Immersive installations that include text, audio, still images, video, and do not require interactivity.
Jury Chair: Ben Bailes
Manager, Interpretive Digital Media, The Morgan Library & Museum
GOLD: Rio Tinto Volcanic 3D in AVIE by iCinema UNSW
Museum Victoria
Judges said: We found Museum Victoria’s 360 degree 3D installation depicting undersea volcanoes a standout among this year’s submissions. The fully immersive 3D environment coupled with geologically accurate renderings provides an excellent means with which to engage visitors of all ages and backgrounds. By placing visitors in the undersea environment, the installation provides additional layers of context. Outfitted with this context, visitors are able to interact with the collection objects in the exhibition with heightened understanding. The behind the scenes technical work brought to bear in creating the installation is also quite impressive. Outstanding for overall user experience, educational content, innovative approach, and use of technology.
Producers said: “Rio Tinto Volcanic 3D in AVIE by iCinema UNSW” is a fully immersive and interactive 3D cinema exhibit and the highlight of Melbourne Museum’s newest exhibition “Dynamic Earth”. Inside Volcanic 3D computer animations of dramatic volcanic activity are projected in stereo on the inside of a cylindrical screen by 12 projectors creating a seamless 360-degree image. Underwater volcanoes, lava tunnels and eruptions take visitors on a memorable journey. Surround sound enhances the immersive nature of the experience.
The “Volcanic 3D” experience cycles between animated scenes and interactive scenes. Visitors interact with animations by standing on glowing floor-rings (which come on at the start of each interactive scene) to trigger additional video and images that provide further information about geological phenomena.
In developing “Volcanic 3D”, curators and animators worked together to create highly accurate representations of volcanic activity and geological processes. In addition high-quality video and photographs of the real-thing have been included, to link these animated representations back to our real world and the objects on display within the exhibition.
“Volcanic 3D” is a ground-breaking new platform for interaction and immersion. The projection system coupled with the interactive floor-rings is a highly innovative use of technology and the perfect way to present the dramatic content of our “Dynamic Earth” exhibition in an exciting accessible way. “Volcanic 3D” is a great hit across a broad range of audiences. It is accessible to all people of all ages and abilities. It has school groups squealing with excitement. Our visitors love it.
SILVER: 18 Camps
Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust, Potion, Variate Labs, and Belzberg Architects
Judges said: Potion developed an engaging, emotional installation that allows visitors to experience the exhibition both as individuals and as a group. This is achieved with beautiful interface design and visual unity across heterogeneous physical devices. The various elements of the presentation convey a large amount of information: statistics, geographical, personal, and historical information in an uncluttered, effective way. This submission was exceptional for the unity of the presentation of its content, its design, and the degree to which it accomplishes its overall objective: a simple, smart and powerful presentation that brings all elements together brilliantly. There is clearly a technical achievement in the execution, but is made to look simple and easy, a mark of expertise.
Producers said: “18 Camps” explores the diversity of experiences endured by inmates in the approximately 18,000 Nazi concentration camps. Given the difficult and disturbing nature of the content, these touch-sensitive displays are designed to be simple to navigate. The eighteen screens not only symbolize the 18,000 camps distributed throughout Europe, they also commemorate the struggle of the Nazis’ victims to survive as the number eighteen in Jewish tradition symbolizes life. “18 Camps” encourages visitors to break the perception that all concentration camps were the same by presenting a diversity of camps, victims, and perpetrators that made each concentration camp a distinct prison.
Visitors encounter a field of united interactive displays emblazoned with the names of labor, transit, or death camps. The screens display five categories of information including the names of camps, statistics, historic photographs, images of the camps today, and survivor’s artwork. Visitors can compare and contrast information about different camps by walking around the room.
The screens cycle through the categories in synchrony, echoing the Nazis’ organized and mechanical system of mass murder. As visitors watch one screen they learn about the infamous labor and death camp complex, Auschwitz-Birkenau, see its location in Oswiecim, Poland, learn that 1.1-1.6 million people were killed there, and see photographs of the gate, barracks, and prisoners.
Visitors can browse this information at their own speed by touching a screen. This action breaks the mechanized pattern allowing visitors to view photographs, watch testimonies, browse powerful artwork by survivors and view photographs of perpetrators.
BRONZE: Dreams of Freedom
National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia and Local Projects LLC
Judges said: Amidst a category defined by large budgets and grandiose subject matter, this submission stood out by achieving great impact using modest means that were superbly suited to the subject matter. The installation uses sculpted wall panels that represent letters from which the narrative elements were drawn. These panels double as a screen for projected video. The blending of form and content showed exceptional creativity and restraint. An elegant and novel way to engage the audience. Technology supports the presentation without overwhelming it or becoming the focus.
Producers said: Located on the second floor of the new National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia PA, Dreams of Freedom uses a signature projection system that blends projected imagery with physical sculpture. The story the museum wished to portray through this installation was a poetic interpretation of the numerous factors that combined to motivate one quarter of Europe’s Jewish population to immigrate to America at the turn of the last century.
HONORABLE MENTION: Life in Balance
Louisiana State Museum and A Côte Blanche Production
Judges said: The Louisiana State Museum’s installation on the impact of Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans is notable for the power of the first person narrative, and the weaving together of disparate voices to present the visitor with a greater sense of the community’s response to the Katrina tragedy. The use of metaphorical elements (pieces taken from the storm wrought wreckage) in the installation allow for the telling of a dramatic event, while at the same time, leaving room for critical interpretation to the individual viewer.
Producers said: “Life in Balance” is the concluding multimedia installation in the 6700-square-foot permanent exhibition “Living with Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond.” The 9-minute, 36-second HD video, shown on 14 screens in the shape of windows, features coastal Louisianians reflecting on hurricanes, the region’s recovery, and their commitment to the place they call home. As people talk, some of the other screens show supporting scenes-rebuilding efforts, anti-violence marches, cultural rituals, among others. As the final element of the exhibition, “Life in Balance” was designed to put a human face on some of the main themes of the exhibition, including resiliency and post-storm activism.
The windows that serve as screens were salvaged from houses damaged by Hurricane Katrina and are glazed in smoked glass. Together, they make a wall that is 22 feet wide and 12 feet high. Each is in a different style, reflecting New Orleans’s architectural diversity as well as the diversity of the people who withstood and overcame the disaster.
Jurors:
Chiara Bernasconi
Digital Media Project Manager, The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
Aristotle Douthit
Creative Director, Comedy Central
Joshua Feldman
Network Administrator, The Morgan Library & Museum
Dan Friedman
Web Manager and Designer, The Morgan Library & Museum
Colin O’Donnell
Partner, Control Group
Gary Peters
CEO and Creative Director, Xzed LLC
Mike Piliero
Partner, Creative Director, FreeAssociation
Michelle Melendez
East Coast Account Manager, Antenna International
