Real-Time Artist
Ford Explorer Virtual Test Drive
While at Imagination I had the pleasure of working on the Virtual Test Drive experience as part of the launch of the Ford Explorer.
The Ford Virtual Test Drive Experience was made using Unreal Engine 5.1 and was available on the web via pixel streaming.
The experience involved the user choosing an environment to drive through, the colour of the car and a music track before setting off on a roughly 3 minute long on rails driving experience. The user could switch between 3 camera modes: an orbiting exterior camera, a driver's view interior camera and a directed cinematic mode. Around 1/3rd of the way into each environment there was also a moment the user could choose between two paths that the car would take.
My role on the project was mainly to create the 3 environments that the user drives through. These were a desert canyon, a forest trail and a snowy mountain pass. I also set all the cameras and sequences for the cinematic mode.
In addition to the test drive experience I also worked on the virtual production shoot that was part of the launch.
Read more about the project in this Imagination Article
Desert Canyon
Forest Trail
Mountain Pass
Explorer Launch Virtual Production Shoot
As part of the launch of the Explorer, there was also a virtual production shoot where Martin Sander would stand next to the car with LED background changing. There were also several shots of the car being "driven" through the desert canyon environment which involved me setting up cameras and sequences in Unreal to match the live cameras.
The full branded experience has won the following awards:
Campaign Experience Awards 2024 in the category ‘Virtual Experience B2C’.
Creativepool Awards 2024: Branded Content, Digital Media and Wave.
Campaign Tech Awards 2024: Best Audience Engagement.
Campaign Tech Awards 2024: Consumer Goods and Retail Campaign.