Virtual Tours
"If I’d had toys like these in my childhood, I’d have grown up to rule the world!"
D. Pyatnolyov
How easy it used to be to amaze people. A piece of clay petrified in fire would provoke wonder. A train “come to life” on a screen inspired delight. A flight into space gave a feeling of omnipotence. Today’s inhabitants of our planet are not so easily impressed. This “happiness inflation” has led to a demanding and impatient attitude toward everything around us. The insatiable thirst for ever-new devices and gadgets is commonly attributed to laziness and lack of time. In the name of saving precious minutes, so many devices and mechanisms are being created that the world around us is becoming ever more self-sufficient: robots drive vehicles, cook meals, entertain our children, do the laundry, clean, repair things, and even remember for us.
So what are we busy with? We watch, study, analyze, choose, buy, and sell. We consume. And to make all of this as convenient, fast, and intuitive as possible, we keep adding more and more tools to our arsenal.
What are virtual tours?
A virtual tour is a very convenient and highly visual marketing tool that allows you to showcase not only individual parts of a space but the entire area as a whole, giving the viewer the ability to move through it independently — all without leaving their couch. With a virtual tour, a person becomes not just a passive observer but an active participant in the virtual excursion. This technology is applicable to nearly every field — real estate, entertainment and leisure, education and medicine, manufacturing and agriculture, retail and tourism.
Types of virtual tours
There are three main types of virtual tours.
1. Video tour shot with a 360-degree camera
This type features journeys through already existing spaces, sometimes enhanced with computer graphics. Modern panoramic cameras shoot video at a resolution of 7680×3840, achieving incredible image clarity. The cameras can be mounted on ground vehicles or drones for aerial footage.
This kind of virtual tour works well in dynamic settings, such as showcasing amusement parks. The one drawback of this format: it’s essentially a pre-recorded video, where the route is strictly predefined.
2. Photo tour shot with a 360-degree camera
This type allows the user to explore all objects in a given space in static mode. Thanks to marker-based viewpoint switching, the length and depth of the experience depend solely on the user, who decides where to move, what to zoom in on, and which point to visit next.
3. Three-dimensional tour based on a game engine
Our favorite type of virtual tour, because it allows you not just to wander virtually through places you have no time to visit in reality, but also to visit places that don’t exist at all.
All the content of such tours is created in 3D editors originally developed for video game production. Since the content isn’t pre-recorded (how could you film what doesn’t exist yet?), the user has the freedom to roam the chosen location and interact with any objects inside it. Such journeys are ideal when experienced through virtual reality headsets, and the use of stereo rendering allows all objects to appear three-dimensional. The only drawback to this type of virtual tour is a limitation on realism, dictated by the limited processing power of VR headsets. But we know how to overcome that. It’s possible — but costly.
3D panoramas or virtual tours?
What to use to showcase your business, products, or services depends on your goals. To show, for example, a car’s interior — a single 3D panorama is enough. But if you want to “step out” and “walk” through the showroom halls, a virtual tour is indispensable.
The thing is, a 3D panorama is essentially a single panoramic spherical image that can be rotated within a 360-degree view. A virtual tour is a collection of panoramas combined into one conceptual structure. With virtual tours, users can “walk” through all the panoramas, moving from one to another based solely on their own preferences and interests.
Capabilities of virtual tours
Virtual tours open up a vast scope for our creativity — and for our clients’ unique worlds. What’s inside your tour depends only on your needs and imagination. Our task is to shape and synthesize it all so that the user is not just impressed once but truly hears and remembers the message you want to convey.
What can a virtual tour be?
A virtual tour should be special. Uniquely yours. All menu elements, fonts, color palettes, and stylistic features of interactive add-ons should be individual. Fully aligned with your brand identity, accomplishing all set tasks, and invariably leading to your desired goals.
Information inserts in virtual tours. A very illustrative and useful feature. Instant answers to questions raised by what the user sees. Information windows, pop-up tips, description cards, infographics of all kinds — from encyclopedic definitions to emoji — anything that cannot be explained by a picture alone can be engagingly supplemented.
Map and radar.
No matter what kind of journey you’re sending your viewers on — a thrilling pirate tour of the Caribbean, a thoughtful stroll through an art gallery, or a presentation of a high-tech manufacturing process — give them the ability to navigate your virtual space on their own. A simple floor plan, a treasure map, an interactive Google map with transition points, a radar, or even a compass — all these tools will be an added advantage for your virtual tour.
Sound.
How many people among your friends love silent films so much that they prefer them to sound ones? Probably not more than two. Sound in a virtual tour transforms staring at a screen into a truly immersive experience. Background music, ambient noise, special effects and jingles, a narrator’s voice-over — these are the audio amplifiers and flavor enhancers of your virtual tour.
Integration of photos and videos.
Why not? Why should a person have to look elsewhere if, right here in your virtual space, they can watch a YouTube video, browse a series of photos and video clips about a subject, process, phenomenon, or event they’re interested in?
Applications of virtual tours
Real estate and construction
You can explain to someone a hundred times what shade the wallpaper takes on when the setting sun shines through the turquoise curtains in a new apartment’s living room. And they’ll still imagine something different from what you meant. Or you can, in just one click, send them a hybrid virtual tour and 3D visualization that shows how the new building fits into the existing landscape, lets the potential buyer see the apartments from inside, look out the windows, walk through the rooms, inspect every corner, “lie down” on the bed — and understand that the apartment is worth buying, though the light fixture in the hallway could probably use replacing.
Hotels, guesthouses, and resort complexes
It doesn’t matter what you own — a small, cozy guesthouse, a chain of hotels, or a wellness complex. Truly excellent service begins with acquaintance, and virtual tours are the perfect tool for remotely showcasing all your services.
Food service and entertainment venues
The saying “better to see once than hear a hundred times” is one hundred percent true when it comes to cafes, restaurants, nightclubs, karaoke bars, and other entertainment spots. What some find delightful may disappoint others. Unrealistic expectations are worse than bad publicity. That’s why virtual tours featured on the websites of food service and entertainment establishments are not just a modern trend — they’re a true necessity.
Shopping malls, stores, showrooms
For retail businesses, virtual tours are also indispensable. No other form of advertising lets customers adequately appreciate the scale and assortment of goods and services. A virtual tour gives clients the choice — what to look at, what to focus on, and from what angle. This significantly boosts trust in the brand as a whole and greatly increases the chances of turning your potential customers into devoted ones.
Industrial and agricultural enterprises
Let’s be honest — if a client sees with their own eyes that your eco-friendly, delicious, natural mayonnaise is not mixed in washing machines but produced with state-of-the-art equipment under the highest safety standards, their trust in your brand becomes absolute.
Advantages of virtual tours
How are virtual tours different from other marketing tools?
Virtual tours combine all the advantages of advertising media with maximum accessibility, interactivity, and visual clarity. The client’s online introduction to the brand happens whenever and wherever it’s convenient for them.
Virtual tours can be placed on countless online platforms, distributed on individual media, used as an addition to presentation materials at exhibitions, forums, and conferences, and be part of educational, entertainment, and tourism programs.