R/GA Singapore turns Uber’s annual rider retrospective into animated music videos

Uber and R/GA Singapore have once again collaborated to create interactive and shareable visualizations of the way people moved across Asia-Pacific cities in 2017.

Year with Uber turns trip data into personalized, animated music videos, bringing to life memorable moments enabled by the ride sharing service in the past 12 months.

A multitude of region-specific locations, instantly-recognizable scenarios and characters were designed for the 2017 experience, alongside a modular soundtrack allowing seamless splicing with the vibrant, stylized visuals.

In all, there’s a base of 5,000 story and song combinations, but when each rider generates their Year with Uberretrospective, content will not only be location-specific, it’ll be unique thanks to the complex, bespoke story engine built by R/GA Singapore. Users in Thailand see tuk-tuks, while those in Singapore encounter elaborately coiffed Tai Tais (wealthy aunties); for Aussies, the iconic Melbourne Cup and Sydney’s New Year’s Eve fireworks are a highlight, while in India the national sport of cricket features. Festivals and holidays are also represented, including Ramadan and Deepavali.

Capturing the nuanced use of Uber in different markets was as integral to the project as the tech that powers it, said R/GA Singapore’s Senior Technology Director, Laurent Thevenet.

“Because Year with Uber needed to sit at the intersection of creativity, innovation and culture, we invested as much effort into representing local character as building an engine that could stitch together the elements instantaneously,” said Thevenet. “We analyzed the possible data combinations and translated them into specific scenarios. These scenarios were then stitched together to form the full user story, creating a true data-driven film. The complexity is concealed, making it an engaging user experience that seems effortless.”

According to Eshan Ponnadurai, Director, Brand and Strategy (Asia-Pacific) at Uber, the campaign takes inspiration from the everyday experiences of Uber riders across over 100 cities in the region.

“Our goal every year is to surprise and delight Uber users with personalised insights that showcase their relationship with our service,” he said. “We’re thrilled to unveil a campaign that brings together data and moments in a compelling narrative that resonates across cultures.”

The experience is available for users in Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and Vietnam. To see how you moved this year, visit www.yearwithuber.com.