Experiencing the historic Pilsen brewery
Platypus Productions recently spent three days filming at the Pilsner Urquell Brewery in Pilsen in the Czech Republic, the historic home of the amber brew. Hired by client Ogilvy to develop an interactive, virtual reality-style application to bring the brewery experience back to South Africa, Platypus partner and film director Stanley Edwards and crew filmed the length and breadth of the ancient brewery.
"The concept was to create an immersive experience where people could be transported to the brewery as if they were walking around its nine kilometers of underground cellars. We investigated various technologies and settled on a set of high resolution video goggles, which together with a carefully crafted stereo surround soundtrack when listened to on high quality headphones, gave us the desired result," he explains.
A steadicam rig was used to give viewers an eye-level point of view. Multiple stereo audio recordings were done in the brewery to capture the ambience. "Once you have the goggles and the headphones on, you might as well be walking around the brewery," says Edwards.