Challenge
Given all of the above factors - Universal (who as a client we have a long held relationship with) and Whitacre were looking to pull all these strands together and use digital media and social connectivity to create something groundbreaking in the Classical sphere and beyond. They had an idea of a ‘Virtual Choir’ - a global choral line singing in time with Eric’s conducting. And more, they wanted to break a World Record. And even more, they wanted us to come up with a unique way to create a global, social visualisation of this ground-breaking initiative.
Given all of the above factors - Universal (who as a client we have a long held relationship with) and Whitacre were looking to pull all these strands together and use digital media and social connectivity to create something groundbreaking in the Classical sphere and beyond. They had an idea of a ‘Virtual Choir’ - a global choral line singing in time with Eric’s conducting. And more, they wanted to break a World Record. And even more, they wanted us to come up with a unique way to create a global, social visualisation of this ground-breaking initiative.
Solution
Eric launched the Virtual Choir initiative posting: “Here we go, gang. For ... the Virtual Choir we will sing ‘Sleep’, and this time around, we’re shooting for the Guinness title of “world’s largest Internet choir.” We’ll need at least 900 singers, so all of you are invited. Any age is welcome. Please visit the Official YouTube page to see the instruction videos and the conductor track, and visit the Virtual Choir page to download the sheet music. Let’s make history!”
Planning
The call had gone out. Participants are encouraged to record themselves singing a piece of specially created music via their personal webcams. Only later would these videos will be ‘composed’ into an international virtual choir. The problem for Universal was that they had no destination for presenting the video submissions as they were being contributed, and no way of illustrating the global perspective of the project. For fuse8 this was an ideal opportunity to utilise the power of the Google Earth API.
Delivering
For us this was an ideal opportunity to utilise the power of the Google Earth API. We created a custom Wordpress plug-in that allows videos to be placed on Google Earth according to the contributor's location based on their YouTube profile. The result is a simple yet powerful combination of YouTube content and Google Earth which demonstrates how far the Virtual Choir project is reaching across the globe.
Delivering the larger project saw us work closely with Semper Fi, an agency supported by Whitacre and operated by and for US Combat Veterans with Disabilities.
Results
The ‘virtualizing’ of the video submission through Virtual Earth led to a real boost in peoples video submissions towards the record attempt; meaning people could see their fellow choresters and truly get to grips with the global nature of what they were part of. Whitacre blew away the previous record; more than doubling the amount of choresters participating from the previous record. And what’s more, the final ‘composition’ of the track being sung, Whitacre’s ‘Lux Aurumque’ (edited together with great skill by Scott Haines) is simply a beautiful choral work.