THE MOST ICONIC BUILDING IN BERLIN
Symbol of Germany’s East-West division and reunification, the Berliner TV Tower is the German capital’s most emblematic building; it has been listed as a German Historical Monument since 1979. From its 200m height, you can admire the whole city.
The TV Tower is a landmark in Berlin’s cultural life. It’s a well-known and beloved icon for Berliners, and for tourists traveling to Berlin, it’s a must-see site. Operated by Magnicity – Berliner Fernsehturm, the global leader in elevated urban leisure, the TV Tower welcomes guests from around the world to discover the city in a new and original way.
OUR GOALS
At the end of 2021, the TV Tower launched a project to create an innovative experience for all its visitors. In addition to modernizing the Tower’s image while retaining its status as a historical icon, the project aimed to enrich the visit with a new experience that had to meet the standards set by Magnicity:
- educational, it reveals and shares the history of the city,
- Immersive, it plunges visitors into another world.
- Technological, bringing maximum realism to the experience
- Memorable and unforgettable for those who live it.
- Accessible to the widest possible range of visitors.
THE BERLIN’S ODYSSEY EXPERIENCE
When you arrive at the tower’s observation platform to admire the landscape, you look at the city differently. You try to decipher and understand it. And you’re curious to know how Berlin has developed over time. We created Berlin’s Odyssey as a unique animation that takes you back in time to retrace the city’s history. In May 2022, this unique and unprecedented journey through time was launched!
The result is a breathtaking 15-minute journey through time. Visitors experience 9 centuries of Berlin’s history in Virtual Reality. Seated in the center of the TV Tower’s reception area, guests are equipped with a virtual reality headset, they embark on a unique journey over the German capital. They see it evolve from the Middle Ages to the time of the Empire and discover the daily life of 2 families, one living in West Berlin, the other living in East Berlin, before the reunification of Germany. Surprising and moving, it is accessible to all, including children aged 6 and over.
In 2023, TV Tower completes Berlin’s Odyssey with a second virtual reality adventure at the very heart of the building and its hidden secret spaces: “The Berliner TV Tower discovery “. This time, the journey takes visitors back to the technological challenge of its construction, the modernity of its appearance, the Tower’s “backstage” and even its summit… You discover the Tower as never before, through an impressively realistic rendering, and take measure of the importance this monument still has today, for the city and its inhabitants.
The music, that accompanies each video, and the voice-over add an emotional charge to this unique experience of Berlin.
AN IMPRESSIVE WORK OF EXPERTS
The film is the result of extensive historical research and meticulous, highly realistic motion capture reconstructions to create a combination of original 3D creation and selected video and photo archives. For these 2 videos, the Berliner TV Tower teams worked with the startup Timescope and supported the project in several ways:
Selecting the periods of focus in the city’s history, the locations shown, information about the tower, the video’s voice-overs, and the sequences to be shown for everyday scenes in the 2 Berlins.
Storytelling, by working on the voiceover texts faithful to the history in both form and content to offer a narrative to keep you thrilled and engaged.
SUCCESS OF THE CHALLENGE
Praised by locals and inaugurated with the city’s Mayor, Berlin’s Odyssey was created in only 8 months for the 1st film and 5 months for the 2nd, and already more than 60000 visitors did it!
Magnicity Berliner Fernsehturm is taking edutainment to the next level: from deep archive research to an accessible and fun experience of History.
Partners
Timescope