YouTube Space Lab

A global competition to send kids science experiments into space and have them streamed live on YouTube from aboard the International Space Station.
We were asked to develop the creative wrapper, art direction, design and development collaborating with YouTube, Google Creative Lab and its partners.

Our teaser poster helped sell the idea to stakeholders - sponsors, Nasa Astronauts, Larry & Sergey and such like. With photography from David Sykes. And yes, that’s a real space cosmonaut helmet. We inspired participation with a simulation that allowed visitors to take off in their own rocket from anywhere on the planet. A bit of HTML5 trickery pulled in Google Map tiles before zooming out for lift-off. Finally we created a one-stop destination on YouTube hosting everything Space Lab. Competition overview, up-to-the-minute content, judging, winner announcements, live streaming - the lot.

A global campaign

We created a series of rich, dynamic banners to spark engagement with the campaign on YouTube. People could watch each video submission and vote for their favourite directly on the masthead.

Live from space

Finally, we housed a livestream in a special YouTube masthead, connecting the Space Lab’s host, Bill Nye, and an audience of over a million unique viewers with NASA Astronaut, Sunita Williams, who performed the winning Space Lab experiments live aboard the International Space Station.

The culmination of a year-long user journey, the live show was true to our goal to be the world’s ‘largest, coolest science classroom’. The wonder of space, and the connective power of YouTube, brought people together to watch a 40 minute show.