The Looking Glass to the Past is a simple concept that uses an interface that could only be enabled by advanced technology, but leverages the natural and ancient human urge to explore and see hidden things. In this case, those hidden things are people and objects revealed in historical museum spaces.
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The concept, if you put aside the technology for a moment is based on a simple idea: the best way to understand the past is to see it with your own eyes, to have a window or looking glass into the past. What you see through the looking glass is a live reenactment of historical events, or past scenarios. Imagine instead of just walking through a historical room, you walked into that same room and could see the people who lived there, in their historic dress, using the utensils or tools or books or other items, interacting with each other in behavior of the times. Like in our modern life, in any given room many things might be happening at the same time. For example, in the Tenement Museum in NY, in a full historical reenactment of a late-19th century tenement kitchen; a mother may be stirring pots over the coal-driven stove, children may be playing or eating at the table, a grandmother may be talking to a grandfather at the other end, and a father may come home from the market at a certain point, etc.
The idea is that simple - to give a museum visitor a screen through which to see that reenactment. One platform may be a PDA or laptop that receives streaming video, another may be a camera hooked up to receive or playback video footage. The basic idea, however, is that wherever the visitor points the device he/she sees the historical reenactment that has been shot in the exact angle and perspective of the viewer, like looking through a window to the past. If a child looks at the screen, holding/pointing it up to the kitchen table, the actual table would remain the same. On the screen, however, the same table would appear with a family sitting at it, footage previously shot. When the child moves, holding the device up to the stove, the screen reveals a person cooking, directly showing how all of these empty spaces, preserved artifacts and information were once alive. By giving a degree of control to the user, new details may be discovered. In fact, because the use is in control, the full "story" can never be revealed by one visit, it may take repeat visits to see all there is to see. Like in real life, the serendipity of the moment guides the user.
Benefits:
- visitors can guide themselves, tours not required, or tours are supplemented by this technology.
- visitors can see artifacts being used by real people, situating the knowledge in (hopefully) correct context. Museums can show educate visitors on how items were used according to their best research.
- satisfy the urge to touch, somewhat, by seeing how things are used by the people who really used them (kids always want to touch things because they want to see how they work).
- visitors have a degree of control, rewarding visitors for using the device well (you see something cool that means you are successfully using the tool, positive feelings).
- visitors are encouraged to explore.
- By having continuous simultaneous details in the video, you are stimulated to examine environments, seeing details you may not have been able to understand without having a person demonstrate. (Like something small on a shelf in the back behind the velvet rope)
- Repeat visits possibly, in order to discover more that you may have missed last time.
Possible technology scenarios:
1. Several cameras record a 360-degree video. The footage is catalogued exactly and stored on a server. In the museum room, a static tripod-mounted camera is set up to simulate the looking glass effect. By sensing and calculating the exact angle that the camera is pointing in, the correct footage is served to the camera. visitors can zoom in and out, examining detail in the footage they might not otherwise be able to see.
2. A camera shoots against a convex mirror mounted on the ceiling or above the action. The footage distortion is corrected in post and the above user scenario is the same.
3. Several cameras record a 360 degree video, frame synched and networked for simultaneous start and stops. the footage could even be recorded to disc on first take, all cameras sending their signal to a central drive. The synched footage is woven together in some image correction tool (After Effects?) then chopped up into segments and assigned a number. Each segment is a single MOV. On the user side, the device has a position mapper of some kind, dynamically allowing the user to change positions on 3 axes. So a child could hold a PDA and point it anywhere. A sensor detects the position of the device and serves the correct MOV file, mapped onto a 3D surface, a sphere or a cylinder, I think. I'm sure there are others!
Cool places this could be implemented:
- the Tenement Museum
- The Met in any historical architecture or recreated room
- Museum of Natural History in any diorama or bones exhibition
- in general: art museums where historical items are shown, cultural exhibits
- in general: science museums where things were once alive
