A next-level virtual digital event

Our challenge was to fit three days worth of activities and inspiration into three hours while making it feel like it all lasted only three minutes. To do this, we decided to create a next-level virtual experience full of energy, a little crazy and above all personal. And that’s why we reimaged the physical experience and transformed it into a virtual one by building an interactive, 3D festival map which supported 15 stages across which more than 35 presentations took place.

Simply transferring all the elements of the original festival to a virtual platform would have led to a clumsy, unsatisfying result. Therefore, reimagination was the key. To kick off the process, we started by conceptualising our vision, the platform and the architecture of the event. The concept was crucial as this became our red thread both visually but also across our communication which we could always refer back to.

With a clear theme and concept, we quickly began to build our 3D map using React Three Fiber, a front-end tool specifically engineered to manage and bring 3D experiences to life. This, in turn, connected to Zoom, Slack and Vimeo. Our designers had the first version up and running in just a couple of weeks.

Apart from designing the experience, we wanted to excite Depsters with what was to come. So we crafted an internal social campaign which included daily hints from our zebra mascot and teaser videos. These social drops excited Depsters worldwide and conveyed that this was not an ordinary Zoom event.

In two months time, we designed and built a custom made a custom 3D festival map which one could easily explore and that was protected by single sign-on. The design and layout digitally recreated the festival site from the previous four years, squeezing in 15 stages and 35+ short and snappy presentations into a 3-hour event, and included some industry heroes like Stefan Sagmeister and Gmunk. A personal welcome movie by CEO Dimi Albers and DEPT® stage hosts made everyone feel welcome. With the help of Slack and ‘social reporters’, people knew what was going on all the virtual stages, creating a healthy amount of event FOMO, before and after the event.

Because of COVID-19, virtualisation has become the new norm and this will shape the future by creating new hybrid events which combine both physical and digital elements. And it doesn’t stop with virtual events, imagine virtual product launches, remote assistance and digital campuses. Thinking bigger, one could picture entire online environments that enable organisations to exchange knowledge or try out products and services in an accessible and personal manner.

For organisations that want to explore possibilities for their virtual event and beyond, we offer services such as concepting, designing and building a virtual 3D world, supporting your brand deploy the necessary technology and security to host a large scale event in addition to helping with the production side of things. Because, in the end, life is too short to host boring events.