(Above) The Imperial War Museum of the North recently switched to digital projection
BEHIND THE SCENES Now I work behind the scenes in one of the busiest design groups in our business. We look at design from the content and story fi rst, with our interpreters often guiding the design principles with words before the lay- out and design is even touched. To use an analogy I will come back
to, a good fi lm is based on a good story and well thought through storyboard and script – don’t start shooting until the initial thinking is done. Working internally with a strong design team, you can sometimes see the frustration that can come with so much technology available, but a diffi culty in fi nding the right tools. Again, it used to be so much easier with the simple slide projector as the main weapon of choice for images and its known limitations. There is a vast array of possibilities today, but designing for the public space and its heavy use requires careful choices and often a thick wallet. We probably have too much technology to hand, but thinking of the many areas of change, it’s interesting
“Now we face a situation where without some form of 3D, 4D, 5D or interactive experience, clients and visitors alike feel short-changed”
to just touch on what we’re watching and waiting for, or need further developments in, to help us just that little bit more.
PROJECTORS
Video projectors started to be used in museums around the early 1990s and are now a key tool for images. The variety of models and lenses out there are huge and often confusing, but as the technology advances, the possibilities for projecting good quality images from the right place increases. That said, we’re waiting for the more powerful and brighter projectors to have lenses that allow them to be placed very close to the screen surface for front projection. Projectors with these special off-set lenses exist for the classroom, but they tend to be lower quality, lower priced and suitable for intermittent use. Projector manufacturers are working on models to meet the demands of museum designers wanting to explore close viewing of high resolution images, without visitors casting shadows and without resorting to rear pro- jection or videowalls.
Another major step we’re
Digital Projection is a UK manufacturer pushing the limits of LED in video projectors
AM 2 2011 ©cybertrek 2011
waiting for with video projec- tors is the development of higher power LED lamp sources, replacing fi lament and dis-
charge lamps. These will offer long
lamp life and more economical running costs without having to get to the projec- tors every few weeks for lamp changes. It will also allow us to make the technology a little more discreet with projectors tucked away from view, as access would not be required quite as much. A UK-based company, Digital Projection,
is at the forefront with this technology, tack- ling some real issues with heat from these very compact LED sources, but it looks like a few years yet before the traditional lamps belong in a museum too.
AUDIO Audio is a very poor partner in technology design for museums, and is often thought about at the last minute. However, many of the tools available have been around for some time with a wide range of loudspeak- ers and processing equipment that tends to evolve slowly from our point of view. The trend to watch is in the development
of directional loudspeakers, allowing small groups or single visitors to be targeted with sound while keeping the general ambient levels down. Dealing with localised sound where there are a number of exhibits together has always been an issue, and while the ugly-looking sound dome has been around for a while and is reasonably effective but low quality, moves are being
Read Attractions Management online
attractionsmanagement.com/digital 51
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