Brands and agencies face a tough challenge when trying to engage consumers inside a store. Typically, display advertising is the preferred method but this tactic comes with its own set of obstacles: Difficulty in grabbing busy people’s attention, managing content so it doesn’t become outdated and measuring success.

Now, imagine being able to communicate with consumers in a more interactive and meaningful way, with content that is relevant, entertaining and provides an experience that standard print or video ads do not. By utilizing the latest technologies, brands and agencies can tell a more compelling and personalized story that will engage their audiences.

The possible applications are endless, but as with all technology it’s a race to do it best. It was under these circumstances that Redox was approached by ARHT Media about creating a system that would leverage proximity detection and augmented reality (AR) and offer something more enticing and interactive.

Over the course of a year, our collaboration led to the creation of a unique platform to elevate the technology of interactive displays. This new system is programmed to appropriately pair content with the viewer, and allows brands and agencies to remove the guesswork when evaluating engagement.

Platform provides tools for integrating different types of digital content that weave together a memorable and personalized story, which is also visually mesmerizing and interactive. Because of the Unity3D* real-time game engine, the platform allows for playback of real-time 3D assets, multiple streams of broadcast quality video, live web pages and live streams.

Seamlessly integrating different technologies on one platform is complicated. This system allows content creators to use familiar tools already popular in the industry, but also allows you to employ new and really cool features.

Creative directors have access to sophisticated playlist functionality, which allows them to use real-time, proximity-based information in storytelling.

Some of the features include: the ability to show different content to different viewers based on gender, age, time of the day, how many people are paying attention and how engaged they are. A viewer could control content by touch or with hand gestures or voice commands, making it truly interactive and inclusive. The result is a personal experience.

Another feature is positional tracking. By attaching a virtual camera to the viewer’s head we can track their movement creating a pseudo 3D effect on a flat screen. What this does, among others things, is allow the user to walk around the object and experience it from different angles. It creates the illusion of a physical environment for them to play in. Also, it’s really cool.
A viewer could control content by touch or with hand gestures or voice commands, making it truly interactive and inclusive.

Another important component of the platform is its ability to interact with mobile devices by generating unique location based QR codes as well as Bluetooth beacons. This allows for a wide range of interactions between online and offline, bringing the two closer together.

Using Kinect and Bluetooth beacons, the system can detect how many viewers are nearby, where they are looking and for how long. The system can also determine gender, approximate age of viewers and provides insights into which content resonated the most.

The web portal allows agencies to manage multiple end devices for multiple clients; it’s also a sophisticated CMS for video/audio and 3D content that automatically syncs with devices.
Clients can view reports on real time proximity data for each device/location, i.e. how many people viewed each clip, how many interactions happened and other pertinent data.

This system provides a lot of benefits for agencies and brands: greater insight into engagement and viewership, immersive content that is more personalized, the ability to leverage proximity detection and ultimately to tell a story with greater impact. It will help you hold the attention of a busy and demanding audience for a longer period of time, and once you have their attention you can easily integrate next steps of your customers’ journey, i.e. sign up, purchase, feedback, etc…

We are proud of our work with ARHT on a revolutionary and unique way to deliver a new visual experience to a wide audience.