Category: exhibition

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exhibition myomb

People are Making Their Own

Guest post by Rob Sherman about how people are using their Make Your Own kit. Thanks, Rob!

It’s safe to say that all of us have a lot more time on our hands, at the moment, than we did two months ago. Long-neglected musical instruments are being dusted off and plucked or parped, and a lot of slightly-disappointing sourdough is being baked. In the midst of a grim global situation, people are trying to keep themselves busy, learn something new, and be as creative as possible.

Unsurprisingly, the Museum in a Box community has been turning out hundreds of collections on every subject under the sun. Some of these collections, created by museum professionals, reveal the secrets of the objects in their care: others catalogue the world around their authors in meticulous, loving detail. Under our current, constrained circumstances, the Museum in a Box is coming into its own as a study tool, personal diary and storytelling device; and we wanted to highlight some of the strangest, sweetest and more scintillating collections available on the platform at the moment. 

Ancient Worlds by AHR

Herakles & The Hydra

Holly, eleven years old, won’t let a little lockdown get in the way of her interest in ancient history. Each object in her collection, Ancient Worlds, focuses on a different object from Greek or Roman history, accompanied by Holly’s evocative storytelling. Listen to her own version of the story of Herakles and the Hydra, and a very convincing impression of a Roman toothache.

A Box Of Noises by renata

Fridge Beeping

Trapped in our homes and twiddling our thumbs, some of us are starting to pay long-overdue attention to the little details of our surroundings, finding beauty and complexity wherever we can. Renata’s collection, A Box Of Noises, takes simple domestic sounds and turns them into something close to music. Paired with her delicate line illustrations, you’ll be surprised that a piece called Faucet in Three Acts could be so captivating.

Climate Change Effects by IES A Basella

Changes in Oceanic Currents

Produced by students at the IES A Basella secondary school in Galicia, Spain, these cards helped classes to categorise and understand the interwoven consequences of climate change over the past century. When you place the stark images of flooded streets and raging wildfires on a Box, you hear the students tell you, in their own words, what awaits our planet if things do not change for the better. There is a version of this collection in both English and Spanish, and the collection is still being used in the school to help new classes understand the Museum in a Box format, and produce their own collections.

Listening to the Earth by Hannah Turner

Hummingbirds with Dr. Douglas Altshuler

This is the final exhibit and online repository for the course, LIBR 588: Theory and Practice of Oral History, in the School of Information at the University of British Columbia. The title of this exhibit, “Listening to the Earth” is a call to answer the question: “How might we preserve stories about organisms for future generations?”. Students in the course interviewed nine experts and scientists and asked them about their favourite organisms.

Hiragana by Takako Copeland

Despite the lure of Netflix and the fridge, some of us want to try and use these idle months a little more constructively. If you’re looking to learn a new language in an accessible and manageable way, Takako Copeland’s collection provides a satisfying and tactile method for learning the hiragana syllabary, a major component of written Japanese. Each card in the collection, illustrated with a hiragana character and an object whose name in Japanese includes that character, is paired with Takako speaking the character and the word aloud. With the cards spread out in front of you or held in your hands, and guided by Takako’s patient voice, there is not a better introduction to the Japanese language out there.

Great Bums Of History by George Oates

Nymphs

With most of the great works of art furloughed behind the closed doors of the big galleries, Museum in a Box’s own George Oates has selflessly created a collection that allows you to experience some of the very greatest up close, and from surprising new angles. Some might say a little too close, and from entirely unnecessary angles, but let it not be said that we aren’t doing our bit for home education. We won’t spoil this collection’s surprise, but it’s safe to say that it is a… multi-sensory experience.

Categories
3D exhibition museum photogrammetry

New work: Photogrammetry for the new Medicine Galleries at the Science Museum!

The Science Museum recently released their Explore Museum Objects in 3D online resource and 20 new 3D models on Sketchfab to coincide with the opening of their new Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.

In 2018, the museum approached us about the idea of scanning a set of objects for the upcoming galleries and we gladly accepted. Using photogrammetry we made a number of the 3D models in the final set. So let’s talk a little about the project and the awesome objects we were tasked with scanning!

The new Medicine Galleries include three thousand objects and showcase some truly amazing medical items. They’re all about ‘exploring our relationship with medicine and health through more than 500 years of history’ and include the world’s first MRI scanner and Alexander Fleming’s penicillin mould!

The process

We’ve created over 20 commissions now, and many of them have included 3D digitisation as a service. This was a little different because the resulting models were to be viewed digitally (and not printed), but we still used the same photogrammetry techniques.

We worked closely with Digital Learning Producers Emilia McKenzie and Josh Blair, whittling down a list of possible objects from the Medicine collection based on their ‘scan-ability’. We looked at material, reflectivity, and size while Josh and Emilia came at it from strength of curriculum links.

Seeing images of the objects in advance really helps with that initial selection, but seeing an object in the flesh is even better, so it was useful to arrange a site visit at Blythe House to preview the objects. There are two major steps to making 3D models: Photogrammetric capture, and making the digital models.

Photogrammetric capture

Inside the treasure trove that is Blythe House where we did the image capture. The parquet flooring proved surprisingly helpful for image alignment!

We set our gear up in a corner of the stores and did image capture over two weeks, averaging about 3 objects per day. The chosen objects varied massively in size and complexity from a large wooden 18th century barber-surgeon’s chair, to a box of matches, to a cast iron baby-weighing scale.

It was great to get up close with the objects and be surrounded by so many other wondrous artefacts in the Blythe House stores. We love going behind the scenes at different museums, in fact it’s a large part of why we started the company in the first place, so visiting was a real treat for us!

Charlie capturing photos of the beautiful Leeches jar, fortunately it’s not so beautiful content has long since been removed!

Making the digital models

Having captured high-res images of all the artefacts we began the job of processing them into models using Agisoft’s Photoscan (now Metashape). A couple of the objects proved challenging owing to their complexity. Manufactured objects are usually more complicated then sculptural/hand-made things, so our models of sculptures tend to be quite forgiving as they’re one mass, whereas machine-made objects like the baby weighing scales or carbolic sprayer are not.

With their uniform metallic parts like nuts and bolts and pressed sheet metal failing to mesh well, areas of the models looked a bit “crunchy”. Accuracy was key for these objects as the detail helped explain their function.

  • Image Capture
  • Agisoft Mesh
  • Remodelling
  • Final retextured model

To solve this we recreated the object topology and remodelled several of the objects using the exported meshes of the original scans, and the photos as additional reference. After remodelling the objects to a suitably detailed level we could then import those to Metashape again for retexturing. The result is a neat model that represented the original and load quickly online.

The remodelled steam sprayer which was later animated by artist Sophie Dixon

The new 3D models

We produced 13 models which you can see on the museum’s Sketchfab page. Our favourites include

The museum’s Sketchfab page. All the models are downloadable under a CC Attribution-NonCommercial license.

Object-based learning

The Science Museum has developed tons of online classroom resources for teachers and educators as part of the project, using 3D models as the base. It’s a great way to introduce object-based learning into the classroom and to help fuel a student’s curiosity. The resources can be browsed through different fields including key stage, curriculum links, and subject.

Emilia and Josh also worked on providing useful supporting material as well such as scale (which is often overlooked with 3D models). There are also loads of discussion prompt questions like is it OK to exploit or harm animals to make humans better?

The Science Museum’s new learning resource site.

At Museum in a Box we’re obviously massive advocates for object-based learning! Mostly because objects are a great way to prompt questions, stimulate discussion and improve people’s critical thinking. What’s more, having a digital model or 3D print means you can move the object around and view it from all angles, something that’s just not possible with objects in a gallery setting.

Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries

We’re proud to have made a small contribution to the brand new Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries space at the Science Museum. It’s brilliant!

We were delighted to work on this digitisation project and play a part in growing the museum’s offering of digital resources. The Education team were great to work with and the outcome is a really well rounded set of resources that encapsulate the spirit of the new galleries perfectly!

We can provide 3D digitisation through our commissions so if you’re considering making a collection through Museum in a Box but don’t have the ability to do 3D in-house, do get in touch.

Categories
3D exhibition History

Designed to Disappear

The 31st July was the 100th anniversary since the start of the Battle of Passchendaele, and in the days leading up to the centenary a sculpture appeared in Trafalgar Square called The Mud Soldier. Created by Damian and Kilian Van Der Velden, the slumped soldier was crafted from sand mixed with mud from the fields of Passchendaele, and designed to slowly deteriorate, washing away in the rain. (It was also rigged with a watering system in case of dry spells, but turned out it was a rainy week!)

Transition from Day 2 to Day 4

 

It was a truly touching memorial and we ran down to Trafalgar Square several times to revisit the sculpture, as did many other Londoners and those who’d travelled from further afield to see it.

Given its temporary nature, we wanted to take the opportunity to make 3D captures of the sculpture in its different states and share those online. We did that on the second and fourth day (which was its last). Here’s the model from the second day…

… and here’s a small print of it we made:

The #MudSoldier was a fitting tribute to remembering the human cost of the First World War. It was lovely to see people who may normally rush across Trafalgar Square stopping in their tracks to observe the sculpture and take a moment to realise its meaning.

We were also thrilled to meet sculptor Damian Van Der Velden and two of the project organisers, Karen Roebuck and Pauline Steverlynck from Visit Flanders, Thank you for letting us loop around the installation snapping away to create the model!

We hope you enjoy it…

Categories
3D design exhibition research workshop

Points of Contact: A new box with the London Borough of Camden

The Arts & Tourism team at the London Borough of Camden received funding from Arts Council England to deploy a Museum in a Box as the primary vehicle to engage young people in the Camden Arts Collection.

We made a box that contained eight works from the collection; a mixture of sculptural and two-dimensional pieces. The box travelled widely around Camden, and was part of 13 workshops across the borough, held at Swiss Cottage, Kentish Town, Queens Crescent and Kilburn Centre libraries, and the Great Ormond Street Hospital. The project culminated in Points of Contact: The Camden Art Collection Unboxed, an exhibition at the Swiss Cottage Library Gallery, open until 1st of July 2017.

Creating 3D from 2D
We were curious to try a sort of extrusion of some of the paintings in the box, and Tom worked to literally add a new dimension to works by Derek Jarman and others, to create a tactile version of each of the flat works.

Hands on, helpful user research
For us, a big part of the appeal of this partnership was the opportunity to conduct workshops with kids and their guardians in all the libraries we visited. We learned all sorts of things about putting the box in front of people who’d never seen it before, and faced a few teeth-clenching moments as the kids played with the 3D prints in unexpected ways (like making the Running Table try to pass through Barred Portal, which it turns out isn’t possible).

It was a pleasure to witness that first “what’s this magic thing?” look on people’s faces, and the general ease of use of the box. We also learned that the “cornucopia” display technique we’d used with more adults — where we spread lots of objects out and let people choose their own adventure — resulted in kids just wanting to try every object as quickly as possible to see what they’d say. In the later workshops, that led us to a more contemplative, steady demonstration, where we’d bring out one piece at a time, ask the kids about it, and then boop the object to see what happened.

We met lots of brilliant kids, but must give special mention to The Magnificent Balthazar, who we met at Swiss Cottage. He was very happy to sit with the objects and the box for well over an hour, and took the time to create his own rendition of each of the works in the box, all eight, and showed real artistic talent, even at just five years old! At one of the later workshops, run by artist Esther Springett, Angela & and her son, Lorenzo, came along, and enjoyed it so much they attended a second session. Angela even took the time to write a guest blog post on the Camden arts blog, where she reflected:

With 8 artists to choose from, Lorenzo chose the 3D printed ‘Cubes’ (Carl Heideken, 1973) and I have to say he totally surprised me with his creativity. After feeling the textures of the cubes and listening to an audio response to each object on special micro-chipped postcards, Lorenzo started to develop his own story about ’12 boxes 6 chances’. A 3D print definitely helped him to get a stronger connection with the piece.

It was brilliant to meet Angela and Lorenzo in person too, at the exhibition which opened in early May.

Exhibition!
This project was the first time that Museum in a Box ended up in an exhibition. It seemed a natural fit to exhibit all the prints, postcards and the box in the exhibition space. We created two versions to playback for visitors: the first was the “official” responses created by artists participating in the project, Esther, Ciara, and Jonathan. It was great fun to hear such creative responses coming out of the box when things were booped, instead of just a factual, wall-label-style rendition of information about each work.

The other set of postcards played responses made by the kids in each workshop. There were new stories and interpretations about each work, and, again, it was excellent fun to hear such creative takes on the art.

I must say, I did feel a bit strange about having the box locked down in an exhibition space, because it’s designed to be mobile, but once Charlie and I saw the superb installation Jonathan and Sophie had designed for the gallery space, my initial concerns disappeared quickly. Now we’re wondering how else a box might supplement a more traditional exhibition experience…

A Collaboration
We certainly didn’t complete this box in isolation, and it was a pleasure to collaborate with Sophie Rycroft and Samina Zahir from the Camden Arts team, Caroline Moore at the fabulous GOSH Arts, artist and gallery designer, Jonathan Miller, and last but not least, artist educators Esther Springett and Ciara Brennan, who surprised and delighted us mightily with their creativity and skill with kids.