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WGAN-TV | Real Estate Pros: Intro to Urbanimmersive Real Estate Photography Services | Guest: Urbanimmersive VP, Business Development and Partnerships François-Hugues Liberge | Episode: 148 | Thursday, 9 June 2022 | Urbanimmersive website | WGAN-TV Podcast
WGAN-TV | Real Estate Pros: Intro to Urbanimmersive Real Estate Photography Services | Guest: Urbanimmersive VP, Business Development and Partnerships François-Hugues Liberge | Episode: 148 | Thursday, 9 June 2022 | Urbanimmersive website | WGAN-TV Podcast


www.Urbanimmersive.com


www.Urbanimmersive.com

WGAN-TV | Intro to Urbanimmersive Real Estate Photography Services

Hi All

[Transcript below ...]

1. Do you want to simplify your real estate photography workflow?
2. Do you want to eliminate subscriptions in favor of pay as you go (or free)?
3. Do you want all your back-end real estate photography services handled by one company?

My guest on WGAN-TV Live at 5 on Thursday, 9 June 2022 is:

✓ Urbanimmersive VP, Business Development Partnerships François-Hugues Liberge

François will demo and discuss:

✓ WGAN-TV | Intro to Urbanimmersive Real Estate Photography Services

Topics Include

1. 3D Tours
2. Interactive Floor Plans within 3D Tour (Hotspot Editor)
3. Floor Plans created from 3D Tours
4. UiMeet3D with live guided video chat
5. Single Property Website (Many Styles; branded and Unbranded)
6. Flyers (auto-generated) (free)
7. Media Delivery
8. Photo Editing

What questions should I ask François-Hugues Liberge on WGAN-TV Live at 5?

Best,

Dan

Urbanimmersive Links

1. Urbanimmersive Website
2. Urbanimmersive Facebook Page
3. Urbanimmersive YouTube Channel
4. Urbanimmersive LinkedIn Page
5. Urbanimmersive on Twitter
6. Urbanimmersive VP, Business Development and Partnerships François-Hugues Liberge

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Transcript (video above)

[00:00:02]
Dan Smigrod: Hi, all. I'm Dan Smigrod, Founder of the We Get Around Network Forum. Today is Thursday, June 9th, 2022 and you're watching WGAN-TV Live at 5.

We have an awesome show today for Real Estate Photographers: Introduction to Urbanimmersive Real Estate Photography Services.

Joining us today to talk about this topic, François-Hughes Liberge, Vice President, Business Development and Partnerships for Urbanimmersive, Inc. Hey, François--Hugues, good to see you again.

[00:00:35]
François-Hugues Liberge: Good to see you, Dan. How are you?

[00:00:37]
Dan Smigrod: Awesome! Thanks for being on the show today. We got a lot to cover in terms of Urbanimmersive real estate topography services. But before we jump into those specific services, tell our audience please about Urbanimmersive.

[00:00:52]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. Urbanimmersive is actually a publicly traded company. We've been established in 2007. We have over 160 employees across the world, mainly in North America though. We started with 3D tours in 2007. We were ahead of the wave.

We had a lot of preaching to do to get out there and we did all our shoots with a regular DSLR camera and doing 24 pictures for each 360. That was time-consuming. We had a nice effect, a nice wow effect, but we saw that it was like it was not a good business model. We tried to design a multi-lens camera. Again, because we're based in Quebec: not Silicon Valley, we had some problems raising money for that. We tried two different things then.

We started a business solution. We tried all sorts of upgrades and upscale our 3D tour solution with 3D avatars, UI tags, or what we call hotspots, to document our 3D environment. Then with our business solution, we saw that there was a need to offer services for photographers.

In 2018, we acquired Tourbuzz, which is a platform for professional photographers offering different services that we'll talk about later on. In 2019, when we saw the technology evolving with the Ricoh cameras coming out, things like that.

We brought our 3D tours back to life. That's been going on for over two years now. Working with a Ricoh camera taking 360s and offering 3D tours. Now we're just like that, giving that more and more involved and more integrated into our platform and to offer a full scope of services for photographers.

[00:02:48]
Dan Smigrod: Awesome. You're actually making my head spin. It sounds like Urbanimmersive: the intersection of technology meets real estate photography services in service to real estate photographers through the acquisition of Tourbuzz. Obviously, having grown quite a bit –160+ employees, 1,700 real estate photographers as clients, as you mentioned, and servicing 42,000 clients through that network of real estate photographers – quite awesome. I think it might be helpful if we jump into specific services. How about we start with 3D tours?

[00:03:31]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. Our 3D tours are our own technology that we've been mastering for 15 years now. It's a really robust solution that's really flexible.

We're there to be open for business. We know also that our customers – real estate photographers – have their own customers and they're the ones seeing the end-user. Our 3D tours can be unbranded, branded. There's lots of flexibility for the 3D tours.

[00:04:06]
Dan Smigrod: Maybe if we actually take a look at a 3D tour, because this is a space where people say 360 tours, 3D tours, virtual tours, digital twins.

Even though you said 3D tour, it's a little bit hard to get my hands around on what exactly is a 3D tour. Plus I know you have another service you're going to talk about called UiMeet3D.

[00:04:32]
Dan Smigrod: Let's jump into the 3D tours services.

[00:04:38]
François-Hugues Liberge: Perfect. I'll share my screen and I'll show you one example of a 3D tour. That's a real virtual tour: [it's not a slideshow of photos. It's a] 3D tour.

Every dot you see is where 360 has been done. Because we work with the Ricoh camera, as you see, we can also take pictures easily outside. It's a real 360. It's not just like a scan of an image. It's a real 360, that is the same one as inside. Click on the Door.

So then I'm inside. Inside, a few things we have. Here we have a mini-map that shows my location. Every dot is where a 360 has been done. I can click directly on it, to go to that. I don't have to walk through the whole thing if I want to get to a precise area....

Just, by clicking again, you can get the map to disappear. With that, you have access to different floors. If I click on the second floor, it'll bring me directly to the second floor and then again, you can just navigate. I can zoom in. You can zoom out. It's really all the functionality of a regular 3D tour. Also I have measurements.

So I can toggle measurements and also you have them on a floor plan also. The floor plan is built from the 3D tour. When we create a 3D tour, we create the floor plan also. There's no third parties involved. Comes with it. There are also difference: two differences in floor plans. You have the basic floor plan. Just the walls are drawn or this one with all the furniture inside.

A nice thing also for the floor plan is, and our platform is a floor plan creator. A professional photographer can go by themselves and do modifications to the floor plans, if they want. They don't have to come back to us.

[00:06:31]
Dan Smigrod: François, even before you talk about what the photographer can do, let's just imagine I'm a homeowner. I'm a prospective buyer. I'm looking at this 3D tour. I see lots of information in the top left, the top right, the bottom row. Could you take us through so I understand?

[00:06:50]
François-Hugues Liberge: I'll go through that. Perfect. UiMeet3D [is available in the 3D tour]. I'll show you that afterwards in more detail. If somebody here who was visiting with me, they will be here.

[00:07:05]
Dan Smigrod: This would be a live guided chat with video? Or is this a chat with text?

[00:07:12]
François-Hugues Liberge: It can be both. It can be here. You can chat just like regular chat. But if I have somebody else who's here with me, I can unlock UiMeet3D.

Then with that, I'd be able to interact within the environment with that person. [It's like Zoom, but inside the virtual tour. I will demonstrate that shortly.] We can walk together, "Hey, look! Take a look at this. Take a look at that." We can see on the mini-map and I'll show you later on in [a demo]. You can see where the other person is in the house. We say, "come and join me in the kitchen."

[00:07:46]
Dan Smigrod: Let's do this – because this is an amazing feature in itself – the UiMeet3D feature. Let's put that aside for the moment, and let's continue taking a look at all the different features that are available in the 3D tour for prospective buyers of this house.

[00:08:06]
François-Hugues Liberge: With that, like I said, the map: the interactive mini-map. Also we have a dollhouse view.

[00:08:17]
François-Hugues Liberge: That's on the side of it. The thing is, when I move, the dollhouse moves also. So you can know especially if you want to renovate some things. What's on the other side of this wall? That's the laundry room.

Perfect. That way it gives you a 3D view of the house. Like I said, it follows you also. Everywhere you go, you can see how you are moving along. That's a nice feature and then you just click back here and then you come back to the interactive mini-map.

[00:08:55]
François-Hugues Liberge: That's a dollhouse view from here. [The dollhouse view is amazing!] [You can look at one floor or all floors.] You have the two floors. You highlight the floor and see, but I cannot click on it to go back.

When I click on this little house, then I come back. We have print screen options. If I see something, I want to show this to my designer, whatever l. I really like this bath tub. Perfect. Just go here. Take a screenshot and then you have on your computer a screenshot of this and you can send it to anybody, friends, family, designer, builders, or whatever.

[00:09:37]
Dan Smigrod: Just for clarification, when I click on that, it would actually download the photo?

[00:09:42]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly. Yeah.

[00:09:46]
François-Hugues Liberge: Now it just appeared in my browser. I saw it download. We can take measurements directly in the 3D tour. [Let me show you how to do measurements within the 3D tour.] That's a pretty standard feature, but we have.

Here are all the settings that you want. Imperial or if you want Meters. Available today in French and English. Spanish coming pretty soon; and that's in full screen. Those are the basic features of the 3D tour. What I don't have to show you –

[00:10:27]
Dan Smigrod: Up at top, I wanted to understand, what is the information in the top-left? What's the information in the top right?

[00:10:35]
François-Hugues Liberge: Photos, floor plan, 3D tour. That's a Single Property Website. That's part of a 3D tour.

[00:10:45]
Dan Smigrod: That's a major feature of the Urbanimmersive, – Tourbuzz 3D tour – is the Single Property Website. We're going to think of that as a separate topic and we'll cover that.

[00:10:57]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes.

[00:10:58]
Dan Smigrod: Great. Then floor plans, is that different from the interactive floor plan that we saw?

[00:11:06]
François-Hugues Liberge: The floor plans – regular floor plans – can be exported in JPEG, AutoCad. It will be floor plans. It's pretty much the same like this one, but in a separate folder, in a separate file.

[00:11:20]
Dan Smigrod: If you click on the top right floor plan, is that going to download the floor plans from this tour?

[00:11:28]
François-Hugues Liberge: In the Single Property Website, it will give you access to it. The photographer [can download the floor plan in the client portal].

[00:11:39]
Dan Smigrod: We'll take a look. We're going to consider floor plans in the discussion of Single Property Websites.

[00:11:45]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. We can talk about floor plans right now, if you want.

[00:11:48]
Dan Smigrod: Sure. Let let's jump in. I do want to make sure we cover what's in the top-left because I suspect that that's the agent information?

[00:11:58]
François-Hugues Liberge: That's the address within the Single Property Website. But in the 3D tour, that's not in this single poverty website.

We have the option also to have photographer branding. It can be presented by Photographer Dan Smigrod. You also can see that in the Single Property Website.

[00:12:17]
Dan Smigrod: That's a whole separate conversation because there's lots of different options for Single Property Websites.

[00:12:22]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly.

[00:12:23]
Dan Smigrod: Even though we're looking at that top bar, there are actually many options for Single Property Websites where digital assets can be included and we're going to look at that separately. I think before we move on to the 3D tour, I had two questions.

First, can we resize that interactive map so I don't see that? Maybe we could step out of the bathroom. I'd rather be someplace else. Great.

[00:12:49]
François-Hugues Liberge: That's the first floor and we'll go back here.

[00:12:51]
Dan Smigrod: On the main floor and you can get there either by walking.

[00:12:55]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly. By here, I could go and just the stairs. We don't do the stairs because we've found that it's not something that just takes time. [Click to skip the stairs.]

[00:13:05]
Dan Smigrod: I love that. I just think, well, why should I have to walk up the stairs? Just click on the icon to go up or down the stairs because essentially that's what I want to do, right?

[00:13:13]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly. That's why you would skip up or down the stairs. This makes it easy if you have a big property – a garage in the back or a pool house – that you don't actually want to walk through the yard to get there. You can just jump to that directly: to the pool or garage.

[00:13:31]
Dan Smigrod: Just for clarification, because you mentioned at the beginning of the show: a Ricoh Theta Z1 camera to create this tour. I presume I'm using an Urbanimmersive or Tourbuzz app.

[00:13:48]
François-Hugues Liberge: We have a Capture app that allows you to take 360 pictures. When you do a 360 picture you see it right away.

You can click on it to see what the footage you've got to make sure you have nice footage. The 360 photos are placed automatically, but if not for any reason, the Capture app gives you some trouble, you can place a 360 that you've done manually.

[00:14:21]
Dan Smigrod: Let's not get into the back-end.

[00:14:25]
François-Hugues Liberge: We're just going to be a homeowner again ;-)

[00:14:28]
Dan Smigrod: We're going to cover that in another way, but I still want to ask the question about cameras. Can I use any 360 camera with the Capture app?

[00:14:39]
François-Hugues Liberge: The Capture app works with the Ricoh cameras.

[00:14:44]
Dan Smigrod: Ricoh Theta Z1. Ricoh Theta Z1 51GB. Ricoh Theta X, the most recent one, and Ricoh Theta V.

[00:14:54]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes, that one.

[00:14:56]
Dan Smigrod: Even some older ones like the Ricoh Theta SC2.

[00:14:58]
François-Hugues Liberge: The Ricoh Theta SC2 works also.

[00:15:00]
Dan Smigrod: Works too. Can I use an Insta360 ONE X2?

[00:15:06]
François-Hugues Liberge: People have tried and we're able to do it. But we don't support it, because we see there's a big difference between the image quality and we suggest people use the Ricoh Theta Z1.

[00:15:24]
Dan Smigrod: If you're a real estate photographer, you're looking at this platform and you want to be able to create 3D tours by buying a Ricoh Theta Z1.

[00:15:36]
François-Hugues Liberge: The Ricoh Theta Z1 actually is the best one for our platform. But if not, we still have customers that import 360s that they did from other cameras. In the client portal, they are able to download 360 images.

The Capture app only works with certain cameras. But on our platform, they can if they want, download 360 images that they took from other cameras.

[00:16:01]
Dan Smigrod: Awesome. Floor plans?

[00:16:04]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. Also just one other thing. Using this icon, you can jump to other places such as going outdoors or indoors. It can also be Urbanimmersive tags. We can document the environment.

We can put information about the furniture. I kept some specs of what this oven is such as which brand is this oven. There's different things like that for tagging within the 3D tour.

[00:16:29]
Dan Smigrod: You can add tags within the tour. This particular tour doesn't have any. Can we see what the 2D floor plan looks like?

[00:16:39]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. Let me jump to the 2D floor plan.

[00:16:47]
Dan Smigrod: How did I know to get there? Because I was staring at the words – floor plan – in the top right.

[00:16:52]
François-Hugues Liberge: That's probably the same thing. If I just click on it.

[00:16:55]
Dan Smigrod: It brings you there.

[00:16:56]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly. Yes.

[00:16:58]
Dan Smigrod: This is a 2D floor plan. Is there an opportunity – as a prospective buyer – to download this floor plan to my computer?

[00:17:08]
François-Hugues Liberge: Not really, but it can be sent out, if you want. It can be sent out by the photographer. Actually, in the Media Delivery, they have access to that also.

[00:17:20]
Dan Smigrod: We're going to talk about Media Delivery and one of the items that can be delivered is the floor plan.

[00:17:26]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes. The floor plan can be delivered as a JPEG file.

[00:17:28]
Dan Smigrod: I may be jumping ahead, but I'm just curious. The floor plan comes as a JPEG file.

[00:17:38]
François-Hugues Liberge: JPEG file, and it can be a CAD file. Could be exported in AutoCad. Could be both.

[00:17:43]
Dan Smigrod: Which would be an SVG file?

[00:17:45]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly.

[00:17:50]
Dan Smigrod: The consumer looking at the 3D tour can see the floor plan on their screen as part of the Single Property Website.

[00:18:02]
Dan Smigrod: Do you want to talk about the Single Property Websites before or after we talk about UiMeet3D?

[00:18:13]
François-Hugues Liberge: Might as well talk about it because we're here right now, so we can talk about it. I can show you an example of a Single Property Website. I can show it right away, so might as well while we are here.

[00:18:23]
Dan Smigrod: That's great. Interesting because you're using one here. This actually is one of the Single Property Websites that Urbanimmersive – Tourbuzz – offers?

[00:18:39]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly. This is a house for sale in Arizona. Here I have the information of the seller, or the real estate agent so the information can be here with all the direct contact information. When you scroll down, if I click on the flier, it will get me to that.

I have a flyer of the property. I can choose that. Again, in the Client Portal, the photographer can choose what they want so they can change pictures, put any picture that they want. That's fully customizable to what they want.

[00:19:19]
Dan Smigrod: We weren't going to do a back-end demo of how all this stuff is created, but, how hard is it for the photographer or for the real estate agent, if that's the case, to create a Single Property Website, to create a flier from all the digital assets?

[00:19:38]
François-Hugues Liberge: It's easy because – especially for photographers that are used to Photoshop and things like that. It's a drag-and-drop thing.

For them, it's really easy. they just need to select which pictures that they want to include and then everything is created automatically. They just need to say what information they want on it, and the templates that allow you to personalize it with all that, all the information.

It's really something that's really user-friendly to do. There's a QR code also, so I can really download right away on my phone if I want.

[00:20:15]
Dan Smigrod: Can you go back to that fQR code for a second?

[00:20:17]
François-Hugues Liberge: Yes.

[00:20:18]
Dan Smigrod: I just wanted to go back to that QR code and just see in terms of that size. It says Tourbuzz.net, and now it's launching. I can see the same tour on my iPhone that you've just been showing us.

[00:20:35]
François-Hugues Liberge: Exactly.

[00:20:35]
Dan Smigrod: Okay. Tourbuzz. Great. If you could scroll back. Is the flier different? Is the flier based on what style of Single Property Websites is being used or?

[00:20:54]
François-Hugues Liberge: -There are two different things there: 1) they can customize the style that they want and, 2) they can customize the Single Property Website that they want. It's two different things.

They can mix-and-match what they want. [The photographer has a choice of flier style and their choice of Single Property Website style.] The Single Property Website.

[00:21:15]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. Let's go back to this Single Property Website.

[00:21:19]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Yes. Single Property Website.

[00:21:20]
Dan Smigrod: -Single Property Website. Could you speak to the variety and the quantity of Single Property Websites and then also what content can be included?

[00:21:34]
François-Hugues Liberge: -We have 20 different layouts of Single Property Websites. [The content is usually the same as what photographers want to include.]

They can, if they want to include floor plans. If they don't have floor plans, floor plans will not be there. Same thing with 3D tours and photos. What will always be there is this: I have: Neighborhoods. I have a map of the Neighborhood where the house is located. Plus, all the local information about – car friendly, quiet, all this as well.

[00:22:09]
Dan Smigrod: -The print is small. Let's see if I can read it: Car Friendly. Quiet. High Schools. Restaurants. If you click on Restaurants, for example, I presume it's going to populate the map with the restaurants.

[00:22:19]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly.

[00:22:21]
Dan Smigrod: -This is not something the photographer needs to build. This is automatically generated by the platform. Okay. I see some other features in this window. Restaurants. Pedestrian Friendly. Vibrancy. Coffee Shops. Transit Friendly. Elementary Schools. There's quite a bit of information about what's available around that home for sale.

[00:22:44]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly.

[00:22:47]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. That's view Neighborhood and then view location on the Map.

[00:22:50]
François-Hugues Liberge: -That's a Google Street View map. Google Maps integration.

[00:22:56]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay, Great.

[00:22:59]
François-Hugues Liberge: -That comes with every Single Property Website. Automatically added. Then you get the photos. I can click on them. I can start the slide show of the photos. Then I'll go from one to the other. I can pause it if I want, so that's really standard stuff. Then, when scrolling down, my other pictures are there.

All 25 pictures are there. Then the floor plan is there; information about it. [Regarding professional real estate photographers...] for Floor Plan Creator. If there's any modifications to do, the photographer can make the changes. They don't have to wait for us to make the revisions. [For example, if I need to change the name of this room.]

[00:23:55]
Dan Smigrod: -Well, an example you called it a Family Room. I'm in Atlanta, Georgia, we might call it the Sun Room. I don't need to send back a change to Urbanimmersive (Tourbuzz). I can simply go into the content management system and change Family Room to Sunroom.

[00:24:12]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly.

[00:24:13]
Dan Smigrod: -Maybe that Garage to Carport. There may be some nuances of language that are different in Atlanta –

[00:24:21]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly. Yes. Okay.

[00:24:23]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. The photographer can change. What else can you change? The names?

[00:24:30]
François-Hugues Liberge: -The names. The furniture actually. If they want to put more furniture and have access to all their library of images. If they like to have more couches here, we can do that. A TV on the wall. They can do anything they want; pretty much with that.

[00:24:48]
Dan Smigrod: -I understand we're talking about real estate photographers. But is there also a real estate agent portal paired with this platform?

[00:24:59]
François-Hugues Liberge: -If the photographer gives access to his customer, they can. But... Our customers – and we have 1,700 customers on our platform – which are typically real estate photographers. They're the ones who control their customers, so they can give the access, if they want to them. But usually, it's better if the photographer would DIY.

Because we don't want – It's not something that can be breakable, but... But we prefer that they know more of the platform. But they can, if they want, give access to their customers. But we prefer, and they usually prefer. The photographers prefer them to do modifications by themselves.

[00:25:36]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay, that's awesome. The photographer can: change names, which essentially are labels. I presume that you could change the title at the top. Is there a feature for dropping in a logo if you want?

[00:25:51]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Yes, they can. Actually – under the JPEG, they can personalize it also. They can put the name and the picture of the agent. They can do that through the logo of their banner and all that. That could be, it could also be customizable on that side.

[00:26:07]
Dan Smigrod: -In the banner, right? I noticed there was a disclaimer. If that particular real agent has a different requirement – For a disclaimer, you could put that there.

[00:26:17]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly. Also about measurements. Measurements are 99% precise: accurate. But sometimes, especially in different states like North Carolina, they're really strict on that. They have to take legal measurements. With that instead of being 20 feet, 10 inches, it could be 20 feet, 11 inches. They can go there and modify all the dimensions that are there.

[00:26:40]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. Anything else on floor plans or floor plans back-end for photographers?

[00:26:47]
François-Hugues Liberge: -No, it covers it. Yeah.

[00:26:48]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. I don't know if this is related to floor plans, but I believe we could download an object file.

[00:27:03]
François-Hugues Liberge: -An object file?

[00:27:05]
Dan Smigrod: - .OBJ file. Is that with the 3D tours? Is that with UiMeet3D?

[00:27:11]
François-Hugues Liberge: -It will be, yes, it will be 3D tours. Yes.

[00:27:15]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. This is somewhat geeky for our audience and for a newbie that is probably not something you want to know about. But I just say for our advanced photographers that might be working with an architect that is designing within a CAD program. The question may come up to say, "can you provide me with a file so that I can begin renovating this house?"

It may be helpful to know that you can get a .OBJ file. That file can be converted, typically, into a SketchUp file or Revit file or something that's actually useful for the architect. Again, this is an advanced feature.

But just good to know that, if that's something that comes up, a space planner might find it interesting, an architect, a general contractor. That is something that is supported by the Urbanimmersive – theTourbuzz –platform.

[00:28:12]
François-Hugues Liberge: -We have a customer that manages on behalf of 1,400 locations. They're using our tools to manage and prepare their designs and the scope of work they have to do. They are using our tools for that.

[00:28:25]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay, so it's good. We're trying to stay super-focused today on real estate photographers. The real estate photography services.

[00:28:33]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Yes.

[00:28:35]
Dan Smigrod: -That said, it's super-hard not to talk about all the [LAUGHTER] different features that Urbanimmersive offers that is actually beyond real estate photography and beyond residential real estate or even commercial real estate. Because I can imagine everything we're looking at applies to nearly every vertical: hotels or restaurants or retail.

But know that there are other features. For the purpose of today's WGAN-TV show, we'll try to keep it focused on real estate services for real estate photographers. Forgive me, I digress. We were really talking about the Single Property Website. I'm going to guess that to some extent you felt like you were done with that topic. But I think I want to just ask the question.

[00:29:30]
Dan Smigrod: The solutions that can be incorporated into a Single Property Website are: photos, floor plan, 3D tours and video.

[00:29:45]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Also information about the business in the Neighborhood and probably from your Single Property Website.

[00:29:51]
Dan Smigrod: -Neighborhood?

[00:29:52]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Yes.

[00:29:52]
Dan Smigrod: -Google Maps, information about the property, a link to download the flier?

[00:30:02]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Yes.

[00:30:02]
Dan Smigrod: - I've run out of fingers, ;-) were there any other digital assets that can be incorporated into this Single Property Website?

[00:30:10]
François-Hugues Liberge: -We've covered them all. [LAUGHTER]

[00:30:11]
Dan Smigrod: -Okay. Then, I think I heard there are nearly 20 or more Single Property Website designs?

[00:30:19]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Twenty different layouts –

[00:30:22]
Dan Smigrod: -Twenty different layouts. I could imagine that if you have a homeowner that has, that you're not doing a 3D tour. Therefore you want to emphasize the photos first or you want to emphasize the videos first, or for that matter, emphasize the 3D tour first. The different templates essentially highlight a different digital asset.

[00:30:48]
François-Hugues Liberge: -Exactly. Yes.

[00:30:49]
Dan Smigrod: - I think I have to add another finger here: includes agent contact info.

[00:30:57]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Information for sure. Agent contact info with all pictures, logos, banners, and all that.

[00:31:04]
Dan Smigrod: - Yes, and also a for more info form, so a lead-generation form so the prospective home buyer can request information from that agent.

[00:31:18]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly.

[00:31:19]
Dan Smigrod: - Just out of curiosity, the agent gets the information. Did they get it by text? Did they get it by email? Do they get it by smoke signal?

[00:31:28]
François-Hugues Liberge: - By email and in the client portal, there are different ways that this can be set up by the photographer, so the ways of communication can be set.

[00:31:39]
Dan Smigrod: - Is text one of the options? I want to get a text every time I get a lead. Text and email are the most popular. Is there anything else on either the 3D tour, the interactive floor plan within the 3D tour, the floor plans or the Single Property Websites, or the fliers that we haven't discussed?

[00:31:59]
François-Hugues Liberge: - About the 3D tour, if you want to go maybe more on the back-end, I don't know if you want to cover that right now. More on the Capture app process? The capture of the 360 images?

[00:32:13]
Dan Smigrod: - I would rather do either a separate WGAN-TV show on how to do capture –

[00:32:23]
François-Hugues Liberge: - But just quickly then about the Capture app process. There are two important things –

[00:32:31]
Dan Smigrod: - Can you tell me about capture for a 3D tour paired with a Ricoh Theta Z1 or Ricoh Theta X, for example, using the Capture app?

[00:32:41]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly, so using the Capture app, the good thing about it is, like I said earlier, you can manually place 360s that you have done. If the algorithm cannot place it automatically, you can override that and place it yourself.

You won't be stuck at something that's scanning. Again that won't happen because you just place the 360 manually. You can just place the 360 image manually. Long corridors or areas that are more of the same such as150 feet off the same wall.

You won't have any problems capturing that. So you won't be stuck at the point that you cannot go forward, and also the size of it.

[00:33:22]
Dan Smigrod: - Even before you go on because there's two things that struck me as soon as you said that.

1) First is a long hallway that looks identical here and 10 feet from here, and 20 feet from here. I think a newbie photographer would scratch their head and go, "well, so what?" There are other 3D platforms that you could use and you'll get stuck, and then

2) The second thing was we're just making the assumption here, but not all platforms do this. Urbanimmersive – Tourbuzz – builds the 3D tour for you. This is not you – on your own – to build the tour. That said, if you want to nudge your 360 to be in a slightly different spot you can.

[00:34:18]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Just manually place the 360. If it is too far off, our post-production team will call you afterwards, "there's something wrong with it," but at least it's nice that you won't get stuck at some place.

Also we enable team scanning. For example, one of our customers did a school that was 260,000 square feet, and it took them five hours. There were five photographers and we merged everything again.

[00:34:43]
Dan Smigrod: - Once again, if you're a newbie photographer and that may roll off your head here, there are other platforms where you can only use one camera to complete the entire tour. You can't merge content from four other photographers to get the job done quickly; so point taken.

[00:35:06]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly. Those are the things that's also nice and also time-wise because the Ricoh is a quick camera like to do a house of 2,000 square feet will take you about 15 minutes.

[00:35:22]
Dan Smigrod: - At a high level, was there anything else about shooting with a 360 camera meets Urbanimmersive – Tourbuzz – capturing?

[00:35:31]
François-Hugues Liberge: - That was it. About floor plans ... We can have a Building Report, if they want. It's optional, but that will give you some information. The same thing as a floor plan. With that it will give you access information of what's the square footage of the area; how many doors; windows; square feet for the walls (so if you need to repaint); you can annotate the type of flooring and square feet so if you need, square feet for carpet, of Serum wood floors, and also the fixtures analysis. How many toilets, faucets, sinks, baths, and showers so that's information you can also get.

[00:36:14]
Dan Smigrod: - That's called the?

[00:36:17]
François-Hugues Liberge: - I'm sorry, a Property Report.

[00:36:18]
Dan Smigrod: - Property Report. That's something a photographer might offer as an Add On for some extra dollars?

[00:36:23]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly.

[00:36:24]
Dan Smigrod: - Good. I think what might be appropriate before we move on, François, is to say to our audience. Gosh, we didn't really cover either in detail, the capture process or the back-end Content Management System.

Go to: www.Urbanimmersive.com www.Urbanimmersive.com and click on a link to schedule. To participate in a live weekly webinar, and you can learn about capture using a Ricoh Theta camera paired with the Capture app, and see the content management system, the back-end of the workflow, where we talked about, "oh, how do I pick one of the 20+ Single Property Websites?" "How do I upload content?" "How do I add photos?" Etc. Good. Let's move on to UiMeet3D.

[00:37:39]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yes. Perfect. That's when I talked to you about the storyline of the company. We did that in 2010, actually, with avatars and because the technology was a bit different 12 years ago, It was avatars; so we are able to interact – a gamification of a 3D environment so you can interact with somebody else. We could chat at that time; there was no video feed but we can chat –

[00:38:05]
Dan Smigrod: - This is so hard to explain to somebody. Maybe –. You have to see it. I believe you're going to run a video and talk over it?

[00:38:15]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yes, exactly.

[00:38:16]
Dan Smigrod: - Let me just tee this up before you share your screen and play the video. Because of the way we do our technology to have a conversation with François in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, me in Atlanta. We're using cameras, etc. It's super-hard to actually demo this by using our computers and having a conversation because we're tying up everything we need in terms of cameras and etc., on our computer to do our WGAN-TV Live at 5.

[00:38:52]
Dan Smigrod: François is going to run a video for UiMeet3D and talk over it. We will have a conversation about it.

[00:38:59]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yes. Perfect. - If you see here, so I'll just start. Before I start the video, this is what you see when I showed you in the tour earlier, the joining UiMeet3D that has been done. Now we're in an environment together, we're three of us.

You can see here who is in the environment and then on the chat; hello. So we can chat as you want. Then also the chat will give you information about who has joined, who has left and all that stuff. Like I said, it's like a Zoom. It's really like a Zoom, but inside of an environment, so we're three of us, and that's obviously we're seeing this screen of

[00:39:40]
Amélie here,

[00:39:41]
François-Hugues Liberge: so that's why she's static in the end. If she starts, then you see other people moving. We can talk to each other as we're doing right now so the same thing, same stuff. We're just talking to them, you see, and then still get that person facing forward and not looking at me, so that's a good thing also.

If you look also on the back-end, like we saw, Urbanimmersive could be personalized, so it can [add a logo] if you want. Then we'll show you the map. The impact of the map still works, and it shows you where you are and where the other people are. With that, you can choose what she just did, and she felt she wanted to follow this person.

Now they're together, so when they're walking together, you'll see they're always together, and I'm here all by myself. When she's moving, she's moving with her, so that's why they're following each other, and I'm here in the auditorium, and then they'll be back in comment and join me there so that way you can know where everybody is.

We can talk to each other, say come back, come and see me. Then she clicks here, you can say, okay, you can click, go to the same position. Then if she clicks that, then she'll move directly to the same position as me.

You don't have to walk through all the things to get back to somebody to meet them. Now she is double-clicking this whole time, so she just follows me then she'll jump right away and meet me right away with that. That way, we can still talk to each other. Like I said, we can still see each other immediately when you're following people; it's good for open houses.

We're told to open houses because you can really walk with somebody else. You can show them things, and I'll just hold on for her to come and join me. Perfect. Okay.

They weren't together. We are in the same room right now, so again, we're talking to each other and then from that moment what we can do with that, what she'll do she'll ask for me to join her and to follow her. Then she's asking everybody just to follow her, so then we can accept and then shows that we have accepted to follow her.

Then, once she starts moving off, I'll go with her, and that's why we're all the three here on the same spot because we work together, we're not seeing each other so that's why we're all in the same spot right now.

You see on the map also that we're working together. She can bring me to any place. Now she'll change floors also, and when she changes floor again, we're jumping up with her on the second floor. It's a really interactive way, the good thing is there's no download, no plug-ins. It's built into the platform, so you don't have to run anything else on top of it.

Outside of it, it's really built-in, the level of interactivity, walking together into the environment, because 3D tours are nice, it's a good thing, it's so nice to have.

By yourself, visiting houses becomes sometimes redundant. We'd like to do something else with that and say mother-in-law, your family come and visit the house with me. They're getting there talking to each other. Do you like this? Do you like that?

That way, it's a nice way to bring 3D tours to the next level. Like I said, there's nothing like walking together with somebody else.

Now we're not as simple, that's why we broke off, so then we can wander around later as we want and go to different places with each other. That's why .. the level of interactivity and the features out there is unmatched.

We are really proud of it because it's our technology, but something that's as iterated and that's built into the platform that exists as though, that we don't see that much on the market right now. What we're trying to – and that's a scoop for WGAN-TV – is to be able to go from one 3D tour to another 3D tour without breaking this.

I could call a call-for-action. Asking for another property that we can go visit together without having to disconnect and connect again. We're working on that right now. Hopefully, by the end of the summer [2022], that will be up and running.

[00:44:19]
Dan Smigrod: - Awesome, thank you for that tour. UiMeet3D. Crazy-exciting. I got to experience it firsthand. Ghislain, the CEO of Urbanimmersive, gave me a personal walk around experience, and my takeaways was, it's Zoom meets 3D tours on steroids.

Instead of always having little boxes of like, where are people that you have these little lollipops, I'm not sure what the term would be, that you can see where others are in this space, and I found that's nice because if you're a real estate agent, and I'm talking to you about the fireplace, and you're looking out the window, to see the view of the ocean, maybe I should 'walk over' to where my client is and start talking about the ocean instead of the fireplace.

You have some sense of presence within the tour that you don't necessarily have with doing a Zoom. You have this very powerful video chat within the 3D tour experience, and then you have these extra bonuses that "oh, I'm with François.

François is giving me a tour." Okay, I can join François and have the tour through his eyes or François, as a prospective buyer, that I'm a buyer of that house and I want to show the agent and ask questions, so François as the agent could follow me as I walk through the space and ask my questions. I think it's intuitively – all the things that you would expect – except the video chat is a little bit on Steroids because you get to be actually within the tour and have some presence of knowing where everyone is.

[00:46:12]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly. On top of that also from the real estate agent's perspective, it's a good lead, Dan, because you can have different options.

You can have a ‘bot’ of an agent – "Would like more information?" – and if they click, "Yes", perfect then the agent receives a text.

There's somebody who would like to join you in a private meeting. Are you available, and they click, "Yes", and they go with them.

Again, it's a nice way also to be there with them and to interact. The other good thing is, as you saw on the video, there's an avatar – a faceless avatar. So, you know that other people are visiting the house with you.

Even if you don't connect, you know that they are there. So you can try to connect with these people visiting and that's where there's a bot, "Would you like some information?" Then you can go into the private room and then go into all the UiMeet3D features with the video and sound.

[00:47:08]
Dan Smigrod: - How many people can be within the experience?

[00:47:13]
François-Hugues Liberge: So far, 20 works fine, and we're pumping it up.

[00:47:18]
Dan Smigrod: If I decide that I want to have a virtual open house and promote, maybe here's the QR code or here's the link.

Then 20 people might be coming or going, and they're walking around and as the agent, I can even see where people are looking and what's of interest to them and decide whether I want to join person 1, 2, 3, 5, 10, or 20 while they're walking around the house, and I can also ask for a registration form even before I get into the tour.

[00:47:47]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly we could ask for a virtual meeting.

[00:47:51]
Dan Smigrod: - It's a guest book, you sign the guest book as you walk into the open house. Is there anything else to talk about on UiMeet3D?

[00:48:01]
François-Hugues Liberge: No, that covers it.

[00:48:04]
Dan Smigrod: Two other topics I wanted to cover, 1) Media Delivery.

[00:48:07]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yes. - In Media Delivery, we offer that on a single asset, so we have all the information that comes with it.

All digital assets that I showed you can be delivered together. Like I said, then they have different choices of branded and unbranded YouTube videos, floor plans.

That's what all comes together. Also, here's a scoop for WGAN-TV Live at 5: we're syndicated with www.REALTOR.com now. If the agent includes the exact street address, then it's published to www.REALTOR.com and the real estate agent receives all the digital assets.

[00:48:44]
Dan Smigrod: - Awesome. On Media Delivery. Just "rewinding" a second. How about video? Is video automatically created? As a photograph, do I have any say of how that video is created. Can you tell us about video?

[00:49:02]
François-Hugues Liberge: - There's an option for a YouTube video that's automatically created from the 3D tour. It's a simple thing. It's nothing complicated, but at least it's created automatically. There's not much involved on the photograph portal to create it.

[00:49:18]
Dan Smigrod: - Essentially I want to say that video is a slideshow of the photos. It's not created from the 3D tour.

[00:49:27]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly.

[00:49:27]
Dan Smigrod: - Slide show from the photos and the video can include the agent's info, the agent's photo, the agent's logo, and all that is created automatically.

If I just say... I want the agent's name, photo, contact info, and I want some generic music and this is the music I would like. Essentially you can get a video created to check-that-box for your real estate agent.

[00:49:57]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly.

[00:49:57]
Dan Smigrod: - Is that automatically published to YouTube if I want that?

[00:50:01]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yes, exactly. It's all there. Yes. The video will automatically be created for you.

[00:50:07]
Dan Smigrod: - 2) Photo Editing.

[00:50:08]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Photo editing. That's a new service that we're offering. It's not public now, but we're getting there. We'll be able to offer photo editing. We have a team based in France actually, photo editors that are really surprisingly good.

[00:50:31]
François-Hugues Liberge: The good thing is we are now a one-stop shop. You can deliver everything from A-Z, and it's 3D tours, edited photos, Single Property Website.

That's why we started to offer that. It really allows you to have more control and again, deal only with one supplier instead of dealing with the different third parties. That's why we're starting to offer that also.

[00:50:59]
Dan Smigrod: - I think what I'm hearing, in part is, this tech meets services all under one roof so that all the basic services that real estate photographer would want can all be delivered from one company so that you don't have to go to one company for floor plans and other company for Single Property Website and other company for the 3D tours and other company to include live video chat and other company for your video editing: all under one umbrella.

[00:51:33]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Exactly.

[00:51:34]
Dan Smigrod: - We haven't talked about pricing. I know all the pricing is actually on the website. www.Urbanimmersive.com, click on the service you're interested in. Something you can tell us about pricing?

[00:51:50]
François-Hugues Liberge: - For sure, like the way it works with credits. There's some bulk prices also somebody knows that does a lot of business with us. They can purchase more credit and they'll get a better price. The good thing about pricing though, it's pay-per-use.

There's no subscription. No hosting fees. There's three years of free hosting with our 3D tours. With that, a good thing is that you pay up front. There are no recurring fees. The slower months you won't be stuck with a big bill you have to pay: you give us money when you make money.

[00:52:29]
Dan Smigrod: - Unlike some other company in this space that charges a subscription, you can pay per tour, pay per Single Property Website, or pay per solution and then if you like it, great. Keep going and if you keep going and you're using a lot of it there is an on-ramp for savings. I think all the services work like that, maybe except for UiMeet3D?

[00:52:58]
François-Hugues Liberge: - UiMeet3D actually right now it'll be a monthly membership. Right now we're still like it's nice, but it's not where we want it to be, so it's more of a better thing. We can include it without subscription, but eventually there'll be a subscription for it.

[00:53:14]
Dan Smigrod: - By and large the pricing strategy of Urbanimmersive – Tourbuzz – I think of Urbanimmersive and Tourbuzz as one company. Urbanimmersive is actually the parent company for Tourbuzz and Tourbuzz is actually the platform that's used to deliver all the services we're talking about. If you're a real estate photographer and you're scratching your head, I keep hearing Urbanimmersive.

I keep hearing Tourbuzz. You can think of it as the same company, but actually Urbanimmersive, parent company to Tourbuzz, as you mentioned at the start of today's show, Urbanimmersive acquired Tourbuzz. Tourbuzz is the platform for delivering the various services and real estate.

[00:54:01]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Tourbuzz is well-known in the real estate market. That's why we kept the platform name because people were used to it. I was just integrating –

[00:54:09]
Dan Smigrod: - Yeah. Just really for sake of simplicity, you can go to www.Urbanimmersive.com and it'll still take you to the appropriate Tourbuzz page. François, is there anything that we didn't cover today that you wanted to cover about for real estate photographers – this introduction to Urbanimmersive real estate photography services?

[00:54:32]
François-Hugues Liberge: - No, I think we've covered all the main things. I think that was a full scope.

[00:54:42]
Dan Smigrod: - Awesome. I think just to summarize, for real estate photographers, if you're new to adding 3D tours and other ancillary services, which you'll find is being able to get all the solutions from one company has an advantage.

[00:55:09]
Dan Smigrod: If you don't end up connecting with Urbanimmersive and you end up using another platform you may find that when you want to add live guided tours, that's a separate company; when you want floor plans, maybe you can order it from that company or you order it from somebody else. Single Property Websites may be ordered from a different company and media delivery solutions may be a different company.

A flier may or may not be offered. All of these solutions, I want to say the strength of Urbanimmersive is the intersection of technology meets services. Urbanimmersive has figured out how to make it easy, fast, and seamless to deliver all the solutions under one umbrella.

I think part of the magic and the secret source that we haven't really talked about but when you start having all your content in one place, then it makes it super-easy to create a Single Property Website and all those derivative works and all that.

[00:56:13]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Yeah, because we see photographers, they are our customers, but they're more like partners for us. We know they're busy. They have a tough job because their customers are demanding; they need everything yesterday. It's hard. The scope of work they have to do. It's something that's not always easy for them. That's why we work like that, offering a full scope of services that we do simplifies their real estate photographer's life for sure. Because like you said, you won't have to integrate it from things, we will take care of that for them. We're on their side.

[00:56:49]
Dan Smigrod: - I would amplify that, what you said François, because some other companies may be equally talking about selling their cameras and services to real estate agents, photographers, and even offering the service themselves and all of a sudden you scratch your head wondering, "well, they're selling me a camera and they're selling me a subscription but aren't they competing with me because they're also selling to the people that I talk to and they're offering services on demand and competition to me."

This is something we shouldn't take for granted is that Urbanimmersive – Tourbuzz – is totally obsessed with real estate photographers as its clients. You know who your audience is. Urbanimmersive audience is real estate photographers.

Urbanimmersive is in service to real estate photographers. Those who Urbanimmersive clients are: Period. Paragraph. And end of story. That may not be obvious when you start talking to other companies that sell cameras and subscriptions and offer their services on demand to your potential clients.

[00:58:06]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Our goal, like you said, is not to sell cameras or to sell subscriptions. Our goal is to sell our platform. When the photographer is successful; we're successful. We don't want to go over them. We want to work with them. That reflects all we're offering. It reflects as all focused on that.

[00:58:28]
Dan Smigrod: - Awesome. François, thanks for being on the show today.

[00:58:31]
François-Hugues Liberge: - Pleasure. Dan was really great. Thanks so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

[00:58:35]
Dan Smigrod: - Awesome. We've been visiting with François-Hughes Liberge, Vice President Business Development and Partnerships for Urbanimmersive. Website: www.Urbanimmersive.com - For François in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

I'm Dan Smigrod in Atlanta, Founder of We Get Around Network Forum and you've been watching WGAN-TV Live at 5.