Night Walk in Marseille

Night Walk represents a huge leap forward in how Google Stories are told, by marrying film with an immersive audio-guided urban street-safari, marking Google’s first nighttime Street View experience. Where the film ends, the online experience begins, allowing people all over the world to explore the vibrant creative culture of Marseille at night. Hundreds of high-definition photospheres allow users to take a tour with a local guide, or explore the streets and stories of the neighbourhood in any order. By capturing the sights and sounds, we transport visitors to another place. Embedded YouTube films introduce neighborhood’s street artists and locals.

Night Walk in Marseille generated over forty million social impressions, eighty-eight million PR impressions, a 15% bounce rate, and two Cannes Cyber Lions (Silver for Storytelling, Bronze for Interface Design). The project also picked up shoutouts from Wired founding executive director Kevin Kelly, The Verge, Mashable and Buzzfeed, driving traffic towards seven digits within a single week.

The idea behind this project was to bring a digitally enhanced version of Julie’s Sound Walks to the fingertips of mobile and desktop users around the world – an innovative step in the field of virtual tourism. To capture the creative melting pot of Cours Julien, we went out at night to shoot some two hundred high-definition photospheres that allow you to explore the neighbourhood from every angle. Like Julie’s Sounds Walks, the experience submerges you in the natural acoustics of the neighbourhood, with a MediaMonks-produced soundtrack that reacts to your movements as you walk and look around. As you explore, integrated Google products such as YouTube videos and Knowledge Panels enhance the experience with bespoke content and information about the places and people that you encounter – demonstrating the power of Google in real-use contexts. Furthermore, next to what is probably the most sublime way of draining your battery in the history of mobile computing, mobile users were technologically treated with recommendations that suggest similar places to visit near their own geolocation, thanks to the Google Places API.

Night Walk in Marseille might be the coolest way to stay up late during the day. The interactive experience was inspired by Julie de Muer’s Sound Walks project. Julie wanted to make it easier for people to get to know Marseille, so she began creating a series of sound walks to guide visitors through her city. 72 and Sunny fell in love with Julie's clever use of Google Maps and invited her to make an interactive version of her favourite walk – the first ever night-time Street View. Using Google’s latest products and technology, we could truly open up Marseille to the rest of the world.