VR/AR Experiential Agency
The Virtual Wild is an interactive agency with a passion for solving our client’s business challenges using strategy, design, and cutting-edge technology.
With the production of innovative and interactive experiences that are visually compelling, we produce tangible results.
The Virtual Wild works with a diverse range of clients and can create anything from large-scale immersive environments to Augmented Reality (AR), and Virtual Reality (VR) applications. We thrive in bringing visual design to life in all shapes and sizes!
We are comprised of a diverse team of interactive experts and creative designers that share an appreciation for user-centered design principles that promote conversations, inspire innovation and challenge the status quo.
Focus
Recommended Providers
Portfolio
River Legacy Discovery Room
Project Details
This project in the news:
https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/25-Million-Makeover-at-River-Legacy-Living-Science-Center-Complete-Opens-Monday-471613103.html
We teamed up with 900lbs and Delcom to create and build an interactive wall at the River Legacy Living Science Center in Arlington Tx. River Legacy wanted to help patrons learn about native plants and wildlife in an effort to foster new stewards who will help preserve parklands.
The exhibit enables kids and adults to interact with dozens of digital plants and animals as they would in their natural habitat. It features a 30ft. long interactive wall, multiple motion-tracking cameras, custom animations, and games. Among many things, visitors move their bodies and wave their arms to splash water, play with fireflies, feed animals, help fungus grow, etc. The wall constantly transitions from one season to the next to help illustrate these ever-changing environments.
Client Briefing Center “Elevation”
Project Details
Hewlett Packard Enterprise wanted to create an immersive experience that provided an overview of their solutions to common enterprise challenges.
Working with the producers of the project, 900lbs, we helped create the interactive touch table and user experience design. ‘Elevation’ is a 20-minute experience that takes 10 participants on an expedition to the peak of an immense mountain. Along the way, challenges are presented to the participants who need to work together to overcome the problem. By the time the participants reach the summit, they have a clear understanding of how their enterprise’s challenges are solved with the right solutions provided by our client.
The trek is ambassador led and uses a 12-foot long interactive touch table, 18-foot wide projection screens, and synchronized lighting queues. The results have been resoundingly positive from both the various internal departments and participants alike.
Performance Lab Mobile Trailer
Project Details
As one of its outreach efforts, the Air Force sends this mobile Performance Lab trailer to Air Shows and Sporting events around the country. The USAF objectives are to expand understanding about career paths they can offer as well as to generate qualified candidate leads. This trailer can be easily moved to multiple locations in a short period of time. It houses several interactive experiences that participants can interact with freely and that inspire conversation between the Air Force recruiters and event patrons.
We teamed up with GSD&M and ReelFX to build, maintain, and install the digital experiences offered in this tour. These experiences gamify tests of agility and reaction time. RFID bracelets are used to login to the different games and the user’s results are then displayed via an onsite leaderboard. The trailer houses 9 touchscreen puzzle games, 3 virtual reality flight simulators, and 1 motion tracking pullup challenge.
https://www.airforce.com/find-an-event
Ocean Alive: A Kinetic Experience
Project Details
This project in the news:
https://www.wfaa.com/article/entertainment/television/programs/good-morning-texas/paige-explores-earthxinteractive/287-1b9d2bb8-aedc-4bc2-8ba7-fa078ff3a301
Earth X is an international, nonprofit environmental forum whose purpose is to educate and inspire people to action towards a more sustainable future. Every April they hold a global gathering of exhibits, conferences, film, food and fun, located at Fair Park Dallas, Texas. This year an estimated 177,323 visitors attended the event.
The EarthXInteractive team asked us to create an experience that would be displayed in their Interactive Zone. The theme for 2019 was all about finding ways to sustain clean, clear, abundant water for all, and to protect our world’s oceans, rivers and lakes. In order to tell that story, TVW came up with “Ocean Alive: a Kinetic Experience.” Our aim was to spread the message that it’s up to all of us to work together in order to make our polluted oceans healthy and beautiful once again.
In this experience, visitors are transported to the bottom of the sea where they can interact with the ecosystem. The motion-tracking kinetic wall displays visitors’ silhouettes and allows them to travel around a seascape. By waving their hands, visitors can pick up trash and unlock rewards such as dolphins and colorful fish. The final reward encourages visitors to complete a custom photo backdrop composed of colorful corals and ocean life. After visitors strike a pose, their photos are sent to a kiosk where they can share their creations via social media.
Perot Museum Facial Recognition App
Project Details
One of the Perot Museum of Nature and Science’s most popular and bustling halls, the Texas Instruments Engineering and Innovation Hall has had a recent make-over. To the delight of gear heads and engineers, the hall features interactive exhibits offering a highly engaging experience for all ages to explore with the worlds of engineering and innovation. From a new engineering challenge lab, robotics centers, a facial recognition app, to wind tubes, and a crank-able mechanical sculpture, the bilingual hall showcases the science behind the tech.
The Perot Museum asked us to create an exhibit to help them to tell the story of facial recognition technology in a fun and non-threatening way. As a result, we decided to create an exhibit that invites participants to view an altered version of themselves on a large projection screen. On one side of the screen, there is also an accompanying touchscreen that provides the ability for visitors to customize a digital avatar with various features. Once a customized avatar has been completed, its features will be superimposed on all of the participants’ faces as they’re tracked in front of the screen.
Our work in the news…
https://www.perotmuseum.org/exhibits-and-films/permanent-exhibit-halls/engineering-and-innovation-hall.html
https://www.dallasinnovates.com/first-look-the-perot-museum-transforms-its-ti-engineering-and-innovation-hall
https://www.dmagazine.com/business-economy/2019/11/texas-instruments-reveals-renewed-innovation-and-engineering-hall-at-perot-museum
Dynetics HLS Website
Dynetics, a subsidiary of Leidos, and a global leader in IT, Aerospace, and Defense technologies is competing to put the first woman on the moon. Their Human Landing System, referred to as the “HLS”, is one of 3 aircraft bidding to NASA to be chosen for the 2024 Artemis Missions. In a tightly contested race and one during a global pandemic, Dynetics needed an innovative way to showcase and market their aircraft to Nasa. In the past, a physical life-size model would be built and shipped from tradeshow to events to demonstrate the aircraft. Now the requirement was a digital, easily sharable experience that would work across many devices, and was due in 10 weeks.
SOLUTION:
The Virtual Wild created an interactive website experience that visualizes the aircraft’s mission and provides hands-on exploration of its design features. Accessible across mobile, tablet, and desktop devices, this highly shareable and innovative solution also has an Augmented Reality component to visualize the aircraft in your own backyard. Utilizing the latest in Web-GL and three.js technologies, The Virtual Wild conceived, designed, and executed the complete project, on budget and on time, and is proud to help support a global leader in their quest to expand human-kinds presence in space.
Reviews
the project
Interactive Visual Design & Dev for Nonprofit Nature Center
“Whenever I needed them, they were there and aimed to please.”
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
We’re a nonprofit nature center, and our mission is to create environmental stewards. We have a 1,300-acre park that has trails along the Trinity River, and it goes from city limits to city limits. People can walk in our park trails from Fort Worth to Meridian to Grand Prairie. A trail from Fort Worth to Dallas is to be completed in the next couple of years.
I manage the program in our nature center, which is built with low environmental impact and a sustainable design. It’s an iconic building in Arlington. We also have enrichment programs for children between 3–5 years old and summer programs that are all based on the environment.
What challenge were you trying to address with The Virtual Wild?
We wanted to have an educational impact on our visitors, so we had a $2.5 million renovation project called the Discovery Room. Virtual Wild helped us with the creative work for this project.
What was the scope of their involvement?
Virtual Wild did original creative work for the Discovery Room’s screens that were 10 feet high. The goal was to deliver information about the things people would see in the park and in the forest. The screens also had many games and fun facts. We had a broken and boring exhibit hall, so another part of the renovation was making the space more user-friendly.
We received funding from different people, and we wanted the project to be educational and interactive. Moreover, we didn’t want any anthropomorphic forms in the visuals — everything had to look realistic. Virtual Wild helped us figure that out as they worked on the code, content, visuals, and concepts of the project.
What is the team composition?
We worked with Jay (Founder & Managing Director), and he led the coding tasks. He was behind the efforts of making things appear how we wanted them to. We also worked with Sarah (UI/UX Designer).
How did you come to work with The Virtual Wild?
I searched the internet for providers for a long time for this renovation project. I found a company that did the project's framework, and I found Virtual Wild through that company.
How much have you invested with them?
We spent around $500,000 on their services. Meanwhile, the whole cost of the renovation project was $2.5 million.
What is the status of this engagement?
This project lasted from January–July 2018. It was designed for content expansion, but we ran out of funds to continue the project. In the meantime, Virtual Wild is working on another project that I’ve received a grant for.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
The project’s success was huge. With Virtual Wild’s involvement, we received lots of publicity for the exhibit hall. We were able to use it as a venue for events, such as business meetings. We received positive feedback, and it became a highlight of our exhibits because children could see images and feed virtual animals on the screens.
How did The Virtual Wild perform from a project management standpoint?
Virtual Wild’s communication was excellent. I worked in the Discovery Room when it was still under construction, and their team was there a lot while explaining everything I needed to know. Whenever I needed them, they were there and aimed to please. Moreover, the project involved 13 different subcontractors, and the Virtual Wild team was patient about having to hurry up and wait. Overall, we weren’t the easiest customers in the world, but they did great.
What did you find most impressive about them?
Virtual Wild team members were creative problem-solvers. I asked them to do a few things that they didn’t do before, and they always figured things out. On top of that, Jay and Sarah were great people to work with, and I loved them.
Are there any areas they could improve?
No, there weren’t any.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
Get a presentation and a bid from Virtual Wild because they do great work. Moreover, if you tell them what you want, they’ll figure out ways to do it even if they haven’t done it before.
The project was a success, and the exhibit hall that the team helped design received plenty of publicity. It also became a highlight for visitors. The Virtual Wild also managed the project well, thanks to their excellent collaboration skills. Above all, they solved problems in a creative manner.