Transforming the museum-community nexus with technology : a virtual museum infrastructure for participatory engagement and management

Museums play an important role in society as the custodians of heritage, and advances in technology have brought about opportunities for curating, preserving and disseminating heritage through virtual museums. However, this is not matched by an understanding of how these technologies can support these functions, especially given the varying levels of resources that museums have at their disposal. To address this problem, a hybrid methodology which combines underpinning theory and practice has been adopted. Initial investigation of the problem takes place through a contextualisation of museology and heritage studies, followed by exploratory case studies that yield design objectives for a Virtual Museum Infrastructure (VMI). A design of the VMI is proposed based on these objectives, and the VMI is instantiated, deployed and evaluated in real-world scenarios using a combination of quantitative and qualitative techniques. The findings of this investigation demonstrate that the use of technology provides new opportunities for engagement with heritage, as experts and community members alike can create, curate and preserve content, which can then be disseminated in engaging ways using immersive, yet affordable technologies. This work therefore demonstrates how technology can be used to: (1) support museums in the creation, curation, preservation and dissemination of heritage, through a VMI that provides support for all the stages of the media life cycle, (2) facilitate active use, so that content that is created once can be reused on multiple platforms (for example on the web, on mobile apps and in on-site installations), and (3) encourage connectivity by linking up local museums using a location-aware interface and facilitates the consumption content using digital literacies available to the public. The aforementioned points, coupled with the system instantiations that demonstrate them, represent the contributions of this thesis

Exploring the past with Google Cardboard

Combining digital reconstruction with mobile technologies has the potential of enriching visitors experience to historic sites. Through designing a mobile App with Google Cardboard it is possible to use technology already in peoples' pockets to provide immersive on-site exploration of historic sites. This paper looks at our experience in developing such a mobile App which acts as a digital guided tour of the remains of St Andrews Cathedral. The App brings together traditional media such as audio, images, panoramas, 3D video and 4π Steradian (or 360°) video with a mobile smartphone and Google Cardboard to provide a tour of one of Scotland's most important historic sites. The mobile App is available from both Google Play and iTunes, providing direct delivery to a potential audience of millions. It complements the location-aware mediaeval St Andrews App, which provides a guided tour to the town of St Andrews as a whole. In the absence of Google Cardboard the App is still useful providing both visual content and audio commentary on this historic monument.Postprin

The Virtual Museums of Caen : a case study on modes of representation of digital historical content

In the early 19th Century much of the Strath of Kildonan was cleared of its people who were replaced by sheep farming. This pattern was repeated across the Scottish Highlands. In 2013 Timespan, Helmsdale Heritage and Arts Centre, hosted a program of activities to mark the 200th anniversary of the Clearances. The centrepiece of these activities was a community excavation of the Caen township in the Strath of Kildonan. Based upon the evidence of that excavation a digital model of the township was created using the Virtual Time Travel Platform. The Virtual World of Caen can be explored as part of an installation in Timespans storytelling room. Visitors can experience what life would have been like in the Strath of Kildonan in 1813. This paper reports how the model has been deployed in different settings and on various digital platforms. These include showcasing the model at the Helmsdale Highland Games where visitors could explore the township of the past on stereo head mounted displays, or a Virtual Museum website that welcomes visitors from around the globe, as well as using Google Cardboard to allow visitors to explore Caen today, the virtual reconstruction of Caen simultaneously whilst on the site.Postprin

Mobile exploration of medieval St Andrews

Saint Andrews is a town with a rich history. It was the religious centre of Scotland for close to a millennium. The Cathedral was strongly associated with the wars of Independence and Robert the Bruce. The castle was the scene of pivotal revolt leading to the reformation and hosted the first Scottish protestant congregation. St Salvators Chapel was the religious centre of Scotland’s first University. This paper presents work which explores using mobile technologies to support investigation, learning and appreciation of the past. It builds on tradition and world class scholarship into the history of this important town and makes them available to school students, researchers and tourists using mobile technologies. From text based quests, through mobile apps to location aware stereoscopic 3D experiences the gamut of available commodity and emerging hardware is used to enable the past to be explored in new ways.Preprin

Digital pathways in community museums

This research was supported by the European Commission, grant agreement number 693669In this article, we investigate the positive impact recent developments in digital technologies have on the relations between museums, their collections and the communities they serve. Our work indicates that sustainable benefit is produced with the use of existing digital literacies and infrastructures. We have analysed and evaluated the potential of emergent 3D and spherical technologies on the relationships between community and museum, participation in the formation of heritage, the ‘visit’ to the museum, and connection with remote audiences. The evaluation arises from our long term experience in working with community museums and through a series of workshops developed for the project entitled ‘Museums and Community: Concepts, experiences, and sustainability in Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean’ (‐‐). Firstly, we contextualise the work presented by examining community museums, trends in emergent technologies and the advancements in digital heritage. Secondly, we analyse the methodologies used to design and execute the elements of the workshops, along with assess case studies to demonstrate distinctive experiences and outcomes particular to each workshop. We also describe how we constructed and implemented a novel design for a cost effective Virtual Museum Infrastructure (), which makes it simpler for communities to create a virtual museum and connect it with global museum networks. Our aim is to communicate our findings in relation to methodologies, workflows and technologies that will be of value in understanding how to overcome the challenges emergent technologies present but yet have the potential to strengthen both community and museum.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

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The Virtual Museums of Caen:a case study on modes of representation of digital historical content

In the early 19th Century much of the Strath of Kildonan was cleared of its people who were replaced by sheep farming. This pattern was repeated across the Scottish Highlands. In 2013 Timespan, Helmsdale Heritage and Arts Centre, hosted a program of activities to mark the 200th anniversary of the Clearances. The centrepiece of these activities was a community excavation of the Caen township in the Strath of Kildonan. Based upon the evidence of that excavation a digital model of the township was created using the Virtual Time Travel Platform. The Virtual World of Caen can be explored as part of an installation in Timespans storytelling room. Visitors can experience what life would have been like in the Strath of Kildonan in 1813. This paper reports how the model has been deployed in different settings and on various digital platforms. These include showcasing the model at the Helmsdale Highland Games where visitors could explore the township of the past on stereo head mounted displays, or a Virtual Museum website that welcomes visitors from around the globe, as well as using Google Cardboard to allow visitors to explore Caen today, the virtual reconstruction of Caen simultaneously whilst on the site

Aerial Virtual Reality: Remote Tourism With Drones

This paper proposes a portable system for group-based exploration of remote landscapes in real-time. The system incorporates a drone for video capturing, a Raspberry Pi for wireless communication, an Android server for streaming and control, and one or more Android clients for rendering the footage in mobile virtual reality headsets. The system has been evaluated from a technical perspective to investigate and optimise resource utilisation, as well as from a user perspective with participants to investigate usability. The findings demonstrate the feasibility of group-based, virtual tours of remote landscapes in real-time using affordable components