When Aiwa became a subsidiary of Sony
Corporation, the consumer electronics brand
repositioned itself to create stylish and innovative
audiovisual products specifically targeted to youth
consumer markets. To express that vision, a website
was created as an online channel filled with
content based on the theme of “hybrid music.” It
was designed to be a portal for a highly exploratory
interactive experience to draw in young visitors and
allow them to absorb—and, in a sense, create for
themselves—the Aiwa brand personality.
Aiwa, and its advertising agency
Weiden+Kennedy, decided that an
effective way to market the repositioned company
was to create a buzz by developing Aiwaworld
and later, Aiwa TV. Under the creative direction
of Eric Cruz, both London and Tokyo offices of
Weiden+Kennedy worked together on the project,
collaborating first with the design collective
The_Groop and animation
studio Ocean Monsters
for Phase 1: Aiwaworld. Then, for Phase 2: Aiwa
TV, they collaborated with the interactive agency
Hello Design. The three latter design firms took on
the project with a creative brief that requested they
build a unique online environment that offers a “new
topsy-turvy experience.”
Creating the unexpected
As a result of this effective collaboration, several creative
teams were successful in creating a wacky animated
world as visually rich as it is surprising. Jose
Caballer, creative director of The_Groop, proclaims
that Aiwaworld is “a place where rules don’t apply,
from gravity on.” Hello Design’s creative director
David Lai adds, “We focused on creating the unexpected.
There are a lot of hidden elements waiting
to be discovered.”
Because Aiwa is a global company making products
that cross cultures, the site needed to do so as
well. Very little text is used. Instead, colorful graphics
of sky, trees, houses, people, and creatures—inspired
by Japanese pop culture—are coupled with sound
snippets from a variety of musical genres. Sounds and
sights can be mixed and morphed in an interactive
world that demonstrates the idea of creating hybrids.
The_Groop and animators Ocean Monsters
(led by creative director Jack Peng) created Aiwaworld’s
look and feel. Ocean Monsters developed
the “Aiwamals” and “Sonics”—the unique creatures
that populate the world. Hello Design then worked
to seamlessly flow the content from Aiwaworld into
the second phase, Aiwa TV, a world within a world
developed to create a space for additional content.
Weiden+Kennedy commissioned two illustrators,
Mumbleboy and Tokyoplastic, to create the work
that exists in Aiwa TV.
Pushing Flash technology
There is complex technology and programming
behind this enchanting world. The site is all Flash
based, and contains an e-mail application and parallax
engine, both designed by Hello Design specifically for Aiwa. The parallax or depth engine allows
for 3D animation on more than one level. It lets
users roll over an item that then zooms forward.
Objects like floating bubbles seem to come from
nowhere in the horizon-less space, drawing users
into the online world to play. This unique interface
is also nonhierarchical, so users themselves choose
what to explore by simply clicking around until
some adventure takes hold of their imagination.
