An app that’s more like a fantasy world than a map for events
By: Erin Quinn
“I’m near the first pole to the front-left of the main stage” — that’s how most people at festivals find their friends. Woov founder Sebastien Westerduin wants festival goers to focus on having fun rather than wasting time navigating events. The solution was an app that allows users to download custom, interactive maps for the festivals they’re attending and track the real-time location of their friends as well as entertainment and activities at the event. What makes Woov unique is how much effort and detail goes into the design of each map; each one is artfully rendered based on the festival’s theme.
Woov uses Mapbox Studio, our visual design suite, to break the mold of flat, 2D graphics, and create world-like experiences.
This week Woov is launching a map with the Amsterdam Dance Event (ADE), a leading electronic music platform and one of the biggest club festivals in the world. ADE’s festival has 2,200 artists performing in 120 venues, attracting over 350,000 visitors from around the world.
“During ADE we will bring the city map of Amsterdam to life!” Sebastien told us. “Visitors will get a real-time overview of what their friends are doing, where their favourite artists are performing, and which events are interesting to them based on their preferences. This is unprecedented for an event of such scale.”
With such a massive lineup, it’s easy to understand why incorporating all of the festival’s content into an intuitive, brand conscious, and visually interesting map requires so much emphasis on design.
Woov’s designers have deliberately chosen a 3D style, reminiscent of a game-like, fantasy world. In their words, it’s playful but not too outspoken. The idea is that the treatment can be applied to every festival map without becoming dull or repetitive, while also remaining on-brand with the festival’s own curated look and feel.
The design team starts with a technical drawing of the festival terrain to ensure every aspect of the map translates to the real world. The next step is to generate all of the assets for the map and place them in their exact location using Mapbox Studio. These assets are things like trees, stages, vendors, signs, essentially any object relevant to the experience. The team creates many of these using the actual artwork from the event, which helps each map stand alone as a unique characterization of the festival it serves.
Sebastien explained, “The tools we use vary with every map we make. However, the tool we use most is Mapbox Studio. The ability to quickly build custom datasets combined with the many different options for adding SVG’s to our map style make our festival maps a lot more dynamic, meaning that the maps truly come alive.”
In addition to working each festival’s own colors, logos, and other creative assets, the designers also reinterpret the most important elements of a festival — like specific stage designs or landmarks — and reproduce them in Woov’s trademark style.
Woov is also experimenting with using location data to help festival attendees recap their experience based on where they went and what they actually did. Here’s an example the team put together of an “aftermovie” featuring Eric Gundersen, our founder and CEO.
Next year Woov will enter into a number of new markets, bringing its product to festival lovers from all over the world. The app set foot on US soil in early September when Woov partnered with Electric Zoo in New York City, so stayed tuned for more US events in 2018.
Looking to build a unique visual experience into your maps? Get started with Mapbox Studio or reach out to sales about designing with our tools.
Navigate the festival universe with Woov was originally published in Points of interest on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.