Extending the campaign beyond the seasonal TV epic, MPC Creative – MPC’s in-house content creation studio – developed a ground-breaking 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.
My responsibilities included devising intuitive methods for user interaction within virtual reality environments and helping developers to develop the communication framework between headsets, users, and servers.
This is the first commercial interactive VR experience to use Leap Motion technology, synchronised with Oculus headsets, to allow users to control their interactivity with their own hands, without the need for gaming controllers. It’s also the first VR experience to introduce video capture of the user experience, with instant composition of users into the 3D garden scene, as opposed to the traditional approach to video capture which captures only the viewpoint of the user at any given time.
Not only can users immerse themselves in the environment of the spot through MPC Creative’s VR experience – a 3D camera mounted in-store captures the user, creating a real-time video composition that merges what’s happening in the real world and the VR one. This allows spectators to get a better idea of what’s happening in the store, and provides a fun, 15-second clip for people to share with their friends.