<div>Even in virtual reality, it seems, there will be no escape from advertising. The Oculus Rift, which is owned by Facebook, won’t be available until early next year, but many of the two billion consumers worldwide who own smartphones can try out virtual reality on the cheap with Cardboard, a device from Google that folds into a viewer with a slot for a smartphone. As more devices come to market with the aim of making virtual reality more commonplace, advertisers and agencies hope virtual reality will be the next great medium for persuading consumers to buy stuff.<br /><br />For now, marketers are producing mostly eye candy in their own apps and on YouTube’s #360Video channel. But with virtual reality shows, movies and stories coming soon, the question is what kind of ads, if any, will work on the platform. Companies including Coca-Cola, Volvo and HBO are struggling to figure that out. So are publishers, including Facebook, which introduced 360-degree ads recently, including video ads from AT&T, Nestle, and other brands. The first obstacle is that it is not yet clear what kind of programming besides games will catch on in virtual reality to provide a place for that advertising.<br /><br />“There’s lots of spectacle, but I can’t name one great story in VR,” said Ben Miller, director of content development at WEVR, a virtual reality entertainment and technology firm in Venice, California. And without a clear consensus on what sort of content will succeed in virtual reality, it’s difficult to predict what form the advertising will ultimately take. For advertisers, success in the new medium will depend on finding the equivalent of the 30-second TV spot or the digital search ad.<br /><br />Like juiced-up View-Master toy stereoscopes, virtual reality headsets such as the Rift allow viewers to navigate 3-D videos and animations. The 360-degree images and sound shift with the user’s head movements, tricking the brain into reacting as if it were all real.<br /><br />Very real <br />In one scene of a virtual reality video shot for the outdoors retailer the North Face by the production house Jaunt, mountain climbers leap off a sheer rock cliff in Moab, Utah, before opening parachutes. “VR is a way to create intense moments and rich, enveloping experiences that can help bolster a brand’s story,” said Adrian Slobin, global innovation lead at the digital agency SapientNitro. It also accommodates old-fashioned branding, like the big North Face logo that hid Jaunt’s 360-degree camera rig in the video.<br /><br />In April, the luxury denim designer 7 For All Mankind, Elle magazine and Jaunt co-produced a minute-long impressionistic vignette of a model walking around a French chateau. It was intended more to let the brand bask in the reflected glow of the shiny, new technology than actually to show off its spring line. “We were, like, ‘Wow, how cool and exciting and new — we’re in,’ ” said Barry Miguel, 7 For All Mankind’s president.<br /><br />The main event, though, will be advertising that occurs inside other virtual reality content. Samsung, maker of the Gear VR headset, which is due out this month, has announced a virtual reality video service for which David Alpert, an executive producer of The Walking Dead, plans to create a fictional series. <br /><br />One option for advertisers is to go native. TV commercials can certainly be annoying, but as miniature shows, they fit naturally into the medium. A 360-degree video that Gatorade released this year, for instance, would be welcome on a virtual reality sports channel. <br /><br />The video puts viewers inside the computer-graphics-enhanced body of the Washington Nationals slugger Bryce Harper. They hear his thoughts as he takes pitches at the plate before hitting a home run over a fence bearing Gatorade’s logo and tagline. The most effective ads will probably be interactive, because there is no multitasking while wearing a headset. <br /><br />MediaSpike, which creates in-game product-placement ads, has demonstrated an ad for virtual reality games that lets viewers drive a car through a city and stop to watch a movie. Another option is to provide utility. Several carmakers have created virtual test-drive apps that would make compelling ads. <br /><br />Many advertisers will slap old tropes and formats onto the new medium. No one will be surprised to see 30-second TV spots shot in 3-D or food chopper infomercials on Sunday morning VR-TV. They might even work. <br /><br />But for how long? Today, the banner ads that have sustained thousands of online publishers have become so annoying that millions of people are installing software to block them entirely.<br /><br />Thomas A Furness III, international director of the Human Interface Technology Lab at the University of Washington and a pioneer in the world of virtual reality, said using this technology was “like writing on the brain with indelible ink.” Some in the advertising industry suggest there is an opportunity for a fundamentally new approach in what will be the most intimate medium yet. In virtual reality, brands will need to make their own leap into the unknown. <br /><br /></div>
<div>Even in virtual reality, it seems, there will be no escape from advertising. The Oculus Rift, which is owned by Facebook, won’t be available until early next year, but many of the two billion consumers worldwide who own smartphones can try out virtual reality on the cheap with Cardboard, a device from Google that folds into a viewer with a slot for a smartphone. As more devices come to market with the aim of making virtual reality more commonplace, advertisers and agencies hope virtual reality will be the next great medium for persuading consumers to buy stuff.<br /><br />For now, marketers are producing mostly eye candy in their own apps and on YouTube’s #360Video channel. But with virtual reality shows, movies and stories coming soon, the question is what kind of ads, if any, will work on the platform. Companies including Coca-Cola, Volvo and HBO are struggling to figure that out. So are publishers, including Facebook, which introduced 360-degree ads recently, including video ads from AT&T, Nestle, and other brands. The first obstacle is that it is not yet clear what kind of programming besides games will catch on in virtual reality to provide a place for that advertising.<br /><br />“There’s lots of spectacle, but I can’t name one great story in VR,” said Ben Miller, director of content development at WEVR, a virtual reality entertainment and technology firm in Venice, California. And without a clear consensus on what sort of content will succeed in virtual reality, it’s difficult to predict what form the advertising will ultimately take. For advertisers, success in the new medium will depend on finding the equivalent of the 30-second TV spot or the digital search ad.<br /><br />Like juiced-up View-Master toy stereoscopes, virtual reality headsets such as the Rift allow viewers to navigate 3-D videos and animations. The 360-degree images and sound shift with the user’s head movements, tricking the brain into reacting as if it were all real.<br /><br />Very real <br />In one scene of a virtual reality video shot for the outdoors retailer the North Face by the production house Jaunt, mountain climbers leap off a sheer rock cliff in Moab, Utah, before opening parachutes. “VR is a way to create intense moments and rich, enveloping experiences that can help bolster a brand’s story,” said Adrian Slobin, global innovation lead at the digital agency SapientNitro. It also accommodates old-fashioned branding, like the big North Face logo that hid Jaunt’s 360-degree camera rig in the video.<br /><br />In April, the luxury denim designer 7 For All Mankind, Elle magazine and Jaunt co-produced a minute-long impressionistic vignette of a model walking around a French chateau. It was intended more to let the brand bask in the reflected glow of the shiny, new technology than actually to show off its spring line. “We were, like, ‘Wow, how cool and exciting and new — we’re in,’ ” said Barry Miguel, 7 For All Mankind’s president.<br /><br />The main event, though, will be advertising that occurs inside other virtual reality content. Samsung, maker of the Gear VR headset, which is due out this month, has announced a virtual reality video service for which David Alpert, an executive producer of The Walking Dead, plans to create a fictional series. <br /><br />One option for advertisers is to go native. TV commercials can certainly be annoying, but as miniature shows, they fit naturally into the medium. A 360-degree video that Gatorade released this year, for instance, would be welcome on a virtual reality sports channel. <br /><br />The video puts viewers inside the computer-graphics-enhanced body of the Washington Nationals slugger Bryce Harper. They hear his thoughts as he takes pitches at the plate before hitting a home run over a fence bearing Gatorade’s logo and tagline. The most effective ads will probably be interactive, because there is no multitasking while wearing a headset. <br /><br />MediaSpike, which creates in-game product-placement ads, has demonstrated an ad for virtual reality games that lets viewers drive a car through a city and stop to watch a movie. Another option is to provide utility. Several carmakers have created virtual test-drive apps that would make compelling ads. <br /><br />Many advertisers will slap old tropes and formats onto the new medium. No one will be surprised to see 30-second TV spots shot in 3-D or food chopper infomercials on Sunday morning VR-TV. They might even work. <br /><br />But for how long? Today, the banner ads that have sustained thousands of online publishers have become so annoying that millions of people are installing software to block them entirely.<br /><br />Thomas A Furness III, international director of the Human Interface Technology Lab at the University of Washington and a pioneer in the world of virtual reality, said using this technology was “like writing on the brain with indelible ink.” Some in the advertising industry suggest there is an opportunity for a fundamentally new approach in what will be the most intimate medium yet. In virtual reality, brands will need to make their own leap into the unknown. <br /><br /></div>