Bryant University in Smithfield, Rhode Island, has been awarded the CampusTours July 2008 Four Star Tour Award for their compelling new InteractiveVideo virtual tour.

Bryant's new virtual tour makes use of InteractiveVideo, in which interactive "clickable" cue points are added to university videos to allow visitors to explore particular topics mentioned in the videos in greater depth. InteractiveVideo allows Bryant to create short, concise and compelling video pieces, without overburdening them with granular information. As topics are presented in the videos, InteractiveVideo "teasers" highlight to the right of the video, expanding to indicate that more content is available on the topic currently being discussed in the main video. If a visitor is interested in the topic he/she clicks the teaser and the video pauses while additional content is delivered on that subject.

Bryant University's virtual tour also includes a compelling new interactive campus map that lets students find campus locations by topic, building name or simply by clicking the item on the map. Color coordinated interactive layers may be turned on or off to highlight locations on the map or place map icons, and the mini-map in the lower right (must click on the mini-map tab to expand it) provides a very convenient way of zooming and controlling the map movement.

The Bryant University virtual is yet another signal of the growing prominence of video in academic marketing and recruiting, and particularly within college and university virtual tours. As an era of students comes of age weaned on YouTube, the expectations for .edu content change accordingly. Furthermore, these students expect more than seeing the dry eight-minute university video now digitized on your site - they expect intimate video vignettes, tour guides, multiple candid points of view, presentations that highlight the daily lives of students and what life will be like for them at the institution. Bryant's tour, with its InteractiveVideos that spawn other video pieces provides a glimpse at the future of academic multimedia, where ever more granular content is combined with third person perspective (usually students) to create a web of university video information appealing to the multiple interests of its audiences.

The CampusTours Awards Committee found the Bryant University virtual tour to be an enthralling online experience, worthy of the CampusTours Four-Star Virtual Tour Award!