The Benefits of Experience: How Wildlife Brought Fun and Artistry to Events in 2023

There’s no faking the magic of real, in-person moments. It’s the feeling of walking down a street bathed in Christmas lights, of bumping into an old friend, or of taking in a show that leaves you speechless. 

In the years since the pandemic, there’s been ongoing discussion about the virtue and value of digital events. Citing examples like Travis Scott in Fortnite, many in the industry have looked to virtual worlds to reach audiences as life becomes more and more digital. But that juxtaposition between real-world events and tech-enabled online moments is a false choice. As 2023 has shown us, the most striking experiences come when more ‘traditional’ concepts intertwine with cutting-edge technology and sheer, simple fun to create something truly unique. 

That theory has been put into practice multiple times over the past twelve months by Wildlife, the creative production studio based in Los Angeles. Working with clients like Amazon and Blizzard, the Wildlife team has had a hand in producing iconic works of art, delicious cocktails, and converting a typical family home into an actual drive-thru, all in the name of crafting moments that live long in the memory. And over the course of doing so, they’ve worked with tools as varied as a simple paintbrush to AI-powered algorithms.  

To pick back through it all and looking forward to an exciting future in the experiential category, LBB caught up with Wildlife’s co-founder and ECD Scott Friedman. 

The Cathedral of Diablo 

Since the release of the previous Diablo game, a decade had passed. That explains why fans of the iconic game series - which sees players delve into the bowels of hell itself to rid the world of demons - were so hungry for the franchise’s fourth instalment. 

So, something big and ambitious was needed to match the scope of the game. That’s why the Wildlife team were called upon by 72andSunny and Activision Blizzard for a remarkably high-concept activation: Crafting a massive, hand-painted battle on the vaulted ceilings of a historic European church. 

“We needed a mind-blowing location for our fresco, and the painting couldn’t be just a piece of concept art”, says Scott. “We needed real brush strokes, real canvas, and centuries-old techniques from a master of the Baroque style to capture the timeless story of good and evil”. 

The result that followed was arguably one of the biggest art projects to be found anywhere in 2023. An enormous piece of art - painted across 24 vault panels on a 40-foot high wall scene  - met visitors to the Chapelle des Jesuites, a cavernous gothic cathedral in Cambrai, France. Adam Miller, a Florence-based Baroque painter and instructor, worked with a team of six artists to create the hand-painted masterpiece depicting an in-game battle. 

Meanwhile, Wildlife helped to figure out the considerable design challenge. The result was a seriously head-turning piece of work which had the dual benefit of creating a space that can support content for trailers, music videos and also in person viewing. 

“We took an ancient artform and delivered it on a modern timeline”, notes Scott. 

Defense Decoder

In order to highlight the intelligence of Amazon Web Services’ AI-driven insights - plus a partnership with the NFL - Wildlife was brought on board to create a unique experience at AWS’ annual re:Invent conference. 

“We put together a large-scale arcade game to tell a story about AWS’ machine learning, which meant communicating something complex in as simple a way as possible”, explains Scott. “To demonstrate their high tech partnership we brought the latest NextGen Stats insights to lifeIn this case we turned machine-learning insights powering Blitz Probability into a show-stopping interactive game where guests needed to act on those insights as a quarterback try and score a touchdown in a high-pressure, late-game situation”. 

As visual cues and AI insights about the defensive schemes were fed to users, participants had to use the information to inform their next choices in order to march downfield and reach the end zone in just sixty seconds. 

“The game’s main challenge is managing the clock and deciding whether to act quickly to make selections with less data and insights or to take more time, waiting to utilise more AI-powered data on screen at the risk of more time ticking off the clock”, says Scott. 

The result was an experience which brought AWS’ AI-insights capabilities to life in a way that was remarkably accessible for visitors. 

The Tyson Crave-Thru

Sometimes, the most satisfying meals taste just like home cooking. But Tyson’s Crave-Thru project took that idea to spectacular new heights, with GSD&M enlisting Wildlife to help create a pop-up drive-thru from an unassuming, regular suburban home. 

The delightful project came to life thanks to smart and thoughtful design, hooked around developing a seamless user journey. “We needed to set up the right elements of an experience that would offer surprise and delight, as well as provide a world to capture content within”, notes Scott.

And so, no detail was left out. Custom-made packaging, a 20-foot sign, and an electronic orderboard were all constructed to give the impression of an amazing one-off experience. “Thanks to our charismatic talent, we took orders on demand and captured the action with everything from hidden cameras and bite-reviews to soaring drone footage and beauty shots”, explains Scott. 

It’s another example of how outside-the-box thinking helped contribute to a one-off event that left an impression - and tasted great, too. 

Bedrock Bartender 

There’s a lot of delight in the unexpected. And this activation, this time promoting AWS’ generative AI services, nailed that formula. 

Using generative AI, users could step up,tell an AI mixologist precisely how they were feeling - and receive a bespoke, mood-reflecting cocktail recipe to match it. Better still, they could take that recipe up to the bar where a bartender would bring that recipe to life there and then. 

“Users step up to a kiosk, type in a feeling, a flavour, or any kind of prompt response and our system tapped into generative AI models to think like a skilled bartender and generate a drink recipe, name, and description”, explains Scott. “The kiosk then prints out a recipe ticket for human bartenders on site to mix up for our guests to drink. They also can scan a unique QR code for their drink, and get a shareable social image of their bespoke recipe”. 

The innovative approach set imaginations - and not just the artificial ones - racing as visitors rushed to discover their own personalised drinks. And the social-friendly graphics were simply the cherry on top (or perhaps the slice of lemon on the side). 

It’s precisely these kinds of experiences that we’re most likely to remember. It’s not about whether it takes place on a screen or not - what matters in the world of experiential is whether it’s fun. And Wildlife’s output in 2023 stands as a compelling blueprint for where to find that fun at the intersection of technology and creativity.