Buffalo Trace Distillery Virtual Tour
UI DESIGN
VIRTUAL REALITY TOUR
After the success of the Craft Your Perfect Bourbon digital campaign, we conceptualized and pitched a Virtual Reality Tour of the 400-acre national historic landmark - Buffalo Trace Distillery.
We believe that in the near future, “virtual experience” will evolve out of the limited entertainment usage, and becoming more of an experiential platform for users to virtually experience a branded location or space. Any location-based brands such as educational entities, museums, parks, restaurants, pop-up events, and of course, Bourbon distilleries! Brands can extend messaging that traditionally can only be experienced through physically being on location, will be able to be delivered virtually.
Two years in the making, building a fully interactive, photorealistic, and scalable digital replica of Buffalo Trace Distillery was an ambitious task. We started by going to Frankfort, Kentucky to shoot and collect ed high-res reference materials, drone photography, archival architecture blueprints, measurements, and texture samples of every inch of the entire distillery. Then we reconstructed the distillery building by building in 3D and developed using the Unity engine for full interactivity.
PHASE ONE
For phase one of the Buffalo Trace Distillery Virtual Tour (BTDVT) project, we launched with 3 different tours: The Hard Hat Tour, that features the making of the greatest American Whiskey. The Distillery Tour, which focuses on the historical facts and overall distillery grounds. And the Barrel Tour takes users through the journey of oak barrels from charring to aging. In addition to the 3 tours, we’ve also added a teaser of a phase two: the Time Machine, which takes users back to 7 periods of time in the history of Buffalo Trace Distillery.
PHASE TWO
In Phase One of the BTD Virtual Tour experience, we have laid out an amazing replica of the 400 acres distillery for users all over the world to tour around and learn about the National Landmark Distillery, virtually. In Phase Two we have integrated some additional fun for fans to challenge themselves and other Bourbon lovers around the world on a Bourbon Trivia game. Users will set out to find hidden bottles around every corners within the virtual distillery and unlock up to 69 Trivia questions and compete scores on the world leaderboard!
THE RESULTS
BTD Virtual Tour’s Phase One received a 20% download rate from the 24,000 landing website visitors. As we continue to add fun and engaging features, such as Phase Two Trivia, we are expecting to see a greater engagement metrics in the coming months!
Project Credits: BajiBot
Vincent Mei – Creative Director
Tyler Furstoss – Art Director
XueZhen Xia – UX Designer
Hui Du – UI Designer
Annie Tsui – Sr. Digital Producer
Tech Magnitude – Dev
