Client
Hydros Innovation
Project type
VR Experience
Hydros Innovation is a high end and high tech lab which develops the future of sailing and water related improvements for an energy efficient tomorrow. They are based in the EPFL in Lausanne and work on different projects that require a good visualization practice for a product that is still being developed.
Jérémie Lagarrigue, CEO of Hydros Innovation, wanted to create an experience that is used in the design process and also could help customers to understand the proportions of the product.
The development of new experience was supposed to be finished for the Monaco Yachtshow 2016 and since it was September already we only had 3 weeks left to develop and test the solution.
Our solution
For such a high quality product as a yacht priced over a million EUR it is key to guide the user through the experience in the most comfortable way.
Our own research and testing showed us a known fact in Virtual Reality development: a shared VR experience is much better when more users are simultaneously involved. We developed a solution where a presenter and a spectator could use two HTC Vive headsets and controller in one tracking space (consisting of two lighthouses) at the same time. They saw a customizable avatar representing the other person.
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Suddenly the user realized that he is still sitting on a sofa but at that moment he saw himself standing on a wooden planked jetty at the waterfront. After a few seconds admiring the sunny beaches and stunning views he saw a yacht dashing along the horizon quickly coming closer and stopping in slow motion in front of the spectator.
Now controls and info boxes are displayed and the user can switch between the interior and the deck view of the yacht with two glassy spheres.
Functionalities were included changing colors, rotating, tilting and hovering the yacht above the water to see how the foils would be retracted or deployed.
We used the same 3D assets to create a color configurator for a large seized touch table where you could easily involve prospects into a haptic conversation about the features of the yacht.