Witnessing the new Game On! AI Experience at the Chick-fil-A College Football Hall of Fame during the public launch on August 25, 2024, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the cutting-edge facility during the free Kickoff Game Football Fest presented by Coca-Cola, was amazing to behold, especially since I attended the iconic venues opening day a decade ago. Georgia Tech defeating Florida State University in Ireland on a last second field goal to win the opening game of the 2024 college football season was icing on the cake of a truly wonderful day that ended with a free concert by Big Boi.
Artificial Intelligence Winner
This new sports technology project was created to put fans into the game in order to share the passions and traditions of college football with guests in Atlanta visiting the sport museum. CFB Hall, President and CEO, Kimberly Beaudin, challenged her design team to reimagine the fan experience as one with more engagement and personalized storytelling memories. Boy, did they deliver.
After months of conceptualization, Geoff Thatcher, Founder and Chief Creative Officer with Creative Principals, and his family discovered a New Zealand tech startup named HyperCinema (hypercinema.ai) that offered a generative artificial intelligence, enterprise-grade platform for digital storytelling enabling guests to be transformed into the sport’s rich history, it’s subculture and ecosystem for the first time. Now, CFB Hall guests can be transformed into the heroes of college football via curated images/videos morphing into players, coaches, weightlifters, cheerleaders, marching band musicians, tailgaters, military pilots, and superfans on the field, while at the Capital of College Football.
“As a leading attraction in sports and a symbol of College Football at the highest level, we were looking for a modern way to pay homage to the sport we love,” said Beaudin. “GAME ON! is our mission in action: an experience that connects fans to college football through education, inspiration and entertainment, while honoring the sport’s excellence through every artifact and AI touchpoint.
Hear Geoff Thatcher with Creative Principals, the creative firm behind the development of GAME ON!, breakdown the creation and unique AI experience it provides for guests.
“When the College Football Hall of Fame enlisted our help to reimagine its exhibits and experiences, we had the vision to help guests become part of the story, rather than just witness it,” said Thatcher.
The AI Process
Using the buildings existing RFID registration process made it easier to integrate the AI to streamline the design and installation processes. Fans teach the generative AI by answering questions about their favorite and least favorite teams, your superpower wish, must have gameday food, sharing where you grew up, and telling it one word used to describe yourself.
The AI also scans your face by tracking a visitor’s eyes as they help complete passes in the passing tree. It takes several minutes to compile and render the data to completion. As you wait, it’s fun to check out the large screen that tells you trending data like a top ten list of the day’s top football positions selected, or the most favorite and least favorite teams, with the popular and local Georgia football team leading the most fav way.
AI-Enhanced Exhibits
On the second floor, the Game On exhibit features 14 fan-specific AI experiences throughout the iconic venue that put you into the 1920’s, 1950’s, 1980’s, and 2024, timelines, including:
- The Super Fan: Guests are transported to a college football stadium where they find themselves cheering in the stands and wearing their favorite team’s colors. Simultaneously, they can read about their own game day rituals.
- The Weight Room: This existing exhibit is being enhanced by GAME ON! AI so guests can both see themselves pumping iron and read about how they can reach maximum strength.
- The Coaches: The existing coaches exhibit has been updated with a video called “The Greatest Coaches That Never Were,” where guests are shown as a fictitious historic college coach who inspired their team through some unusual methods.
- The Champions & Contenders: Guests can pose with the Heisman and College Football Championship trophies, next to a display case featuring the real-life hardware.
- The Field JumboTron: As guests enter the College Football Hall of Fame’s famous field to kick, pass and run, they’ll find a video of themselves as their favorite team’s most recent college recruit with a personalized voice-over playing on the field’s large LED screen.
The immersive experiences are a first-of-its-kind by putting guests into the story using AI and the cloud. Users laugh, giggle, clap, and interact with other guests as if they knew each other before the AI transformations. Museums, theme parks, attractions, and live events, will love this unique opportunity to create their own AI generated, leading edge product that is a turn key solution. Football programs can even use a Game On! AI experience as a recruiting tool.
The CFB Hall is looking for a Game On! title sponsor. Logos and key messaging can be easily inserted into all curated images and videos. NIL rights provided by the top 25 college football programs ensure high-fidelity opportunities for branding, marketing and sales. Colors are imported exactly as wanted.
Beaudin talked about the different orange colors needed to match Texas/Tennessee/Florida, and how the AI created a funny image of the Clemson pumpkin orange as a women wearing orange with a pumpkin. One of the Football Fan Fest bugs Thatcher shared was an image of a fan with literally, dandelion yellow hair, ha-ha.
Ticket prices were raised slightly this year to help offset the original $5 per guest computing power needs, according to Kimberley. As the generative AI platform becomes more efficient and optimized, costs are expected to go down. Thatcher says costs are now down to $4.50 and expects that to be cut in half in no time.
Game On! Team
A team of 100 people worked on the AI audio/video and integration.
HyperCinema, The Producers Group, LLC., 3Stage Design, Forward Thinking Designs and Project Workshop, worked together with the CFB Hall’s team to roll out Game On!
“For the last two years, our team of skilled experts has been developing and refining this hyper-personalized storytelling technology. We’re honored to collaborate with Creative Principals to create this remarkable experience for the College Football Hall of Fame. Now every guest can become the hero of their own story, ushering in a new age for creative guest experiences,” said Dr. Miles Gregory, co-founder and creative director of HyperCinema, the company responsible for the patented technology that powers GAME ON!.
CFBHall Additions Over The Years
The Hall also partnered with Aflac to create an all-new exhibit celebrating the rich shared history between the US Military and College Football. The fitting tribute honors our U.S. Service Academies, Senior Military Academies and Hall of Fame Inductees who served. The exhibit will showcase priceless artifacts, uniform displays and an 18ft x 12ft video wall of stadium flyovers. The new “Military and Football” exhibit also includes a GAME ON! AI experience putting guests in the cockpit of a plane or helicopter during a stadium flyover.
Additional upgrades include an expanded exhibit on the game’s biggest rivalries, a high-intensity walk-in tunnel, specially curated display honoring a decade in Atlanta and a reimagined retail experience in the Team Store.
I blogged about the CFB Hall’s Microsoft Gaming Lounge last year.
As well as attended Football Free Fest 2023.
In 2019, my son on the autism spectrum and I attended the Kulture City sensory certification for the CFB Hall.
New AI Art Form
The AI experience is indeed a new art form, as stated by Gregory, however, do not fear the AI, rather, embrace the transformative experience for what it is, a good faith leap into the unknown that the College Football Hall of Fame safely provides for guests so that each visitor can put themselves into the game like never before.
Thatcher feels it’s not about the next level AI tech, it’s about the interactive guest experience that transforms each person into a story unique to college football’s storied history and love of the game.
Sports Techie, my son Kellan and I rate CFB Hall’s Game On! AI experience as an A+ sports technology-centric, new concept-to-reality, project that is massive amounts of fun for college football fans of all ages and generations.
Images are kept for 24-hours unless you order merchandise used on a Team Store t-shirt or poster. Digital downloads of the entire personalized Game On! AI experience, to include 2 videos and 12 images, are available for $9.99.
The National Football Foundation (NFF) founded the Hall in 1951 to immortalize the greatest players and coaches as role models for future generations and established its new home in Atlanta in 2014.
For more information on visiting the Hall in Atlanta, a 10-year TripAdvisor ® Certificate of Excellence recipient, visit the College Football Hall of Fame website.
Use Game On! AI Experience to ‘unlock your inner hero’ at the College Football Hall of Fame, located on Marietta Street in downtown Atlanta.
See you later sportstechie in Seattle, Atlanta and around the world!
Sports Techie Social Media Networks
Sports Techie Twitter: @SportsTechieNET: http://twitter.com/SportsTechieNET
THE #SportsTechie Twitter: @THESportsTechie: https://twitter.com/THESportsTechie
Sports Techie Facebook Fan Page: http://www.facebook.com/SportsTechie
Sports Techie YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/sportstechie
Sports Techie LinkedIn Group: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/2958439/
Sports Techie LinkedIn (Robert Roble): https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertroble
Sports Techie Instagram: http://instagram.com/sportstechie
Sports Techie Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/SportsTechie/
Sports Techie Skyword: http://bobroble.skyword.com/
Sports Techie Snapchat, Skype: sportstechie
Sports Technology Podcast with Bob Roble.
Sports Techie Quora: https://www.quora.com/Bob-Roble
Sports Techie Moby Picture: http://www.mobypicture.com/user/sportstechieNET
Sports Techie Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/86791607@N04/
Sports Techie Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/user36773456
Sports Techie Guy: https://twitter.com/sportstechieguy
Sports Techie Alignable: https://www.alignable.com/atlanta-ga/sports-techie-llc
THESportsTechie Is A Consultant For Videon: https://www.videonlabs.com/