PLANETARIUMS
Following the grand opening on 16 August, up to 1,000 people a day were visiting the new attractions at the SCSM
Studios], about Galileo and the telescope, and Back to the Moon for Good about the Google Lunar XPRIZE competition. We have Violent Universe after Christmas, another E&S feature. We’ll purchase Earth, Moon and Sun [Morehead Planetarium Production distributed by Sky-Skan]. We’re also doing laser shows with our
laser projector. We’ll show these during extended hours. Special programmes are a chance to appeal to different audiences.
Will you do live shows? Yes, at the end of most planetarium shows we’ll take a trip to outer space in the museum’s Sky Tour, a 10-minute live presentation about the night sky. During the show, guests learn how to identify constellations and planets that are currently visible from Columbia and take a trip to other places in our Solar System, such as Saturn, Jupiter and Mars.
What makes this planetarium different? First, we’re connected to a multi- disciplinary museum with history, art, natural history and science and technology. Add the observatory, 4D theatre and telescope gallery and it’s massive. I don’t think there’s another place like this in the world.
84 Second is the interactivity we have
on offer. We’ve put in new AV functions; we’ve put in a fibre connection to a router that allows us to bring content in or out from the planetarium. We can originate live content that can go elsewhere and we have a video input so we can stream directly from the observatory (or anywhere else) into the planetarium – that’s going to be perfect when the eclipse happens in 2017. We have a nice ability to move content throughout and beyond the building.
It must help to be part of the wider museum. Definitely. The state’s budget is always fluctuating, but we’ve given ourselves the opportunity to start raising more revenue and to be more self-sufficient.
What staff structure do you have? Our planetarium has one full-time manager, with additional part-time astronomy educators to follow. Our observatory manager supervises three educators, which allows us to keep the observatory open all through the weekend and for select hours on weekdays. Our STEM education manager coordinates the science activities.
Read Attractions Management online
attractionsmanagement.com/digital
How do you feel about the world of planetariums currently? Some changes to digital systems have been met with resistance. There’s still a lot of love for traditional astronomy content. I enjoy a traditional show; it’s wonderful to sit in a dome theatre and see a star show. But it’s inevitable the digital systems have taken over, because of budget and ease of use. It’s interesting to see the competition between the traditional planetarium experience and the pre-recorded aspect. A blend is good. It’s good to be able to revitalise our content on a periodic basis.
What’s the best part of this project? We’ve been waiting for this planetarium for many years. I hear people say how the old planetarium inspired them to go into science, or got them excited about school. With the observatory, when someone
climbs the ladder and looks through an eyepiece at a distant object for the first time, seeing what Galileo saw 400 years ago, it’s cool – simple and beautiful. The glass came from Zeiss back in 1925 and there’s a poetic beauty about a large refractor and a beautiful image coming through it. It’s rare that people get close to an observatory, let alone stumble on one in a museum. It’s really neat. l
AM 4 2014 ©Cybertrek 2014
PHOTOS: BRETT FLASHNICK / SEAN RAYFORD
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