million devices. Notably, that’s a fraction of the 2 billion Android devices on the market, and doesn’t reflect user adoption. (For comparison, Apple’s Siri is currently available on 1 billion devices.)

In addition, Google is also following Apple’s lead to process AI-powered apps locally on mobile devices as well as in the cloud. This improves app performance and security, and also enables Google Assistants to adjust to a user’s specific preferences more quickly.

Standalone Daydream VR Headsets Aim To Broaden Consumer Appeal

It’s been a full year since Google unveiled its VR platform, Daydream, and so far, only a handful of compatible handsets have been released.  Facing mounting competitors in the VR space, Google is taking another stab at virtual reality with new  Daydream-enabled phones from partners, and a new standalone headset form-factor.

On the handset front, Google announced that Daydream will be supported by the new Samsung Galaxy S8 phones later this summer. As the best-selling line of Android phones, it’s’ a big win for Google, even if Samsung continues to support their own platform, GearVR, which is powered by a rival, Facebook’s Oculus. Plus, the upcoming flagship phone from LG will also support Daydream VR, making the platform considerably more accessible for mainstream users.

Google is teaming up with HTC Vive and Lenovo to build an untethered, standalone VR headset, allowing an immersive experience without additional phone or PC hardware. The headsets will support inside-out tracking, using the “WorldSense” technology from its Tango AR platform to track virtual space and making sure your view in VR matches up with your movements in the real world without the need for additional cameras or sensors. This move puts Google in the company of Oculus and Intel, both of whom have showed off early standalone headsets with self-contained tracking systems.

Fluid UI Design For Android O & Android Go For Emerging Markets

Near the end of the opening keynote, Google turned the attention to the next Android mobile OS, Android O. The preview highlighted a more fluid UI design, which includes features such as a Picture-in-Picture mode for multitasking while watching videos or during video calls, a more customized notification dots system, and a machine learning-powered smart text selection that makes it easier to choose the texts to copy and paste.

In addition, Google also launched a new data-conscious version of Android O named Android Go, targeting emerging global markets where mobile connectivity is still in development. Android Go is a modified version of Android for the lower-end handsets, completed with apps optimized for low bandwidth and memory. Google says Android devices with less than 1GB of RAM will automatically get Android Go starting with Android O. It is also committing to releasing an Android Go variant for all future Android OS. Google previously created a similar low-cost Android OS to serve the emerging markets called Android One, which initially rolled out in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Indonesia, and other South Asian countries in 2014.

What Brands Need To Do

Google’s announcements at this year’s I/O event are very much covered by two trends emphasized in our Outlook 2017. The introduction of Google Lens marks Google’s official entry into camera-based mobile AR feature (the Tango AR platform is too inaccessible to count), a leading element in the current meta of Advanced Interfaces. The notable updates that Google Assistant received, in particular the computer vision capabilities that Google Lens brings, make the voice assistant a more helpful and intuitive Augmented Intelligence service for users. And the expansion of the Daydream VR platforms shows Google’s continued investment in virtual reality, another facet of the evolution of advanced digital interfaces.

The integration of Google Lens in Google Assistant poses some exciting new opportunities for brands to explore. For example, CPG brands may consider working with Google to make sure that Android users can use Lens to correctly identify your products and receive the correct information. For retailers, the addition of the VPS feature holds great potential for in-store navigations and AR promotions, once it becomes available to a higher number of mobile devices.

The new features coming to Google Assistant makes it a more capable contender in the fight against Amazon’s Alexa. In particular, the support for handling transactions and the “Visual Responses” should offer brands great opportunities to drive direct sales and engage customers with a multi-media experience. For auto brands, in particular, the integration of Google Assistant into some of the upcoming connected cars bring new use cases for engaging with car owners via conversational experiences. The addition of Visual Responses means it is now possible to deliver additional content, be it videos or images, about your products via Google Asistant, adding a visual component that is crucial for marketing fashion and beauty brands.

In terms of VR, Google’s initiatives should help expand the accessibility of its VR platform and get more users to watch the 360-degree and VR content available on YouTube and other Google platforms. For brands, this means increased opportunities to reach consumers with immersive content on Google-owned platforms. As more mainstream tech and media companies rush into VR to capitalize on the booming popularity of the emerging medium, brand marketers should start developing VR content that enhances your brand messaging and contributes to the campaign objectives.

How We Can Help

While mobile AR technologies and standalone VR devices are still in early stages of development, brands can greatly benefit by starting to develop strategies for these two emerging areas. If you’re not sure where to start, the Lab is here to help.

The Lab has always been fascinated by the enormous potential of AR and its ability to transform our physical world. We’re excited that Google is bringing computer vision to android devices and it allows us to develop AR experiences delivered by Google Assistant reach millions of users. If you’d like to discuss more about how your brand can properly harness the power of AR to engage your customers and create extra value, please reach out and get in touch with us.

The Lab has extensive experience in building Alexa Skills and other conversational experiences to reach consumers on smart home devices. So much so that we’ve built a dedicated conversational practice called Dialogue. The Zyrtec AllergyCast Alexa skill that we collaborated with J3 to create is a good example of how Dialogue can help brands build a voice customer experience, supercharged by our stack of technology partners with best-in-class solutions and an insights engine that extracts business intelligence from conversational data.

As for VR, our dedicated team of experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to know how the Lab can help your brand figure out how to tap into these tech trend coming out of Google I/O this year to supercharge your marketing efforts, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Google Unveils Daydream VR 2.0 With Chrome and Cast Support

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Google’s Daydream VR platform is getting its first major software revamp later this year, Google revealed during a keynote focused on VR and AR on Day 2 of its I/O developer conference. The update, codenamed Daydream Euphrates, will roll out to all phones with Daydream support as well as the standalone VR headset it is making with HTC and Lenovo.

One of the biggest new features is Chrome VR, which will let Daydream owners browse the web inside VR and launch WebVR-based content when it rolls out this summer. All bookmarks and other personalizations will also be synced to it once you sign in with your Google account.

In addition, Google is also adding a cast option so that you can mirror the VR screen on a TV via Chromecast so other people can also see what you’re seeing in VR. New screenshot and screen-capture features are also added to facilitate sharing. YouTube is also getting a VR space where you can connect with friends and watch videos as if you were in the same room.

What Brands Need To Do
Altogether, this update for Daydream VR brings some new features to make the platform a bit more user-friendly and functional, which help make Daydream to stay competitive as the race of bringing VR to mass market starts to heat up. The launch of a standalone Daydream VR headset that works without an Android phone can be a great way for Google to attract iPhone users. As VR platform continues to mature, it is time for most brands to come up with a VR marketing strategy and start thinking about how VR content may help strike a deeper connection with your customers.

How We Can Help
Our dedicated team of VR experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners and backed by the media fire-power of IPG Mediabrands, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lab can help you tap into the immersive power of VR content to engage with customers, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: 9to5 Google

 

Guinness Uses VR To Enhance Sampling Experiences At Tesco

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Guinness is adding a little VR fun to its in-store sampling promotion to entice shoppers to try out its latest line of beers. Working with R/GA London, the Irish brewer created a 360-degree video designed to transport viewers into a world of colors, shapes, and sound that Guinness says are “scientifically proven” to enhance flavors of each of its new beers. This unique campaign will take place in selected Tesco stores in the U.K. starting this month, with plans for international roll-outs set for later this year.

What Brands Need To Do
This campaign offers an innovative take on in-store samplings as it shows how a CPG brand can leverage immersive content to add some flair to your product experience. With VR technologies continue to mature and become available for mass consumers, brands should consider exploring this type of experiential marketing that truly engages with your target audiences through the kind of immersive storytelling that VR content enables.

 

Source: CampaignLive

 

What To Expect From 2017 Google I/O Conference

Posted on by Lab Team

Google is set to kick off its 2017 I/O Developer Conference on Wednesday to announce some of its latest software and hardware news. As with years past, the Lab has been keeping a close tab on Google, with special interests in the developments Google Assistant and Google Home. Here’s a round-up of all the news Google has announced so far, along with what we expect to see from this year’s Google I/O event.

Android-Powered Connected Cars
Google is teaming up with Audi and Volvo to ship car systems running on Android operating system. This means cars running Android infotainment system will also include Google Assistant, allowing car owners to use voice command to carry out various tasks such as searching on the go, asking for directions, and making phone calls. Google is expected to show off live demonstrations of the operating system running on the Audi Q8 and Volvo V90 SUVs at the I/O event.

Conversational Interfaces And Voice Assistant
In addition, Google has also updated Allo, the messaging app it introduced last year that has yet to gain much traction among mobile users, with selfie-generated stickers. Google is also making it easier for Allo users to add people to group chats by supporting QR codes for groups.

Speaking of Google Assistant, the company is also reportedly working on bringing the voice assistant to iOS devices by adding it to the Google Search iOS app. It would be a similar tactic that Amazon deployed to get Alexa on iOS, and although it likely won’t guarantee much increase in usage, it does significantly boost the accessibility of its AI-powered assistant service for iOS users.

For this year’s event, we expect to see major updates to Google Assistant as well as new its hardware partners, as Google continues to duke it out with Amazon in the smart speaker space. So far, Amazon is leading that emerging market with a 70% market share, thanks to the first-mover advantage it scored with the Echo products. Google Home is a distant second with a 23.8% share, which means Google still has a lot of catching up to do.

Standalone Daydream VR Headset
Outside the conversational assistant and smart home space, we also hope to see some updates regarding Google’s Daydream VR. First launched at last year’s Google I/O event, the Daydream VR system has not gained much momentum in consumer adoption, largely hindered by the limited number of mobile handsets supporting it. Google is reportedly going to demo a “standalone Daydream VR headset” at this year’s I/O event, according to Variety.

Beyond these key areas of interests, we also expect to see more announcements on the next generation of the Android OS, Chrome OS, Instant Apps, Android Wear, and Android TV.

Please check back later this week for the Lab’s in-depth analysis of all the things marketers need to know from Google’s I/O conference event this year. Follow us on Twitter @ipglab for our live updates.

 

Sources: As linked in the post

 

Microsoft Unveils New VR Controller For Windows 10

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On day 2 of its annual Build developer conference, Microsoft unveiled a new set of VR motion controllers for virtual and mixed reality headsets running Windows 10. The controllers will be able to work without external tracking sensors, offering “precise and responsive tracking of movement in your field of view using the sensors in your headset.” The controllers will ship later this year during the holiday season, and they will be bundled with Acer’s upcoming entry-level headset selling for $399. Unfortunately, the controllers will not work with Microsoft HoloLens.

What Brands Need To Do
As with the voice assistant space, Microsoft has a lot catching up to do when it comes to the virtual reality headsets. A recent report from IHS Markit estimates that Samsung will sell 4.1 million Gear VR units by the end of the year. IHS is also estimating that Google has sold 120,000 units through 2016, with 2.3 million selling in 2017. As VR headsets inching closer to breaking into the mainstream market, brands need to be proactive and start working with content creators to explore the immersive medium and create engaging branded content.

How We Can Help
Our dedicated team of VR experts is here to guide marketers through the distribution landscape. We work closely with brands to develop sustainable VR content strategies to promote branded VR and 360 video content across various apps and platforms. With our proprietary technology stack powered by a combination of best-in-class VR partners and backed by the media fire-power of IPG Mediabrands, we offer customized solutions for distributing and measuring branded VR content that truly enhance brand messaging and contribute to the campaign objectives.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Lab can help you tap into the immersive power of VR content to engage with customers, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]) to schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: CNET