AR provides a new avenue for expression and collaboration with fans through a medium that inherently requires user participation. Fans can walk inside of a traditional music video and see and hear things in a completely new 360° point of view. This affords a new level of engagement that creates meaningful connections with fans in a world of snackable content.

This project was a partnership between Childish Gambino, Google, MediaMonks with technical support from Unity3D. The mandatories were simple: use a multiplayer portal in AR that lets fans step into Childish Gambino’s world. The brief was open: Explore the creative limits of Childish Gambino’s brand philosophy and the narrative elements of his new album.

This was a shared AR journey through Childish Gambino’s music that encouraged fans to participate in a sacred communal space where they could unlock the hidden meaning of his brand and explore a cosmic journey. Gambino’s message hints at a deeper meaning, a purpose to life, and Augmented Reality does reveals just that by transforming the real world with enhanced graphics. We teased out these concepts on multiple levels. Fans are presented with a portal to a magical but hidden world. At first glance it appears to be a simple game, but when fans dig deeper there’s a cosmic journey that awaits down the rabbit hole. Many visual metaphors and easter eggs hint at a sort of digital Plato’s Cave where a 2D world springs to life in 3D.

The target was two fold. 1. Childish Gambino fans 2. App developers interested in developing augmented reality apps. Using a cultural icon such as Childish Gambino who’s approach challenges norms was a perfect fit for a new technology that layers new meaning onto the real world - AR. Our approach leveraged AR as a new storytelling medium and not simply a gimmick.

We deployed a cross platform (iOS & Android) AR app that used Cloud Anchors, the latest multiplayer AR tech from Google and Unity3D. This app was the world's first multiplayer AR musical experience and invited users to take a journey through Childish Gambino’s musical universe. The app was launched at Coachella to correspond with Childish Gambino headlining two nights and a physical installation created for the Pixel 3.

The app was selected to be featured on the Apple app store and was downloaded 50k+ in the first week. It also received major press coverage from VanityFair, Billboard, Venture Beat, VRScout, Engadget and many more 100M+ impressions.