16. • Enable access for a global audience
• Bring the objects to life for audiences
• Engage audiences through play
• Provide extraordinary experiences
• Demonstrate things when it’s too big,
too small, too fast, too slow, too
expensive or too dangerous to do it for
real
We use digital to…
18. Passive
One way
Decision tree - v narrow &
deep
Active
Choice but no input
Decision tree - broad & shallow
Interactive - two way with visitors
Decision tree - broad & deep
Films
Projection mapping
Soundscapes
Audio commentaries
Immersive environments
where visitors are only passive
observers
Digital Labels
Computer Information Point
Find out more
Immersive environments where
visitors are offered a limited set of
choices
Games
Quizzes
Feedback exhibits
Simulated technology visitors can operate
Immersive environments where visitors are active
participants - lots of choices, linked to previous
decisions
Types of exhibits
20. Passive X Interactive
Object driven X Story driven
Educational X Entertaining
Real world X X X X X Imaginary world
Exhibition X Experience
Photorealistic X X X X X Graphic
Scientific accuracy X X X X Artistic licence
Robots as primary
focus
X X X X Robots as a lens to
explore other theme
Other?
Experience Map
23. The Digital Lab explores how museums can
fulfil their missions in the digital age.
Operating at the intersection of design, technology and
content, the Digital Lab explores the new forms of audience
experience that are enabled through emerging digital
technologies.
24. The Digital Lab’s initiatives will:
• explore and test emerging technologies and establish their suitability for
longer term initiatives;
• be agile and rapidly respond to new technologies and opportunities;
• deliver prototypes products that can be trailed with audiences;
• lab projects will have a short lifetime, unencumbered by the needs of
long-term sustainability;
• engage audiences, providing them new experiences;
• share findings and insights widely both within the museum and with the
culture/heritage sector;
• form partnerships with technologists, companies, researchers and others
who share our interests;
25. Areas of interest
• Digital storytelling
• How might digital media allow us to more effectively foreground objects in stories?
• How might we use digital to layer information for different audiences, Is it possible to
dynamically reorder content driven by user interest?
• VR & AR
• How might VR & AR enable audiences to explore collection objects and the stories
around them in new, more immersive ways?
• Location aware services
• How might location-aware mobile technologies enable audiences to experience
collection objects in the places where those objects have significance? - i.e. outside
the museum
• How might we use WiFi triangulation and access points to deliver new experiences to
visitors such as layering of content and context?
• Gaming
• What kind of games might be developed that enveloped the whole museum
experience?
52. Simplicity is good
Each exhibit should do one thing and do
it well
Always try to exceed audience
expectations
53. Set goals and objectives
you can’t measure success (or failure)
without them
54. • Write a brief – even if you are doing the work internally
• Know your audience
• Properly analyse the task (don’t leave the most challenging bits
until last)
• If you use cutting edge tech be prepared to BLEED
• 80:10:10
• Work out who else needs input (IT, curatorial, design, Ops …)
• Test frequently with the real audience (and on actual hardware)
• Hold adequate contingencies (time and money)
57. Why, what and
how
• In total we have reviewed over
250 evaluation studies and
academic papers conducted
between 2000-2019:
• 185 formative evaluations
• 35 larger scale summative
evaluations (SMG)
• 12 summative evaluations
from non SMG institutions
• A number of front end
evaluations (SMG)
• 8 peer reviewed academic
studies
• A series of practitioner
reviews, reports, and blog
posts
58. Formative
Evaluation -
Prototyping
• Identifying barriers amd
opportunities in what is being
proposed.
• Testing with 'real' visitors from within
the target audience.
• Usability/Ergonomics: can visitors
use it?
• Motivation: is it attractive and
appealing? Is it intrinsically
rewarding?
• Comprehension: do they understand
what it's about?
59. Museums are
unique places
• The setting and the expectations
of the setting profoundly affect
visitor behaviour:
• It's a brief experience
• You're often stood up
• It's a social experience
• It's a public experience
• There are lots of distractions
• Visitors expect museums to
provide certain experiences, not
provide others, and for these to
be communicating certain
things
60. "I liked the video interactions, not just here but across the other parts
of the museum too. It kind of brings a bit of character to it rather
than just looking into glass cases" [Visitor to a history museum]
"It's easier to understand the object and I get
deeper learning with the information from the
video" [Visitor to a decorative art museum]
"You went from a video to something to read, that was good, that was
really mixed and I think would really work for children too" [Visitor to
a history museum]
"It was completely new information, so it was very useful for me. I
watched the video but at the same time I looked at the statue" [Visitor
to a decorative art museum]
"How sunspots are catastrophic. I learnt this by
playing the game." [visitor to a science museum]
"It made me more curious after playing the
game. I read all the stuff around it. I was
drawn in." [visitor to a science museum]
“I just like interactive experiences. Sometimes
interactives are geared to youngsters but people our
age like them too” [visitor to a science museum]
61.
62. Next Steps
Dissemination
• Internal to teams within SMG –
including the creation of a wiki portal
for ease of access to report
• Publication in SMG journal
• Other publishing
• Blog posts
• FAQ list
• Conferences
Potential Areas for Future Research
• What impact does age, gender, level
of science capital etc. Have upon
visitors' expectations, use and
response to digital media?
• Are some sections of our audience not
being effectively catered for?
• How do different formats and
designs of digital media differ in their
impact upon visitors?
• Virtual, augmented and mixed reality
technologies
65. They are not usually about
technology.
Technology just provides one way for
people to interact with content and
each other so that they can have
those experiences
Our objects and their stories are our
most important assets
Hello, My name is Dave Patten and I am head of new media at the Science Museum in London. I have a background in electronics and Computer science. I have been at the museum for over 30 years and have been developing and commissioning digital exhibits since I arrived at the museum. I manage a small core team of 6 people including software devs, hardware engineer, videographer and project managers. Depending on what projects we are running I will bring in other people on contracts. We do some in house development and a lot of external commissioning which we manage. I also manage the museums Digital Lab programme (of which more later)
Science Museum Digital Lab Digital Labels Audio Immersion Review
For those of you that don’t know us we are a large museum in central London - we get about 3.4 million visitors a year. The Science Museum’s mission is to foster a society that celebrates science, technology and engineering and their impact on our lives, now and in the future. We are part of a group of museums which includes
The National Railway Museum in York
The National Science and Media Museum In Bradford
The Science and Industry Museum in Manchester in the NW of England - on the site of the oldest surviving passenger railway station, in the heart of the world’s first industrial city, today alive with innovative discoveries in science and technology.
Locomotion Shildon . The town of Shildon has had an exciting story to tell since the earliest days of the rail industry, making it the perfect place to explore the rich seam of local railway history and discover how the railways have changed all our lives.
The Home of Timothy Hackworth one of the founding fathers of the railway age.
(90m wide and almost 300m long) and features a spacious storage hall, conservation laboratories, research spaces and photography studios.
The Science Museum is just over 100 years old and we have a strong Science, Technology & Medical collections, We grew out of the great exhibition of 1851 - this photograph is when the collection was housed in the V&A museum and was known as the non arts collection
We have very traditional galleries
Spend the last 15-20 years developing mainly exhibitions with a life of between 5 and 7 years, mainly contemporary science. High level of interaction which we know our visitors enjoy
And everything in between
We have lots of objects but even so only about 7% are on display in the museum
Labels are often necessarily short and not very informative for the general visitor
We have fabulous objects like this section of a very early transatlantic ommucincation cable - but it only real become intesting when its story is revealed.
And we have lots of things that are impenetrable - can anyone guess what this is?
How do we use digital
How do we work with exhibition
Some tools to help plan experience
Experience mapping - making sure we get an appropriate spread for the type of exhibition and the target audience.
Planned the experience - on rails (seated for H&S)
Experimentation
Digital as event
We have a long history of developing and using digital labels and I will show you some examples and talk about what works and what doesn’t (for us)
Transparent screens - Digital interpretation, Screen based interpretation of objects difficult people look at the screen not the object. This tech allows us to keep the object in the visitors field of view
Gateway Scences - collection of objects in a setting
Real objects in 3 dimensional forced perspective sets - putting the obects in context
Screen based interpretation which allows us to dig deeper into the objects, there stories and the people than we could do using traditional labels.
Working models - linking a model to an object showing how things work
The museum is really interested in using more audio both to deliver content but also to set context and ambience. Sound scapes - Robots, the sun, medicine
Analysts chair in new medicine galleries - talking therapies.
Telephone exchange - oral histories linked to the actual object
3D scan of plane
Soyuz TMA19
People want digital
Yes (and not just in this museum and not just children and families)
Consistently the most heavily used elements of an exhibition, typically engaging over 60% of the visitors observed in galleries
All quotes are from adult visitors
Paper vs report – context of paper
Review is building on the 1999 paper that collated everything we had learnt over the previous 10 years about how visitors at the SCM use digital exhibits
Covers the research we conducted over the last 20 years from 2000 - 2019
In total we have reviewed over 250 evaluation studies and academic papers. Most of the findings have been drawn from 185 formative evaluations, we have also drawn data from 35 larger scale summative evaluations of completed exhibitions at SCM. Additionally we have drawn upon summative evaluations conducted at the BM (5), V&A (4), California Academy of Sciences (1), National Museum of Scotland (1), Te Papa Museum, Wellington, NZ (1). Further relevant data was found in 8 academic studies published in peer reviewed journals. Finally we were able to draw some broad conclusions from a series of front-end evaluations at the SCM and other
Review focuses primarily on 3 key questions:
- what are the potential barriers to visitors using, enjoying and learning from digital media exhibits?
- what are the common characteristics of digital media exhibits that are appealing, accessible and achieve their LOs?
- what are the pros and cons of different exhibit interfaces?
Prototyping - what is it (as the majority of the data covered in the report comes from this sort of research)
Purpose is to identify the range of problems that a visitor may encounter when using the exhibit and to identify ways to remove these problems.
Conducted in the development phase of an exhibition project when changes to the design and content can still be made without incurring undue additional costs - Because of this must be conducted quickly, often using partially finished, partially functional versions of the exhibit
Sample sizes small – typically 5-15 pairs or groups of visitors - so result are qualitative
Focusses on 3 main issues:
- Usability
- Motivation
- Comprehension
Designed to be iterative with 3 or more rounds of testing to ensure the design and content changes have addressed the problems previously identified and to ensure that new problems have not inadvertently been incorporated
Museums are unique places.
These differences profoundly affect how visitors behave in museum settings, including the ways in which they use digital media. E.g:
- It's a brief experience – compared to the time people would invest playing a game at home
- In most cases they're standing up (and often viewing the screen at a less than ideal angle)
- It's a social experience – visitors want to share the exhibit with friends or family
- It's a public experience – other people are seeing what you are doing (and occasionally interfering with your experience on purpose or unintentionally)
- There are lots of distractions
- Visitors expect museums to provide certain types of experiences, not provide others, and for these exhibits to be communicating certain things and not others
People want digital
Yes (and not just in this museum and not just children and families)
Consistently the most heavily used elements of an exhibition, typically engaging over 60% of the visitors observed in galleries
All quotes are from adult visitors
Social
Often claimed that digital can inhibit social interaction among visitors - potentially a very serious challenge since social interaction has been shown to be a vital facilitator of learning in museum settings.
However, our research, and that of other museums, consistently find the opposite to be true. In most cases digital media exhibits are used collaboratively by 2 or more visitors, often with one person operating the controls and the other(s) providing advice, commentary, background info, help reading text
We have observed visitors engage in extensive conversations and sharing of information at digital media exhibits in Atmosphere, Energy: Fueling the Future, Energy Hall, Engineer Your Future, In Future, Information Age, Our Lives in Data, Who Am I?
In Energy: Fueling the Future a 3rd of visitors in family groups and all visitors in school groups were observed using digital exhibits in collaboration with someone else
Observations of visitors at the Design A Coat of Arms exhibit at the V&As British Galleries found that a third were using it collaboratively
Many more...
Far from inhibiting social interaction, the weight of evidence across a wide range of museum settings demonstrates that interactive digital media encourages and sustains it
Next steps - dissemination & future research
Museums are about people, our collections and experiences
Museums are not usually about technology - technology just provides one way for people to interact with content and each other to have those experiences. Our objects and our stories are our most important assets.