Hybrid Museum Experiences

Annika Waern is a 'research through design' academic who has been researching technology-supported physical play and games for about fifteen years. Currently, she is conducting research in the areas of hybrid play in museums, children’s play in outdoor settings, and circus training to foster proprioceptic skills. Anders Sundnes Lovlie does research on the intersection of design research and media studies, focusing in particular on experience design, locative media and play. Anders was the coordinator for the GIFT project, and has been involved in a number of design projects involving museums like the Munch Museum, Danish Architecture Center, the National Gallery of Denmark, Brighton Museum and the Frederiksberg Museums. Kevin Bacon is Digital Manager at the Royal Pavilion & Museums Trust, a charity managing five museums in the city of Brighton & Hove. With previous experience working in both front of house roles and as a curator of its photographic collections, he became the service’s first digital lead in 2011. He holds Master’s degrees in political philosophy and digital media and is a Visiting Researcher at the University of Brighton. Nikita Mathias is a senior concept developer at MUNCH, where he creates digital and analogue visitor experiences, does research and works on publica_x0002_tions. His background lies in art history, media studies and aesthetics, and he holds a PhD from the University of Tübingen, Germany, on the topic of the visual history of natural disasters. In addition, he spent years working as a journalist and at various cultural institutions. Born and raised in Germany, he has been living in Oslo for several years. Lina Eklund is a lecturer in HCI at the Department of Informatics and Media at Uppsala University, Sweden. She has a PhD in sociology and is interested in social behaviour in and with designed, digital technologies. She has been a researcher at The Swedish National Museum of Science and Technology, where she worked with the exhibition of digital games. The work resulted in the Play Beyond Play exhibit. Current work focuses on uses and practises of digital technologies in museums, such as digital games and hybrid experiences. Paulina Rajkowska is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Informatics and Media at Uppsala University. She comes from a mixed background of sociology, media studies and HCI. Her prior work includes writing on social phenomena in video games as well as application of critical theory to design practices. In her ongoing research she is looking at reflexive practice, playfulness and how both of those can be applied in projects, to improve the quality of their outcomes. Jocelyn Spence is an interaction design researcher with an interest in performative experience design, performance, gifting, and cultural heritage; she is a Research Fellow in the Mixed Reality Lab at the University of Nottingham. Karin Ryding is a PhD Fellow at the IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Her research interest includes critical play, game design, affective interac_x0002_tions, posthuman perspectives and cultural heritage. She holds an MA in Visual Culture Studies from Lund University and a BA in Game Design from Uppsala University. Outside of her research career, Karin has worked with designing board games, locative games, transmedia and other forms of experimental and creative play experiences as part of Ozma Games. Christian Hviid Mortensen, PhD, is a former curator of media heritage at the Media Museum in Denmark (2007-2018). Currently Christian is a postdoc at the IT University of Copenhagen, where he researches the dynamics of hybrid heritage experiences spanning the digital and physical realms. His research interest is the dynamics between media, culture, heritage and memory. Christian is also on the editorial board of MedieKultur: Journal of Media and Communication Research. Anne Rørbæk Olesen earned her PhD in Communication from Roskilde University in 2015 with the thesis Co-designing Digital Museum Communication. She has co-authored publications in internationally renowned anthologies and journals, such as The Routledge Handbook of Museums, Media and Communication, Museum Management and Curatorship and Museum & Society. Her research focuses on digital communication, design practices, collaboration and experience design. Sejul Malde is a Cultural Research Manager. He works with cultural or_x0002_ganisations, developing and managing collaborative research projects that explore how cultural organisations respond to digital change and become more relevant to the needs of today’s audiences and society. Sejul brings significant experience from across both the commercial and cultural sectors. He is currently based in Australia, working as Research Manager for the College of Arts And Social Sciences at the Australian National University. Dimitrios Darzentas is a multidisciplinary Research Fellow in the Mixed Reality Lab at the University of Nottingham’s school of Computer Science. His background is broadly positioned around Cultural Informatics, Game Design and Technology, Mixed Reality Storytelling, and the Design of Meaningful Things. He is currently working on several EU and EPSRC funded projects involving the use of technologies such as Virtual and Augmented reality and 3D Scanning in interactive museum experiences. These explore how such technologies can enable end-to-end capture of meaningful content, whether tangible or intangible in nature, and their use through the creation of engaging experiences and exhibits. Beyond these he is also working on projects and evolving fronts involving Future Foods, Circular Economies, Experience and Game Design, and Hybrid Physical-Digital Artefacts. Edgar Bodiaj is a research associate and developer at the Mixed Reality Lab. He has a background in Computer Science and is currently involved with projects focusing on user interaction and engagement inside Virtual Reality. His research interest includes VR experiences, Data Visualisation, and Novel Online Communication. Paul Tennent is an assistant professor of mixed reality at the University of Nottingham. He has been working with artists and institutions round the world to deliver and study ‘in the wild’ experiences for more than a decade. His research is around sensing, sensation and sensitivities, often involving deployments that are physically and/or psychologically uncomfortable. Sarah Martindale is an audience researcher with an interest in how people attach meaning and value to digital interactions and new media; she is a Nottingham Research Fellow in the Department of Cultural, Media and Visual Studies at the University of Nottingham. Harriet Cameron is an interdisciplinary PhD researcher at the Mixed Reality Lab, University of Nottingham, based within the Horizon CDT. Her research explores identity, power, space/place, and how technologies interact with and configure these experiential concepts, particularly in galleries and museums. Velvet Spors is a creative technologist and doctoral researcher at the Mixed Reality Lab, University of Nottingham, based within the Horizon CDT. They are currently investigating digital self-care technologies in a public setting (in partnership with the National Videogame Museum). Their research foci are empathy and care in/with/through technology, games and (implicit) interconnectedness between people. Steve Benford is the Dunford professor of Computer Science at the Mixed Reality Laboratory at the University of Nottingham where he directs the Horizon ‘My Life in Data’ Centre for Doctoral Training and the ‘Smart Products’ beacon. He previously held an EPSRC Dream Fellowship, has been a Visiting Professor at the BBC and was elected to the CHI Academy in 2012. He has collaborated with many artists over the past thirty years to create, tour and study interactive performances and installations with a view to gaining new insights into how humans can experience computers. Jon Back is a design researcher at Uppsala University. His focus is on how to create engagement, feelings and experiences in public settings. His work is mainly focused on expanded game formats, where the game reaches out of the computer and into the everyday world. He is highly inspired not only by classic game design, but also by areas such as live action role-play, child’s play, storytelling, and street performance. He is a researcher and a practitioner, and besides academic publications he’s also published board games and card games, as well as performed playful participatory performance art and organised many kinds of game events.

Preface (Kevin Bacon and Nikita Mathias)

Concepts

1. Introduction (Anders Sundnes Lovlie and Annika Waern)
Why hybrid museum experiences?
GIFT
The structure of this book

2. Hybrid Museum Experiences (Anders Sundnes Lovlie, Annika Waern, Lina Eklund, Jocelyn Spence, Paulina Rajkowska and Steve Benford)
The Physical and the Digital
The Personal and the Social
The Museum and the Visitor
Conclusions

Cases

3. The Gift App – Gifting Museum Experiences (Jocelyn Spence)
The Experience
The Designer Perspective
The Museum Perspective
The Visitor Perspective
Analysis of the Gift App
Conclusions

4. Never let me go – Social and Introspective Play (Karin Ryding)
Becoming Mouse: The Experience
Designing for Playfulness
Designing Never let me go
The Visitor Perspective
Analysis of Never Let Me Go
Conclusions

5. Your Stories – A Life Cycle Analysis (Paulina Rajkowska)
The National Museum of Serbia
The Design
The Design Process
Visitor Perspective
Museum Perspective
Designer Perspective
Analysis of Your Stories

Craft

6. Action Research as a Method for Reflective Practice in Museums (Christian Hviid Mortensen, Anne Rorbak Olesen, Sejul Malde and Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
Reflective Practice in Museums
What is Action Research?
Action Research in GIFT
The Cross-Departmental COP: Three Examples
The Cross-Organizational COP: Learning Beyond the Organization
The GIFT Project: A Cross-Sectorial COP
Discussion
Conclusions

7. Sensitizing Design Teams to Theory (Annika Waern and Paulina Rajkowska)
Sensitizing Concepts and Boundary Objects
Sensitizing Scenarios
Resident Theorist
Other Ways to Sensitize Designers

8. Ideation Tools for Experience Design (Anne Rorbak Olesen, Christian Hviid Mortensen, Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
The Importance of Ideation
Three Tools for Ideation
Combination and Usefulness of the Tools

9. Data-Driven Visiting Experiences (Steve Benford, Dimitri Darzentas, Edgar Bodiaj, Paul Tennent, Sarah Martindale, Harriet Cameron and Velvet Spors)
Visualizing Visitor Behaviour in Thresholds
Visiting Gifting Behaviours 162
Visualizing the Use of Visitor Box Cards
Opportunities and Challenges

10. Evaluation (Jon Back and Jocelyn Spence)
First, Ask Why!
What Is Important to Know?
Who Should Your Study Subjects Be?
Where Will You Be?
When and for How Long Can You Study Them?
How to Get Your Answer
Early On: Formative Studies
Analyse Your Evaluation
Ethical Considerations
Conclusions

Coda

11. Remediating, Reframing and Restaging the Museum (Annika Waern and Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
The Ideal Museum Experience
Reimagining the Museum Experience
Final Words

Bibliography
Index