museum4punkt0: digital technologies open up new worlds of experience in museums
Press release from 10/31/2018
Virtually penetrating the forest floor or travelling across the moon, experiencing carnival all year round or discovering the hidden sides of paintings: The "museum4punkt0" project, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM) with 15 million euros, is developing digital offerings throughout Germany that turn museum visits into an experience - The seven participating museums from Bavaria, Saxony, Bremen, Baden-Württemberg and Berlin present 360-degree films, augmented reality tours and virtual tours - An initial assessment
The Germany-wide joint project "museum4punkt0" was launched over a year ago. The aim: to enhance museum visits with digital means. Apps, virtual reality and location-specific recommendation systems are now part of everyday digital life - but they have rarely been used in museums. Yet digital technologies open up a wealth of possibilities for exploring inaccessible environments, experiencing historical events and providing background knowledge about museum objects. In order to utilise this potential, museum4punkt0 is pursuing a concept that is unique in Germany: seven museums of different sizes and thematic focuses are jointly testing new formats that support learning, discovery and participation in the museum - and are continuously testing their prototypes with visitors. The results - from source codes for apps and virtual reality applications to guidelines for implementing the technology in museum operations - are in turn made freely available to other cultural institutions for re-use and further development. The BKM is providing a total of 15 million euros for this purpose until 2020.
The first interim results have now been presented in Berlin, ranging from 360-degree films and augmented reality tours to virtual moon trips. Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters emphasised the completely new form of cooperation: "The participating institutions represent the diversity of the German museum landscape and are jointly developing new digital products to better reach the public of tomorrow. We need to change museum infrastructures in order to be able to respond to changing visitor behaviour. That is why it is so important that 'museum4punkt0' offers products as open source and for reuse."
The President of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, Hermann Parzinger, emphasised: "As a federal and state institution, the SPK was happy to take the lead for 'museum4punkt0' because we are very interested in this transfer of knowledge in times of digital change. In the project, institutions of different sizes, structures and experience with digital processes have grown together to form a close network. A consistent sense of community is important if cultural institutions want to survive in the digital transformation. museum4punkt0 is setting an example here: It enables other museums not to have to start from scratch for their own digital projects, but to be able to build on the project's considerations, findings and solutions. In this way, museum4punkt0 is also an important source of inspiration for current transformation processes at the SPK - with regard to our digital offerings as well as our working methods."
And what do the initial results of "museum4punkt0" look like in concrete terms?
With a focus on 3D digitisation and visualisation, the Deutsches Museum München is bringing masterpieces of technology to life. Since August 2018, visitors to the Munich VRlab have been able to control virtual reconstructions of the Lunar Rover, the Sulzer steam engine or the Benz motor car themselves and learn how they work. Georg Hohmann, Head of Deutsches Museum Digital, says: "The VRlab opened on 1 August - and is already a highlight for visitors. They can travel across the surface of the moon in a realistic virtual reality environment with the "Lunar Rover", experience Otto Lilienthal's flights or learn how a steam engine or the Benz motor car works. An augmented reality app is also currently being developed for the "Cosmos Coffee" special exhibition."
The Senckenberg Museum für Naturkunde Görlitz has been testing the virtual reality animation "Adventure Soil Life" at various locations in Germany since November 2017. Virtually shrunk to the size of an insect, visitors can explore the forest floor and learn about creatures that are otherwise almost inaccessible. Museum Director Willi Xylander emphasises: "With the new digital formats at our museum, we enable our visitors to experience impressions and emotions that cannot be generated by traditional exhibition formats alone. The new virtual applications make it possible to experience inaccessible living spaces and open up the entire museum to an extent that would not have been possible before. The virtual look behind the scenes, the interactive familiarisation with our scientists and their work and the opportunity for citizens to actively participate in our current research questions creates transparency and shows our museum as a lively place of encounter and intensive exchange."
About the exhibition experiment "Prisoners of war. Powerlessness. Longing", the German Emigration Centre Bremerhaven has been testing how historical and emotional aspects of migration can be conveyed digitally since summer 2018. In two settings - with originals on the one hand and purely digital on the other - it is researching the feelings and learning effects that each type of staging evokes in visitors. Museum Director Simone Eick explains: "We are using new virtual formats to tell the immaterial aspects of migration history: emotions and ideas. Ontological portals enable an interactive exchange online and in the museum about family histories, the formation of opinions in immigration societies and the high risk of manipulation through digital technologies in migration debates."
The Museum Narrenschopf Bad Dürrheim and the Fasnacht Museum Schloss Langenstein also aim to convey emotional facets of intangible cultural assets: to this end, numerous 360-degree films were created in the last carnival season that put viewers right in the middle of the customs. In addition, a digital guide system integrated into the museum rooms is currently being tested, which reacts to visitor input and interaction patterns. Rohland Wehrle, Museum Narrenschopf Bad Dürrheim, and Michael Fuchs, Fasnachtsmuseum Schloss Langenstein: "For the two carnival museums, participation in the joint project is a unique opportunity to pave the way for the future - especially for small museums. The first completed 360-degree films have been very well received by the test subjects, confirming an emotional immersion in the "Fastnacht" customs complex - by jesters and laypeople alike. The complex structures behind the virtual museum guide are becoming increasingly visible and are gradually linking visitor profiles, content and staging into a functioning system."
After months of intensive visitor and user research, the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin are developing services that digitally complement the museum experience before, during and after the visit. Experiments show how augmented reality can be used creatively - for example, to visualise hidden layers in paintings, to clarify the geographical and social contexts of exhibits or to make guided tours interactive. Christina Haak, Deputy Director General of the National Museums in Berlin: "In our sub-project, we have already been able to gain valuable insights from extensive visitor and user research into visitor motivations, expectations and experiences, which we will process by the end of the year in the form of various tools for target group-specific work with digital technologies in museums. We have also realised initial prototype applications in which, for example, we have investigated the potential of augmented reality for the Gemäldegalerie or the future Humboldt Forum. We will incorporate all these findings directly into further developments as part of an iterative approach and make them available to the museum landscape."
The Humboldt Forum Foundation at the Berlin Palace is focussing on allowing visitors to actively shape knowledge in the museum. To this end, the video storytelling toolkit "kosmosdigital Humboldt Forum" is being developed, with which different target groups can contribute their stories about exhibits. The mobile application "My Object" helps users to playfully find their personal favourite object and embark on an individual journey of discovery through the museum. Lavinia Frey, Managing Director Programme and Projects: "With the 'My Object' application, we are developing a low-threshold and interactive application based on the experiences and characteristics of gaming that enables visitors to playfully explore the diversity and complexity of the exhibits in the Humboldt Forum. 'Kosmosdigital' points the way to a participatory museum: web videos and digital storytelling are used to co-creatively involve stakeholders in the curatorial work of the Humboldt Forum. Their personal views and everyday experiences are at the centre of interest."