With its creative audacity and conquering spirit, Dior widens the gap in the digital innovation field by creating its own virtual reality headset called “Dior Eyes”, the world’s first combination of VR imagery technologies and sound recording in 360°.
THE BRIEF
Innovate with a retailtainment approach for the launch of the new Dior make-up range DiorShow with a unique immersive experience. Guidelines :
- Fun and innovative
- Audience: large audience, in store
- Celebrate a new era in the relationship between Dior and its customers: sharing a brand new content form and retail experience.
- Create a never seen before experience unique to Dior universe
- Immersion into new Dior Show make-up range
- To be deployed worldwide by june 2015 (3 month production)
INSIGHT
Client behaviors around the word have seriously evolved: they talk, they share, they comment. Client experience is now about consistency and emotion, because emotions are more profitable than messages. People don’t want reasons to buy products, they want true bonds. We decided to create a genuinely thrilling experience that would give Dior clients the physical sensation of living the Dior show backstage. We knew that people are very intrigued by what’s happening behind the curtains, so we decided that we wanted to give them the opportunity to see it all, something that would truly give a glimpse into the backstage.
CONCEPT
BACKSTAGES IN 360° VIRTUAL REALITY Dior’s customers find themselves backstage at the recent Ready-to-Wear fashion show, entering the intense world of the make-up artists as if they were right there.
SOLUTION
DIOR EYES We decided to create our very own virtual reality headset inspired to develop the kind of immersive, thrilling, innovative experience we wanted. A tailor made virtual reality headset that immerse user inside the Dior backstage by using 360 audio and video deployed in Dior’s selected points of sales worldwide.
PRODUCTION
From the beginning, we wanted to do something that very few people have ever experienced: to make it genuinely immersive and put the participant in control of the experience. So we came up with the solution of creating our own headset adding a 360° sound. We designed and produced a 100% 3D-printed VR headset. The headpiece embeds a high density screen (515 ppp) providing a 2K image resolution, in other words hardly pixelated, associated with a FOV (Field of Vision) close to 100°. This technological feat of vision is completed with holophonic audio sound, recorded live in 360° thanks to a binaural microphone that perfectly recreates a “spacious and enveloping” sound sensation following the user’s movements.
ARCHITECTURE
Dior Eyes include: A smartphone with a high density screen (515 PPP) and a tailor made VR app capable of rendering 360 audio and video. High quality speaker Two lens that transfert the image from the screen to the viewer. Three leb backligth capable of production a big amount of lumens to enlighten the Dior logo and the ear bud. An electronic board and a Lithium battery that manage the lighting of the Dior logo, the charging of the smartphone and the led battery.
DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY
To create such a complex object there is no direct ligne, all the parameters and constrains interact together and it’s nearly impossible to take them in account without a very long design workflow. As we only had 3 month to product a series of headset, we have chosen to follow a fast prototyping methodology. All the features and functionalities were split by priority into different categories and designed and tested by iterations. The use of 3D printing and electronic prototyping were used to make each iteration as fast as possible. Designed for an emerging technology, on a device wholly owned and operated by DIOR, there were no notable restrictions or regulations. We were mindful, to give the most realistic possible impression of an immersion in a Dior show backstage within the Experience.
R&D : CHALLENGES
FOV & VIDEO QUALITY
To create an immersive VR experience, we needed to deal with 3 parameters that are all linked together and that need to be take in account in the choice of the lens focal and diameter. After trying a lot of different lens we have chosen a 40 mm focal and a 35 mm diameter lens.
LIGTHING & FAST CHARGING
As the headset is wireless, we needed a way to charge both the phone inside and the battery used for the lighting of the Dior logo. Main constraint were to have a “fast charging” function for the phone and the battery and to keep viable the USB data access to the phone so we could update the app and the content.
3D PRINTING QUALITY
The 3D printing were the perfect solution because it helped very quick interactions however the drawback is the quality and resistance of the material. We have tried different materials, PLA, ABS and finally used NYLON because it’s lighter and stronger.
360 AUDIO & VIDEO
360° video is a well known technology but having an audio recorded played at 360° is a true challence. We have used an holophonic microphone, we also have develop an algorithm capable of orienting the sound depending of the headset spacial position.
RESULTS & EXPECTATIONS
“Dior Eyes” provides both the most immersive VR experience ever seen, as well as a unique 360° performance, all created in an advanced design… The “Dior Eyes” headset is a key development as part of the trend for fun and innovative “retailtainment” strategy. Dior widens once more the gap in the digital innovation field. Beyond the innovation, an intense moment is captured in a single beating heart at the Dior Fashion Show: “The show starts backstage”.
PRESS
- Fubiz : “Dior Eyes”
- Independent : “Virtual Diamonds and Dior Eyes : Could augmented reality be about to revolutionise”
- L’ADN : “DigitasLBi lance un casque VR pour Dior”
- Design Boom : “Dior designs a headset for unprecedented backstage access to fashion shows”
- IQ by Intel : “Passion for Fashion Fuels AR and VR Couture Trends”
CREDITS
- Head of Labs : Julien Terraz
- Creative technologist : Nicolas Petremann, Stephane Allary
- Project manager : Alexandre Suriano
- Account director : Arnauld Wechsler
- Video directors & Motion designers : Louis Blaise, Olivier Dubocage, David Sultan, Javier Sacristan Rodriguez
- Creative directors : Laurent Nuyen, Jey Ziegelmeyer
- Art directors : Joane Antien, Nicolas Saint Paul
- Software developers : Peder Sandqvist, Martin Krafft from DigitasLBi Sweden
- 3D Print : WiShape
- Couture: Rouge Satin