Talking Statues was an amazing interactive digital outdoor artwork to celebrate the launch of Night at the Museum 2 on Blu-ray and DVD.

Working with Fox home entertainment and Taylor Herring, I developed interactive concepts and directed the special effects filming session for this amazing spectacle.

Sitting side by side in Bond Street, London, Churchill and Roosevelt statues were brought to life, using live digital video effects, and custom designed projection techniques.

The process

First we filmed two actors, one playing Churchill, the other Roosevelt. They filmed a number of lines, as if having a conversation between the two of them. The script was very funny, with lots of jokes about the problems of life as a statue. The filming took place on a special rig that allowed us to keep the heads of the actors very straight. Because, of course, statues cant move! I had to make sure that the actors put all of their expression and emphasis on their eyes, their mouths, and of course, their voices. At the end of the process we had some great comedy moments between the two actors.

Next, the videos are cut and edited together to make seamless conversations between the two actors. The videos were then colour treated and specially stabilised, to make sure that the features on the actors faces matched perfectly with the contours of the statues. Anything unnecessary like hair, cheeks and chins were digitally removed.

After that, the eyes and mouth of each statue were digitally “layered” so that they could be dynamically projected. Each layer was loaded onto two laptops, one for each statue. The video layers were synced with the audio for seamless playback.

Because the event was for one night only, and was completely outdoors, with no power supplys, we were able to design a custom system that used portable batteries to run all of the technology. This avoided any wires, and there was no need for high voltage to be in a public place. So it really was a 100% self contained projection system.

When the projector systems were moved into place, the software was then able to instantly match up the eyes and mouths of the statue with the eyes and mouths of the actors. The video layers could be triggered at any point, allowing TV presenters to literally interview the statues about their experiences. It was a lot of fun, and a great event that attracted a lot of media attention.

The end result

The end result was spookily effective. It was very eerie to see these two classic politicians come to life late at night in London’s Bond Street. It really brought some of the wonder of Night at the Museum to life. During the project we went through a lot of R&D, and we were very pleased with our research into long-life batteries for use in outdoor projections like this. To run this system for over 3 hours without having to plug anything in was a big achievement. The project was put together in just a few weeks, and that gave us just enough time to develop and test prototypes to create a fun and unusual final project.

Credits: Fox Home Entertainment, Taylor Herring, HMC Interactive

The Question Table was a prototype design that I created, along with Mike Cobb, as a test to see how information could be saved to your skin.

Based on similar technology that I developed in the Butterfly Garden project, the Question Table was an entirely new concept.

The big idea

The ultimate aim is to allow people of different ages and with different interests experience a museum exhibit in a totally new and interesting way. At the start of your museum visit, you would be given a small personal armband. Each armband containing its own unique RFID chip. The RFID chip would save all your personal preferences on it, so as you approached another interactive experience throughout the museum the information presented to you would be able to change and adapt, based on your chosen options.

Choose your own path

At the start of any museum experience could be 3 different question tables, set at different heights, so that children could select a lower table, with child friendly topics, and adults could try a larger table with more advanced, challenging topics.

The table used special infra-red motion sensors that allow you to physically “scoop up” a question, and drag it off the table. Each circular table had an overspill projection, so that the data you selected would be projected onto your skin.

Around the edge of the table would be a wide range of RFID readers, that would then save the data to your bracelet.

If you were to approach another table, or another side of the table, your data would be loaded off of your bracelet onto your skin, and you could throw it around and manipulate it on the question table.

Cost

This cutting edge and unusual technology is actually very cost effective to implement. The RFID bracelets are cheap enough to be able to be used as a replacement to traditional printed tickets. The benefits are huge too. Each visitor gets their own personalised learning experience, so no two visits are the same, encouraging repeat visits. Also, custom settings can be saved onto the bracelet, so that, for example, teachers could check just how long their students were using each exhibit in a museum, allowing them to review any areas that may have been missed on a school trip.

From dream to reality

The question table is a great example of some of the prototype technology I helped to deign, that went from a dreamsheet concept to full scale mockup. Hopefully you will see this in a museum of the future!

I had such a great time working with Cadbury World on projects like Chocolate Rain that I was thrilled when they, along with Newangle, asked me to work on a new interactive project for the historic Cadbury Collection.

The Story

Cadbury doesn’t just make great chocolate, Mr Cadbury also designed and built most of area surrounding his factory. He provided houses for the workers, schools, playing fields, sports clubs, and all sorts of other things to make life in Bournville a happy and healthy place to be. Cadbury world wanted to share the idea of building your own, virtual town, and see what it would be like in the future.

The Idea

I was tasked with programming a new interactive game that would take place on a giant interactive table. The game would be a lot like Sim City, where players would create housing, roads, schools, pubs, power plants, and pretty much everything else that you need to build a thriving city. But this game had a twist. Not only did you have to work against time and budget constraints, but you had to work with 3 other friends to help build the city. That means its a 4 player sim city! A very challenging thing to program indeed! But it was a lot of fun.

Each player takes a different side of the table, and must place different buildings down before the time, and the budget run out! Players must work together to make sure that everything is in the right place, as different players will be given different options, keeping the game fast paced and exciting.

Hidden Sensors

Underneath the table were hidden tiny electrostatic sensors that could detect players hands as they waved them over the table. This allowed for fast, large-scale gameplay. Simply by placing your hand on the giant map, a building would be placed under your fingertips.

The average game time lasts around 3 to 4 minutes, and once the buildings are placed in literately thousands of different configurations the camera “zooms out” and shows a realistic view of what that city would look like in 25 years time.

Will it be a thriving metropolis, or a dead end, crime ridden town? Only by working together will you get to find out.

I programmed all the software and the game mechanics, and Electrosonic provided the hardware. The concept was brought to life by Newangle, and Mark Dowsett created the various graphics and hundreds of icons that were used in the game.