The Dive
Samsung
Issue 35 | June 2015
Agency
Leo Burnett Sydney
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officer Andy DiLallo Creative Directors Kieran Ots Zaid Al-Asady
Production Team
Developer Farhan Amjad Integrated Producer Laurent Marcus VR Video Production Company Rapid VR VR Video Director Taylor Steele Production Company The Pool Collective Director Christopher Ireland Sound Production Company Jam Studios
Other Credits
Samsung Clients Sharon Edmondston Misha McDonald Group Operations Director Jeremy DeVilliers Client Services Director Amanda Quested Senior Business Manager Grace Kluver Account Director Laura Dowling
Date
February 2014
Background
Samsung Electronics Australia wanted to launch the Samsung Gear VR, a new virtual reality headset, which was available for purchase as an accessory to the Samsung Galaxy Note 4.
Idea
To demonstrate the potential of VR technology, a 360-degree film was created which allowed users to explore a world they could not explore any other way – the underwater home of great white sharks, without bars, cages or breathing apparatus.
Incredible footage was filmed by Taylor Steele of sharks near Port Lincoln, South Australia, including one astounding 360-degree shot of the inside of a shark's mouth, captured when it attempted to eat the camera rig.
To give online audiences a hint of just how immersive 360-degree film can be, a Dive Shop was set up in the town of Alice Springs, 1,200km from the nearest ocean. Locals were invited to experience the shark dive through the Samsung Gear VR.
Their reactions were filmed and edited into 'Shark diving in the desert', a short content piece at http://youtu. be/1MLvt2O1Az8
The idea was rolled out to Samsung Experience Stores in Melbourne and Sydney.
Results
Not yet available.
Our Thoughts
The potential for VR is huge. It’s also going to be a market in its own right worth huge sums of money as different tech companies compete with each other to provide the hardwear and software to create the most ‘real’ experiences. Samsung is staking out its territory early with this idea, which dramatises beautifully the fact that VR is basically teletransportation. You can be in the middle of the desert but think, feel and respond as if you are 20 metres down in the Indian Ocean.
In choosing not to demonstrate the technology itself but the reactions of ordinary people to it, the agency has come up with a deceptively simple idea in response to what would have been a very tricky brief.