Museum artefacts are usually displayed behind glass often too fragile, small, heavy or valuable to allow the public to handle physically making most museum artefacts for display only.
With the increasing rarity that museum objects or a replica object can be touched or held within the museum setting, Manchester Museum and technology partner TAD Systems Ltd embarked on an investigation into the use of Haptic technology and Digital Touch replicas to help find alterative interactive methods to use with their collections.
An ongoing project which recently receiving a further two years funding to continue their investigation, as part of the project, the museum are integrating an Egyptian Cat sarcophagus from the Museum’s collection into Haptics to produce a digital touch replicas which will deliver information to the visitor when touched.
Looking at how new 3D technologies and resources can improve the quality of our visually impaired visitors experience at museums and art galleries, the project is further exploring the possibilities of visitor interaction with objects that would never be accessible through a museums handling table. To find out more about museum visitors tactile experiences, the team have devised an online survey to help them gather information which you can take part in using the link below:
https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/8KFWQ79
More information can be found at the project site – http://www.ambavis.eu/.
For those interested in finding out more about the project’s background, a blog detailing the early development of its technology can be accessed HERE, or you can contact Sam Sportun at Manchester Museum by email – samantha.sportun@manchester.ac.uk.