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March 29th, 2011
by T2 + Back Alley Team
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Augmented Reality Brings Touch and Feel to Online Shopping

Online shopping has entirely changed the way that consumers seek out the goods they want. And augmented reality (AR) is bringing touch and feel to the online shopping experience. According to eMarketer during 2010, ecommerce reached $165.4 billion dollars last year. This is 14.8% growth over last year!

But even though online shopping has enabled us to skip the lines, poor dressing room lighting, get what we want at better prices and avoid pushy sales people – there’s often still an inherent desire to actually touch and feel the products we’re interested in buying. Augmented reality and other experiences are changing the way people shop – and making the online shopping experience infinitely more personal.

72% of consumers find ratings and reviews on retail sites very important in the shopping process and another 50% will spend a half hour or more reading reviews about the product they are interested in. Despite this reliance online product information – many still wait to purchase the product in person. Research has shown the consumers are four times more likely to buy a product once they’ve held it in their hands.

What if technology allowed to you virtually “touch and feel” the product you desire from the comfort of your home?

Electronics giant Olympus wanted to see what consumers’ reactions would be if they did just this when rolling out their new SLR hybrid camera. People shopping for cameras typically want to touch the camera, feel its shape, size, how it feels in their hands, where the different controls are located, etc., and, naturally, that has usually required a trip to a brick and mortar store. Knowing this is an important element of the buying experience, Olympus wanted to provide consumers a hands-on opportunity with their new product – without having to head to a retail store.

Olympus’s ad agency, Mullen encouraged the brand to use Total Immersion’s augmented reality (AR) tool, D’Fusion@Home. Since this was a unique product rollout – Olympus and Mullen built a site specifically for this campaign. Consumers went to the site to look at camera specs and go on a product tour. If interested in more in-depth information, consumers were prompted to load the D’Fusion@Home AR plug-in and print out a paper marker. When printed and folded the marker produced a scale-size representation of the camera. The coolest part? Once AR reproduction appeared on the consumer’s screen, key features (shutter button, flash switch, video record etc.) were highlighted with bulls-eye targets that consumers could click to see how they function. Consumers could also set the ‘product’ on a tripod and snap a few digital pictures which they could also share via Facebook. Experience, experimentation, sharing – this campaign pretty much had all the bases covered.

Check out this demo video Olympus provided:

A Demonstation of Olympus Pen Augmented Reality from edward boches on Vimeo.

Combining online shopping with a virtual ‘touch and feel’ opportunity proved to be quite successful for Olympus. More than 22,000 consumers watched the product tour and 51,000 interacted with the product via augmented reality. Although online shopping may make our lives easier, this case study reinforces the fact that products become more memorable when we have a ‘hands on’ interaction at some level.

Much like we mentioned in our recent post about the Picasso exhibit, one of the great things about augmented reality is that it allows more opportunities for consumers to interact and connect with products (whether it’s art, music or consumer goods) regardless of geographic limitations.

February 23rd, 2011
by Lindsay Howgill
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Picasso In the Digital Age

Picasso, Virginia Museum of Fine Art

With the help of QR codes, augmented reality and marketing in Starbucks stores, even Picasso is making the leap into the digital age.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA) unveiled its highly anticipated show, “Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris” on February 19th. Art shows of prolific artists like Picasso seem to draw a decent crowd on their own – so why use technology to promote the show?

Accessibility. VMFA was the only east coast venue selected for the exhibition’s seven-city international tour. By leveraging QR codes and virtual galleries, VMFA is able to share this exhibit with thousands that otherwise might not have been able to see the exhibit.

To pull off this feat VMFA teamed with Martin Agency, a Richmond-based advertising agency that helped them create virtual “galleries” in Washington D.C., New York and Philadelphia. To create these virtual galleries Martin tapped Layar, an augmented reality app developer.

How does it work? Simple. If you’re in the vicinity of these select locations, your phone will detect it, and the app will allow you to view one of Picasso’s works hung virtually in your surroundings. In addition to the augmented reality app, they also provided QR codes to 33 Starbucks locations, enabling coffee seekers to scan the code and view Picasso’s works while waiting for their coffee order.

We here at T2 + Back Alley are pretty excited about this clever and innovative promotion of the Picasso exhibition. For us, art is something that can transcend time and societal limitations and inspire.

In our book, smart digital marketing is proving to help make so many aspects of life – including art and music – more accessible to consumers.

October 14th, 2010
by T2 + Back Alley Team
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Augmented Reality – It’s Out of This World

Alright, so it’s only imaginary ‘out of this world’ but new augmented reality technology is being used much more by advertisers to blur the line between the real world and the virtual world. If you’re not hip to augmented reality (or AR), blogger Nick Brucher explains that AR is “based on holding a 2D image up to a webcam and then seeing a 3D image on screen.” Advertisers initially began offering consumers AR experiences through specially designed micro sites. For example, BMW developed this site so their consumers could experience using a Z4 coupe painting a canvas in a TV spot.

AR is now being integrated into both mobile and print executions, too. Mobile applications include things like AroundMe which allows consumers to locate restaurants, bars, museum etc., wherever they are simply by holding up their smartphones and VegasReality, designed by MGM Mirage, which merges real Vegas and virtual Vegas and delivers new ways to explore hotels, restaurants etc.

Print publications are making their magazine issues more dynamic by integrating AR. In the most recent issue of UK’s Grazia – readers were not only able to read about the dynamic front woman of Florence + Machine they were also able to make her sing and dance around.

One of the most dramatic integrations we’ve seen recently is being executed by JC Penney in partnership with Heart’s Seventeen.com to create a virtual dressing room. The days where consumers have to roll the dice and gamble on a piece of clothing they’ve purchase online are, in some instances, a thing of the past. Shoppers will automatically be fitted during the live-video stream (no symbols or pieces of paper here), and motion capture technology then enables users to “try on” different clothing articles they like by simply pointing at the screen. Here’s a video on how the dressing room will work:


Demo via Nick Burcher

Innovative magazine publishers and brands are turning to AR more and more and we think it’s awesome. AR allows readers to go beyond the pages and actually interact with the content. And, especially when it comes to the fashion industry, we’re seeing more and more of the players in the industry not only creating clothes, but creating innovative web content – and consumer experiences – as well. Teri Rogers wrote about that over here, and if you’re interested (and she’s always interesting), go check it out.

Bottom line, any time you can engage consumers on a deeper level it’s a big benefit. In the context of online shopping, AR enables consumers to better visualize what an item will look like on them – and can actually enhance the shopping experience – and most, important, help close the sale.

September 15th, 2010
by Teri Rogers
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Kansas City’s T2 Lab: Exciting Experiential Design Underway

The Lab at T2, which specializes in experiential design executions as well as augmented reality, has some great projects underway and some surprises in store. If you love pop culture, keep your antennae up over the next few months.

One thing that’s not a surprise is a sequel to the award winning “T2 Massacre” one year later. Dubbed “Haunting in the Crossroads,” this one will happen during Kansas City’s traditional First Friday in the Crossroads event in October – and will have a distinct Twilight Zone feel. Not to give everything away, but we can tell you that this “experience” will be super cool and something to put on your “don’t miss” list.

We’re also working with Berry Plastics on an augmented reality piece. They make the plastic cups for lots of fast food chains. When you log into the url and activate the AR marker on your cup, you’ll get a personalized musical experience. Each cup will be different, having a variety of music genres and ways to customize, create, and share your song creation through your interaction and manipulation. We’ll share more on this exciting augmented reality project soon.

Experimentation and creative play is always a part of The Lab and we are working with Arduino Technology, testing all sorts of sensors like touch, breath, velocity, brightness, and temperature. With this super accessible technology we are measuring the real world, which can create the bridge, further connecting the digital world with the real world through various “experiences.” Stay tuned for more details on both of these projects.

January 19th, 2010
by Garrett Fuselier
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Augmented Reality

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On any given day, you will most likely interact with numerous online interfaces, typing emails, shopping online– all by clicking around on a screen with a cursor. But, what we’ve come to develop as a society is a flat environment, one that is hard to interface with on a spatial level. Most importantly, our interactions have become almost unintuitive, and we have to do a great deal of cognitive thinking just to click on a link. Augmented Reality, merges these two worlds, bringing digital, 3-dimensional environments into your immediate surroundings. Just as the name suggests, it enhances our perception of reality by adding new, dynamic pieces of information that couldn’t exist naturally in the real world.

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