Degrees of Immersion: Use 360-Degree Video to Create Compelling Storytelling

Great storytelling is immersive in that it draws readers orlisteners in and transports them to a different world. Even low-tech readingcan be an immersive experience for an avid reader who’s found a grippingpage-turner. In an immersive language class, the target language is the onlylanguage used; non-speakers are forced to figure out from context and bybuilding on previous days’ learning. Technology provides new formats forcreating immersive experiences, offering the potential to create eLearningexperiences that can capture and hold learners’ attention.

The ultimate immersive experience, virtual reality, remainsout of reach for many eLearning designers. To bridge that gap and createaffordable immersive eLearning, consider 360-degree video. Here’s a guide towhat it can—and cannot—accomplish when used as part of an eLearning program.

Put learners at center of action

Using 360-degree video puts the viewer literally in thecenter of the action. If the space where a story takes place is central to the eLearning,or if examining a location is a component of the eLearning, there’s no bettertool. Using 360-degree video is strongly recommended for any scenario in which learnersneed to see a place, the people and items in a place, or, especially, thejuxtaposition of people and items. Two-dimensional photography or video cannotalways convey the visual aspects of a place adequately or give viewers a fullsense of what it’s like to be there; 360-degree photography or video offers afuller perspective.

Movement is an important element of 360-degree video. Thecameras can move through a space while handheld, on a dolly, or on a drone. Thistype of movement can be uncomfortable for some viewers to watch, though, causingeffects similar to motion sickness. Stabilizing the video during editing canhelp alleviate the problem.

Alternatively, the videographer can remain stationary andrecord the movement around a fixed spot, which can bring the space to life forviewers. Instructional designers should choose stories for 360-degree videocarefully: Static scenes are poor candidates because learners won’t remainengaged in an immersive story with no action!

Immersive video is not a panacea. Like any technology, ithas strengths and drawbacks. In traditional video, the camera has a singlefocal point and all viewers see the same thing. But when viewing 360-degreevideo, whether on a laptop or tablet or using a headset like Google Cardboard, learnerscan turn around, look up, and look down. They control the focal point—whichmeans that they decide what to look at and when. This has severalimplications:

• If there is any activity going on that couldcatch learners’ eyes and distract them, the learners are likely to focus theirattention on it.
• The video is still linear in that it will end.If a learner hasn’t turned or looked at an important element, and the videopasses that point, that learner could miss critical information.
• Learners’ focus might also center on an area oritem in the video in ways that the instructional designer did not anticipate.

The lack of control over what learners see and when is amajor difference of 360-degree video; if an eLearning course requires thatlearners focus on a particular area of the video or there are must-see elements,360-degree video might not be suitable.

Bringing eLearning to life

With learners in the driver’s seat, 360-degree video isuniquely able to bring a scene to life. It is commonly used for virtualtours—of college campuses or real estate properties listed for sale, forexample. Advertising and journalism have embraced 360-degree video in sometypes of storytelling as well, going after the emotional response that a moreimmersive experience can evoke.

Destery Hildenbrand, a learning specialist at RockwellCollins, said that it’s possible to record video of an expert speaking about anarea or event, then overlay that person’s audio—and even video—onto the 360-degreevideo for an expertly guided “tour.” At his DevLearn 2016 discussion, Hildenbrandsolicited suggestions from attendees for using 360-degree video to enhance eLearning.Ideas included:

• Narrated tours—of a city, a museum, a nationalpark, or a historical site—where the instructor provides commentary as thelearners “participate” in the tour and can look around the site whilelistening.
• Using 360-degree video to augment safetytraining would allow learners to identify and spot problem areas, demonstratingtheir proficiency in assessment tests. Firefighters could study scenes that cannever be re-created by viewing a video over and over.
• Naturalists and park rangers could use360-degree video to teach learners about fragile ecosystems and parts ofnational parks that are inaccessible or closed to the public.
• Companies with multiple sites could use360-degree video tours during onboarding to acquaint new employees with theirfacilities and with colleagues around the world.

An even more economical, and less distracting, option is 360-degreephotography. It is still photography, not video. However, providing the full360-degree view of an environment, even as a one-moment snapshot, delivers a farmore immersive experience than a single shot or a photo essay. Both 360-degreevideo and photography are visually immersive, but neither allows the learner tointeract with the environment.