CNN’s content studio, Courageous, has created a 360 video ad for Norfolk Southern Trains, highlighting various elements to help people better understand the freight train industry. Via Adweek:
The movies, which people could view with Samsung Gear VR headsets at a CNN-hosted restaurant next to the convention centers in Cleveland and Philadelphia, let viewers ride atop, alongside or underneath the massive machines in a way that brought them closer than ever before.
Bruno Maestri, Norfolk Southern’s vp of government relations and corporate communications, said the goal was to help educate convention delegates, policymakers and other attendees while they were gathered in one place.
“I think what you want to take out of it is that it’s a complex industry and that it takes a lot of people,” Maestri said. “We have 30,000 people, and it takes really quality people to make this thing happen.”
In one movie based at a facility called Moorman Yard, Courageous used drones to shoot 360-degree video from above the vast railyard to show how the trains are transported.
According to Otto Bell, vp and group creative director at Courageous, the work had a deliberately “understated tone” and was inspired by the humility and pride of Norfolk Southern’s employees, rather than being highly scripted promotional material.