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Video Feature at Swedish Museum Relies on Dataton Watchout

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LINKÖPING, Sweden — Sweden’s National Museum of Science and Technology (Tekniska museet) has drawn more than 300,000 visitors with its 100 Innovations exhibition since it premiered in Feb. 2012. One of the exhibition highlights, an hourly screening called “The Brain,” relies on Dataton Watchout multi-image and presentation software along with six projectors that map individual sections of video across a 6-by-12-meter curved video wall display.

More details from Dataton Watchout (www.dataton.com):

The ‘100 innovations’ exhibition at the Tekniska museet (The National Museum of Science and Technology), Stockholm, Sweden recently won the ‘Best program for targeted audience’ category of the IDCA Awards (International Design Communication Awards).

Tekniska museet photos by Ellinor AlginThe entire exhibition was produced by the National Museum of Science and Technology in conjunction with PS Communication and STORY Design Studio. ‘100 innovations’ showcases the most important innovations in history as voted by the Swedish people. Since its inauguration in February 2012, ‘100 innovations’ has attracted over 300,000 visitors and is scheduled to run until 2015.

A central part of the ‘100 innovations’ exhibition called ‘The Brain’ screens hourly interactive video demonstrations using none other than Dataton Watchout multi-image and presentation software integrated with six projectors to map individual sections of video across a 6 x 12 meter curved video wall display. Music and sound effects work with the video as museum visitors select their favorite innovation, post messages and interact with what is shown on screen. At the end of each presentation, an innovation award is presented by an ‘ABB robot’. Voting is also accessible for online and virtual visitors to the museum website.

Tekniska museet photos by Ellinor AlginWatchout dynamically engages, informs and enthrals visitors

Video content for each of the individual innovations of ‘The Brain’ exhibit was designed and created by multimedia specialists, Eyebrite Film and Visions. Systems integrator, Informationsteknik designed the system and installed the interactive video wall display.

“The really interesting thing about Watchout is that we have created an information system where visitors can vote for an innovation in person or online. The information system uses a database that is integrated with the Dynamic Image Server feature of Watchout that is automated to access dynamic information for display on to ‘The Brain’. The innovation selected is completely dependant on what visitors vote for which means that the show is always changing and evolving, and there is always an element of surprise. You never know what the Watchout show will look like,” explains Marcus Boij, Technical Manager, Stockholm at Informationsteknik.

Tekniska museet photos by Ellinor AlginWatchout performs projection mapping

Because the entire screen is curved, this created a challenge for the projection mapping,” explains Jan Brånå at Eyebrite Film and Visions.

“Another challenge solved by Watchout was the ability to present text and information on each individual square, and Watchout easily managed to scale text according to the size and position of the display area.”

“Thanks to Watchout it was possible to do everything we wanted including combining the show elements with images, film and soundtracks, live feeds and interactive functions.”

Lars Sandlund, chief operating officer at Dataton says: “We’re delighted that our technology was used as part of this award winning exhibition. It demonstrates Watchout’s effectiveness and flexibility in giving multimedia and exhibition designers new and engaging ways of communicating and storytelling.”

The National Museum of Science and Technology also utilises Dataton PICKUP audio guides in various exhibition areas.

Tekniska museet photos by Ellinor Algin.

For a video (© Video by Eyebrite Film and Visions) go to: http://vimeopro.com/user9877126/eyebrite/video/72488773