Henry Cowling On the Return of Virtual Reality

UNIT9’s VR creative director tells us how and why the format will change the world in this Q&A from Cannes.

Why has VR seen a resurgence in the past few years?

There are several factors contributing to the resurgence of VR over the past few years. The existence of a vast and lucrative gaming market has made innovation and investment in VR economically viable, which has driven a cluster of companies (including Google Cardboard and Oculus VR) to develop the world's first viable consumer headsets.

Add to this a consumer demand that has been bubbling away since VR first captured the public’s imagination back in the 90s and the existence of a global creative community tinkering away with every imaginable form of VR content and you have something that's going to change the world.

Is it all down to tech advancement or is it easier to convince people now?

The new technology has made it possible, in fact easy, to convince people of the significance of VR. All you have to do is find a sceptic and put a headset on them with some quality content (by which I do NOT mean the rollercoaster app everyone seems to have tried) and you have a new convert.

How important is VR becoming to the creative industry and brand marketing?

We are just beginning to see the impact of spatial storytelling, by which I mean both virtual and augmented reality, on brand marketing. 

These technologies allow brands to give audiences fully immersive media experiences - it’s a new relationship between brand and consumer, which as an advertiser I find very exciting.

VR enables brands to paint their values on a much wider canvas. We can transport users in an almost real sense, to new worlds and experiences. I expect to see the rise of a new breed of agency that will specialise in connecting with audiences this way. 

There is already a tremendous desire among agencies and brands to give consumers virtual experiences. Typically this takes the form of installations, but as the online audience for VR continues to develop, we'll see virtual films, games and apps proliferating in the same way their 2D counterparts already do. 

At UNIT9 we’re already working with a wide range of clients on VR projects: automotive brands, tourist boards, alcoholic beverages, financial institutions - even the betting industry. It demonstrates the appetite that is building for branded virtual reality content.

Tell us about one of your recent innovations and how you’ve used VR to help a brand’s cause…

We recently released a virtual reality product called Get in the Race for the UK bookmaker William Hill. It’s the first of its kind, using GPS trackers on horses to drive a virtual reality recreation of the horse race so that consumers can experience a live horse race from the jockey’s point of view. Get in the Race will be available on branded Google Cardboard headsets and at installations in William Hill shops.

A 360º film-based VR campaign created by UNIT9 was for the Canadian tourist board, taking users on an incredible journey to British Columbian. For me the most interesting innovation was the use of our bespoke 360º steadicam rig "Johnny 5" which allows us to move the camera in a way that's truly cinematic. There is sort of a received orthodoxy in VR that you can't move the camera, but this is simply untrue as long as it's very steady. During filming we attached the VR rig to all manner of things including boats and drones, giving the viewer a visceral experience of being out in all that natural beauty.

What sort of presence do you think the VR medium will have at the Festival this year?

We'll see a VR circus at Cannes this year! There will be cardboard headsets carried around on silver platters like canapés at VIP receptions. I also expect to see lots of VR case studies among the awards entries, particularly in the innovation and experiential categories; many of these will be our own work.

How likely is it that there’s room for a VR category at Cannes Lions in the future, or will it just fall into one of the existing ones?

For Cannes to be relevant there has to be a VR or spatial storytelling category in the near future. I don't see how it can be bundled in with other work as it's very different on a craft level. 

What, for you, makes a great VR innovation and what from the last 12 months has impressed you?

On the technology side the most exciting single innovation of the last 12 months is Google’s Cardboard VR headset. When it was first released, I don’t believe I was the only one who thought Cardboard was a belated April fools gag - the technology is so simple and that’s what makes it effective.

It works by inserting your own smartphone into an origami headset and downloading an app or streaming VR content directly via your browser. The user experience is not as immersive as high-end headsets, but the technology democratises virtual reality, making it available to anyone with a smartphone. 

Cardboard headsets can be made and distributed cheaply and en masse by brands looking to build an audience for VR content ahead of their competitors. It’s a major innovation.

On the content creation side, I’m most excited by VR filmmaking that tackles narrative form storytelling cinematically. We are still learning what's possible here, but I think it's an important step for VR to reach the mainstream. Simple questions like how do you guide the viewer to notice something important? How do you create tension in a scene? The kind of thing that's now very established in film but is all very new territory in VR.

How important has data been or will it become for the medium and research?

As VR matures it will open up a scary amount of personal data. We will learn intimate details about how users follow stories and what captures their attention, because it's possible to track every movement of their heads. 

What are you most looking forward to taking away from this year’s festival in terms of learning and inspiration? What will be the hot topic, do you think?

How much rosé can be consumed at Tom's Table, UNIT9's infamous, long running Cannes bash.