Experiential Design Series: Creating an Experiential Design
By Christine Neas
In our previous post of this series, we discussed what Experiential Design is. Now let’s explain how to create an installation.
Thinking about how the experience will look and feel from the customer’s perspective is vital to the success of your campaign. As with any campaign, content is a guiding component of an experiential design project, but budget, timeline, and the actual installation space are also aspects of your project that must be determined before design can begin. Once the primary four components have been established, you can move forward with creating your experience.
ELEMENTS: Common elements used in Experiential Design.
Immersive Environments: Often created with a projection or a screen and are a great technique to captivate your audience’s attention.
Video: Video installations can range from two to thousands of screens with the power to transform ordinary spaces into engaging experiences.
Interactive: This type of installation can be large or small and can be displayed in any media format.
Graphics: Colorful, oversize graphics can be used to gain attention, tell your story and provide the initial marketing message.
Video Mapping: When the element of surprise is needed, it’s a versatile and portable technique that can adapt to any surface. Video mapping can be interactive.
Augmented Reality (AR): Augmented reality is used when you want to add an existing environment. Visitors see the room they’re in while experiencing some altered form of reality - a digital overlay to their environment.
Virtual Reality (VR): To be considered VR, visitors need to be fully immersed and usually need to wear a headset.
Holographic Installations: When you want to bring animated objects into the real world, holographic techniques are used but are usually very expensive.
CONTENT: How to use content in your Experiential Design.
Relevant Content: Do your graphics convey the relevant information and a compelling message? Your content should tie together your brand story, goals, message, visuals, video and anything else you are using in your installation.
Relevant Materials: Do your materials convey the relevant experience? it’s important to keep the materials in the design on track with the message you want to convey. For example, if environmental sustainability is your theme then it makes sense to print with recycled and ethically sourced materials. If you’re promoting a luxury brand, then investing in high quality materials over cheap synthetic ones is the way to go.
Creative Design: The design of experiential graphics refers to both the overall architecture as well as the specific design elements that will make your brand stand out. The graphics theme should be bold, clean and capture the audience’s attention. Simplicity is key and good design will transcend time.
Impression: Ultimately you want the experience to be useful to the customer. The average person is constantly bombarded by ads and will not give a second glance to anything that has no value or message to them personally, so make sure your design has a reason to exist. Your goal: Will your visitor find the experience worth talking about?
Interaction: This one is the most fun! How would you like your visitors to interact and to what degree? Take time to consider what visitors might find the most enjoyable, interesting or engaging. The best exhibits encourage easy interaction that creates a sense of fascination.
User Experience: A positive experience is the goal of your installation. Make sure your visitor can learn what they want about your product or service quickly and easily.
Experience Accessibility: This applies to both the content and physical space of your design. For example, if your target audience is kids then make sure to design at their eye-level. If it’s for an audience that speaks a different language, ensure the exhibit is multi-lingual.
Have questions about experiential events or would like help designing an experiential exhibit? Let’s collaborate! Contact Creative Fuel Co. today and we can help your stand-out from the crowd!