Help: Live Action Film From Fast & Furious Director Justin Lin For Google Spotlight

Help is the newest title from Google Spotlight Stories, a collaborated effort between Fast and Furious director Justin Lin and Google ATAP (Advanced Technologies and Projects.)

Justin Lin & Paul Walker at Fast and Furious set!

Justin Lin & Vin Diesel

Help, a short immersive 360 spherical film debuted at Google I/O. Help may be a short 5 minute film but the piece actually took two years to make. Help is the fifth installment from the Google Spotlight archive, and it is also the first live action spotlight story. Help is free to download for a limited time. Be sure to set aside enough download time and memory, because the file size is 1GB.

Google Spotlight stories enable viewers to use their mobile device like a window that allows users moving it any direction or viewing from any angles. Viewers can enjoy the 360 immersive stories directly on mobile devices or on a VR headset.

“Your phone is the window into that world,” explained Regina Dugan, whose ATAP group at Google has been developing these Spotlight Stories. ( From Variety )

“With the SDK, an animator can build a story using familiar tools (e.g. Autodesk’s Maya) and set up interactive story in an intuitive way,” ATAP’s technical project lead for Spotlight Stories, Rachid El Guerrab, said in a statement “A lot of work is going into our new ‘film language,’ and how we introduce creators to thinking in 3D, in 360 degrees, with a free camera, and with viewer-based pacing” ( Mashable ).

“It’s more of a shared narrative,” Lin said during a session at Google I/O Friday. “When I go on set, it’s very important, the lenses I choose, what I choose to frame or not frame and that’s how I make my movies. And now I’m sharing that power with the viewer and it’s actually very liberating.” ( From Mashable )

A custom 360 camera rig built for HELP called “Spidercam” Image source: Variety

Google is taking the same approach as it did with the newly announced 16 camera rig, making the new format of storytelling widely accessible as open source. Google is releasing a “Story Development Kit” that provides tools such as sound design, editing, and testing for filmmakers around the world to create and publish immersive short films and stories.

Google Spotlight stories aims to bring viewers a world of storytelling tailored for mobile devices. The app is currently available to download on Google Play. The app will be also be available on iOS and Youtube app.

Justin Lin at Help film set Image Source: Variety

Google Spotlight Stories truly is a milestone of a new form of immersive cinematic storytelling custom made purely for mobile devices!

Content & Image Source: Variety, Gizmodo, Mashable, Android Authority, Zimbio