In the summer of 2009, A&E tapped Circ.us to come up with an innovative solution to help promote the "The Five Lives of Criss Angel"; the new season of Criss Angel Mindfreak. Leveraging augmented reality, here is what the the NYC creative communications firm came up with.

1. The Five Lives of Criss Angel Augmented Reality
Experience
Turning Fans Into Mystifiers

2. Circ.us is a creative communications firm
that helps
brands and their agencies tell
stories
through
innovation and participation.

3. The Five Lives of Criss Angel, 2009

4. Objectives
• Drive tune-in to the
premiere of The Five
Lives of Criss Angel,
airing August 2009.
• Drive traffic to The
Criss Angel mini-site on
aetv.com
• Generate buzz starting
one month prior to first
airing, possible press
worthy story

5. Story:
Turn fans into
mystifiers through
Augmented Reality

6. Strategy
Leverage Augmented Reality to
allow users to print out a sheet of
paper that would become the
input device for a five level game.
Each level was contextually based
on one of the five episodes of the
show.
This was one of the first (if not the
first) commercial examples (in the
US) of using an Augmented
Reality marker as a multi-input
device for a game.

8. Each level of the game Prototype Testing
was a 3D maze

9. Players had to manipulate the piece of paper in order to “unlock” each level.

10. A heads up display guided users
Head’s Up through the game

11. Emerging Technology Players were presented with
guidance throughout the
Presents Challenges experience

12. Follow the Leader

13. After completing the experience
against the clock, users were
All Media is Social prompted to enter their scores
via Facebook Connect,

14. Circ.us Services
•Ideation/Strategy
•Augmented Reality Development/Programming
•Game Design/Leveling/QA
•3D/2D Art
•Interface Design
•Facebook Connect Implementation
•Sound Design
•Video Production
•Promo In-Banner Video Creation
•Game Hosting and Analytics