Our AR Campus Tour is Live!

How do you better engage university applicants during a campus visit? To support their 2022 Offer Holder Days, we've been working with Bath Spa University on a one-of-a-kind Augmented Reality Campus Tour app. Inspired by the rise of immersive technologies to captivate audiences with dynamic, interactive media content, the AR Campus Tour app aims to bring Bath Spa’s Newton Park campus to life, adding an extra layer of digital magic over the already beautiful surroundings in order to encourage applicants to see the often hidden opportunities, networks and successes that define a student’s university experience.

The AR Campus Tour app was informed by our latest R&D and insight into immersive audiences, drawing on research into the psychology of immersion and how different audiences value and utilise immersive technologies. Led by Immersive Promotion Design's Matthew Freeman, the project was a collaboration with ZubrVR, who built the app and shot bespoke immersive content using 180-degree and 360-degree cameras. It was also a university-wide initiative, supported by Bath Spa University’s Marketing, Student Opportunities, Accommodation, Technical Services and Senior Management teams.

Manifesting as a trail across Bath Spa’s Newton Park campus, the app invites visitors to track down posters inside campus buildings. When the posters are scanned, an augmented reality experience is triggered before your eyes. One moment you’re being magically transported inside a live TV production shoot and a dance rehearsal. The next moment you’re being greeted by one of the university’s Pro-Vice-Chancellors, who pops out of a poster. There’s also the chance to quite literally step inside 360-degree digital recreations of student projects as well as the university’s student accommodation spaces, and to hear from a number of student voices sharing their stories of how they’ve thrived at university.

Talking about the AR Campus Tour app, Matthew said:

“Many people have recognised the potential of immersive technologies like virtual and augmented reality. Up until now, though, few UK universities have harnessed such technologies to better promote the university experience to its student body.

We know that going to university is about developing skills and knowledge for a future career, but it’s also about forming new networks and connections, and benefitting from impromptu opportunities and creative learning – most of which is often invisible to the naked eye during a one-off Open Day. The AR Campus Tour app is our way of starting to make some of these invisible university experiences visible for everyone to see.”

Explore the project on our Case Study page, or watch the full walkthrough video below.