Immersive Environment Thingvellir - National Geographic / Disney

Immersive Environment Thingvellir

National Geographic / Disney

Client
National Geographic, for Disney+ on Apple Vision Pro
Launched
5 August 2024
Place
Thingvellir National Park, Iceland (UNESCO World Heritage Site)
Our role
3D capture and 360° panoramas on location

Thingvellir is one of the most historically charged places in the world - a UNESCO World Heritage Site where the world's oldest parliament, the Althing, convened for centuries, and where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates slowly pull apart beneath your feet. National Geographic and Disney+ commissioned us to bring this singular place into Apple Vision Pro as an immersive spatial environment - so that Disney+ viewers with an Apple Vision Pro can stand inside it.

Immersive Environment Thingvellir highlight

At Thingvellir you stand at the edge of continents - where the earth itself is being pulled apart, and where a parliament first gathered over a thousand years ago. We wanted that sense of place to be something people could actually feel.

The National Park

Thingvellir National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Iceland, is a landscape of dramatic rifts, glacial springs and layered history. The North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet here - and for centuries this was also the gathering place for the Althing, the world's oldest parliament. Our team handled the full field production: 3D assets and 360-degree panoramas captured on location in Iceland, recreating the park as it exists in reality.
On location at Thingvellir National Park during the 3D capture expedition
On location at Thingvellir National Park during the 3D capture expedition

Our Commission

National Geographic selected Thingvellir as a real-world environment for Apple Vision Pro alongside fictional worlds from Marvel and Star Wars - a deliberate decision to ground the platform in places that carry genuine historical and natural weight. Our role was to make the environment feel as faithful to the real place as the medium allows. Every rifted canyon, glacial spring and stone field in the experience comes from our on-location capture - not approximations of Iceland, but Iceland itself.
On location at Thingvellir National Park during field production
Photographing the Icelandic landscape for 3D capture
Snowy terrain at Thingvellir captured for the immersive environment
The Thingvellir experience rendered on Apple Vision Pro
Tectonic rift landscape at the UNESCO World Heritage site
360-degree panorama capture equipment in Iceland
Volcanic rock formations at Thingvellir National Park

Inside the Environment

The experience offers two ways to be at Thingvellir: a snowy winter landscape in Arctic daylight, and an aurora-lit night scene. Authentic natural sounds recorded on location give each setting depth and presence. Both versions are built from the same field capture - the same ground, the same light conditions, translated into spatial media for Apple Vision Pro and Disney+.
The Immersive Environment Thingvellir on Apple Vision Pro with Disney+
The Immersive Environment Thingvellir on Apple Vision Pro with Disney+

Impact

Thingvellir launched on Disney+ for Apple Vision Pro on 5 August 2024 as National Geographic's first immersive environment - a real UNESCO heritage site on the same platform as fictional universes. For a place as historically significant as Thingvellir, that matters: the birthplace of Icelandic democracy can now be visited from a living room.

Credits

  • Martin Edström - Director
  • Oliver Akermo - Camera & Editor
  • Jonathan Lövholm - Immersive Producer

Get in touch

Get in touch hello@ivar.studio +46 (0) 733 13 05 69