2020 Brand Experience & Activation

SNB FORUM

TitleSNB FORUM
BrandSWISS NATIONAL BANK
Product/ServiceINTERACTIVE MEDIA WALL
Category C03. Exhibitions / Installations
Entrant IART Basel, SWITZERLAND
Idea Creation IART Basel, SWITZERLAND
Production IART Basel, SWITZERLAND
Production 2 IDEE UND KLANG Basel, SWITZERLAND
Additional Company EMYL GMBH Basel, SWITZERLAND
Credits
Name Company Position
Elisa Berlin iart ag Administration
Marcel Colomb iart ag Software Engineer
Markus Ebbighausen iart ag Software Engineer
Stefan Gerber iart ag Software Engineer
Lenard Gimpel Idee und Klang Sound Designer
Beat Grossniklaus iart ag Craftsman
Christoph Grünig iart ag Craftsman
Oliver Hagmann iart ag Project Managemer
David Hänggi iart ag Technology Manager
Simon Hauswirth Idee und Klang Sound Designer
Raphael Höglhammer EMYL Scenographer
Jonas Huber iart ag System Engineer
Thomas Jochum iart ag System Engineer
Patrick Kessler iart ag Craftsman
Johannes König iart ag System Engineer
Martin Kovacovsky iart ag Media Designer
Guillaume Massol iart ag Software Engineer
Jan Pistor iart ag Media Designer
Valentin Spiess iart ag CEO
Wolfgang Szabó iart ag Project Manager
Lukas Tschümperlin iart ag Financial Manager
Reto Weljatschek iart ag Hardware Engineer

Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation?

The Swiss banknotes are an omnipresent and essential product in every resident’s life. They are used and seen on a daily basis. However many people don’t know much about the work and history of the notes’ issueing institution, the Swiss National Bank. Key motivations behind this project were conveying a more open attitude towards the general public and raising awareness about the history, products and tasks of the Swiss National Bank.

Background

SNB Forum is an information and events centre at one of the head offices of the Swiss National Bank. It is located in the heart of Zurich’s banking district and opposite the highly frequented town square “Bürkliplatz”. In the newly renovated historical building, the bank created a zone which is separated from the highly secured remainder of the office building. The placement of the public centre outside the security parameter is a first for the SNB and part of a move towards more openness. The zone contains multiple seminar rooms and a street-facing public area. The brief was to create an attraction for passersby to invite them into the building and to communicate the history, the various tasks and products of the central bank. It leads into a second adjoining room containg an information centre in which visitors receive leaflets, use public workstations and request books from the bank’s library.

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

Our idea was to create an immersive, free-standing media wall for visitors to explore the history and tasks of the SNB and the new Swiss banknote series. The media wall can simultaneously be operated on both sides by several people. On the front, visitors are invited to interact with large-scale digital versions of the Swiss banknotes. Time, light, wind, water, matter and language - the visual core elements of the banknotes - can be experienced. This is done through interactive scenarios: virtual butterflies flutter around and land on the visitors' fingers, clocks and prisms are moved, dandelions and paragliders are given lift. The rear side offers access to a wide range of historical and theoretical topics. Here the design is factual, but the interaction is sophisticated: Up to four visitors can simultaneously move the parameters of individual content by touch. A detailed historical panorama of the SNB's tasks unfolds.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

The media wall displays the banknotes in a size, resolution and brilliance never seen before. It attracts passersby from the street inside the public area of the bank. Once inside, visitors can further discover the tiniest details of the design and contents of the new banknotes by manually turning the notes using touch gestures. By tapping on a banknote, an interactive journey unfolds, conveying the main topic of a specific banknote as an emotional audio-visual experience. An interested public of all ages, invited scholars, employees and passersby can further explore the history and tasks of this important national institution on the rear side of the media wall. An interactive application allows up to four simultaneous visitors to sift through a vast universe of information drawn from a connected content management system. Content can be kept up to date and changed at any point.

Describe the execution (30% of vote)

The media wall was specially designed and engineered for SNB Forum and opened in October 2019. Measuring 5 x 2.3 metres, it features 24 x 55-inch screens, 20 loudspeakers, and weighs 1800 kg. The wall offers real-time 3D-playout on 12K, multi-channel audio and infrared multitouch for four people on each side. In addition, a sophisticated water- and air-cooling system and a mechanism to swivel the wall by 30° was implemented. An interactive application provides texts, images and videos taken from a connected CMS. Each banknote was photographed 80 times on each side from continuous angles using a specially developed photo booth. 160 individual images form a sequence. This allows each note to be swivelled vertically through 360° – and all details and light reflections appear in unseen magnitude. Based on the main topic of each note, the virtual journeys were developed using a game engine.

List the results (30% of vote)

The immersive media wall is the Swiss National Bank’s first permanently public touchpoint – and an important part of its efforts towards a more open relationship with the general public: “Switzerland is just great. What other country thinks in such detail and offers its citizens such interesting things? In other countries at most a website is made.” Comment by a reader of the Swiss newspaper 20minuten.ch “And suddenly the butterflies of the 20-note come to life.” Quote from Swiss newspaper NZZ