The eyes want to have it: Multimedia handhelds in the museum(an evolving story)

Peter SamisAssociate Curator, InterpretationSan Francisco Museum of Modern Art

WCC 2008 Milano • 8–10 September 2008

Setting the Stage

Museums! Even if they look like this on the outside...

...they look like this on the inside.

…and this...

…and this.

This is our Problem Space:

Modern art—like all the objects museums exhibit —exists in a framework of meanings.

• Physical aspects• Process of its making• Relationships (to its maker, to ideas, to

other works)• Documents (journals, letters, sketches)• Media• Methods of approach and understanding

Of these, art museums typically strip away all but one or two.

• Process of its making• Relationships (to its maker, its time)• Documents• Media• Methods of approach and understanding

• Physical aspects

Experts………………Novices

Somewhere along the linethat leaves us to restore the

context.

Hypothetical Demand Curve:

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

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First Forays

Points of Departure — SFMOMA 2002

First use of artist videos on PDAs in a museum space.

Sometimes interpretation’s a case of what’s missing…

Sometimes it’s a case of what’s there.

QuickTime™ and aSorenson Video 3 decompressorare needed to see this picture.

The goal is to meet people where they are—both conceptually and physically.

So the Goal, at least, is clear.

But the means are constantly changing…

.

as is the Museum environment.

Technology & museums change at very different paces.

With that in mind, a bit of history.

Early prototype: MEG @ Experience Music Project, Seattle, 2002

Mobile Exhibition Guide

Lessons learned

• Bulky & cumbersome to carry

• Long development cycle

• Expensive to build (prohibitive for non-profit institutions)

• Technology surpassed by time of its introduction!

• Compaq iPAQ Pocket PCs with video clips stored on 64 MB Compact Flash cards• Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player running on Windows CE (imperfect)• Used to present video clips of artists in each gallery

Points of Departure iPAQ Gallery Explorer2002

CIMI/Renwick Gallery prototype,

Washington, DC

• Visual menus for each gallery• 20–45 second clips• 30-second message length deemed

ideal• Add’l layers can be selected• Video clips ask: “Why did you

become an artist?”

The Visitor Experience

Tate Modern’s Multimedia guide, 2002/3…

Casual cues shift attention from artwork to screen… and then back to artwork

Just-in-time learning/modeling how to look

UBC’s Museum of Anthropology demo 2004…

Ubiquity Interactive, Vancouver

…through use of QTVR and animations

Augmented space: physical spaces filled with electronic and visual information

…and social sharing of that information

Question of constantly changing hardware models,

not to mention form factors

…and of consequent lack of technical support!

Visionary Failures*

*aka reach exceeding grasp/techno-hubris

GettyGuide Handheld (A Cautionary Tale)

• Works of art: image & stops• Events: tours & exhibitions• Map• Audio stops - keypad entry• Location sensing

• Download content• Wayfinding

• Integrate with kiosk & web

GettyGuide Handheld: The Execution

• Five internal departments• Five vendorsYet none had a vested interest in the complete system functioning

Internal: Interactive Programs (interpretive content), Collections Information (object/registrarial information), Museum Information and Media Systems (academic programming and hardware), Web Group (academic programming), IT department (infrastructure hardware and software)Vendors: Server and application programming, location sensing hardware & software, handheld hardware & programming

“There is no safety in unlimited technological hubris.”- McGeorge Bundy

GettyGuide Handheld: Evaluations

Visitors would rather pay for a simple audio player with all artworks covered than a free but fancier handheld with only some, e.g., family audio stops.

Visitors would also approve of a handheld that had all the audio content with a touchscreen keypad & improved on-screen map

Inform the potential of handhelds – can we use them? How can the handheld and audio player be used in conjunction What to See guide

—Handheld vs. simple MP3 Audio Player (Antenna X-plorer) Study Result

ArtScape @ the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass.

Good idea, but an absence of further in-depth content made the return visit to the website superfluous.

WiVID Messaging & Live Updates (prototypes)

Multi-modal communications

<— All these plus:• Interactive

gaming• Simulations• Tickets• eCommerce• & Concierge services!!!

Chasing the tail of technology was getting museums nowhere… 

(except into debt)

Nancy Proctor’s Findings (Formerly Antenna Audio Strategic Planning in London, now at Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC)

• Wireless location-sensing’s just too problematic

• Onboard content’s “a good thing”

• Stabilize the platform

• Keep it simple• The best

technology is invisible

Capability - Maturity Model

• Initial phase: “heroic”• Managed phase: “1-deep”• Defined phase: Processes in place• Quantitatively managed: metrics • Optimizing: metrics fed back into

system

Institutions’ reach was exceeding their grasp.Don’t skip the steps. Just set your sights on the step you’re at, and the next.

Grassroots Returns & Tests

Enter a cheap & disruptive

Social Technology:

the Podcast

SFMOMA Artcasts

• A rapid response, audio zine format that blends structure and flexibility• A movement from the Museum out into the community, and from the community into the Museum

Beyond an audio tour:

A $2 admission discount at all price levels when they show their Artcast:

• Adults• Seniors• Artists • Teachers• Youth

Guest TakesPamela Z

JT Leroy

Beth Lisick

Vox Pop

disruptive

Social Technology #2:

The Cell phone

Why “disruptive” ?

They posed fundamentally new questions: • Should visitors bring their own devices?• Should Museums ask visitors to contribute their own voices and interpretations?*

Matthew Barney: Drawing Restraint, 2006

Our problem: subtract the man/film from the gallery, and…

How to make the mute plastic speak?

Traditionally, this would have been cause for a multimedia feature.

…online, by the galleries, in the Koret Center.

To this, we were adding multiple format audio tours:

• Podcast: download from home

• Gallery X-plorer: rent in Atrium

• Cell phone: turn on in show

Collaborate with Antenna to develop content for all three.

Downloadable podcast map

Cell phone promotional card - collab w/ Guide by Cell

In fact, we thought we were setting out to measure visitor preferences for three different types of audio tours.

And we did that.

What did we find out?

• There is no clear winner• Traditional devices

skew older• iPods and cell phones

seem to skew younger*• Visitors appreciate

multiple experience options

* statistics not fully conclusive

Different devices support different touring styles:

Cell phones averaged less than 50% stop use, indicating à la carte, on demand use.

iPods and traditional audio tour devices averaged 70-80% stop use: a more immersive, custom experienceIn fact, iPod and traditional headset tour users had more in common than these users might suspect…

Those who chose the iPod and cell phone formats rated them more highly than traditional headset tour users rated theirs.

—although the content was identical!

Phone logs enabled us to see patterns in where visitors wanted information most:

(or perhaps where they or could find the labels!)

In fact, GuideBy Cell now mashes up area codes and Google Maps to reveal where visitors are from:

Stats: Cell-phone Tours

Good News: Guide by Cell records

• 1st exhibition with over 10,000 calls

• Average message selection in other museums is only 33%

Bad News:• Still only averaging

45 visitors/day• Only 3.7% of

exhibition visitors

So somewhere along the way,

the target

shifted.

The elephant in the room is that:

The vast majority of our visitors do not use technology during their museum visit.

So how do we reach them?

If our goal is to use technology, we may just nod and move on. But if our goal is to enhance visitor experience, we have to think larger.

“Variable on-demand mediation.”–Brad Johnson, Second Story Interactive

Interpretive Menu: analog + digital

• One curatorial intro panel• Exhibition brochure• Docent tours

Audio tour delivered via: • Antenna MP3 gallery guide• Downloadable podcast• Cell phone tour courtesy

GuideByCell

Learning Lounge in show:• Plasma screen with Barney

video interview clips• Barney FAQ wall graphics• Interactive feature/website• Books & catalogs

So what did we learn? What did visitors prefer?

Audio: Different people opt for different devices

Video: Visitors want to see and hear the voice of the artist above all else

and perhaps most surprisingly:

Visitors opt for the analog first.

Here’s what that looks like:

INTERPRETIVE OFFERINGS (COLLAPSED) USED BYRESPONDENTS (I N PERCENT)

USED

INTERPRETIVE OFFERINGS (n = 251) %

Exhibition introduction wall text 78Exhibition brochure 55Learning Lounge (one or more offerings) 51Audio tour (audio guide headset, cellphone, or podcast)

47

Drawing Restraint 9 film 17Exhibition Web site 15SFMOMA docent- led public tour 2

Use of offerings by respondents:

But on the other hand:

TABLE 43RATINGS OF INTERPRETIVE OFFERINGS

RATING7-POINT RATING SCALE:DID NOT HELP ME APPRECIATE BARNEY’S ART (1) /HELPED ME APPRECIATE BARNEY’S ART (7) n MEAN ±

Cell phone audio tour 46 6.2 1.10Podcast audio tour 18 6.2 0.81Antenna audio guide headset tour 50 5.6 1.44Learning Lounge 95 5.5 1.45Exhibition brochure 131 5.2 1.53Exhibition Web site 31 5.2 1.37Drawing Restraint 9 film 40 5.1 1.92Exhibition introduction wall text 182 4.7 1.65

What helped make meaning?

But taken together, Interpretation works:

FI GURE 7OVERALL RATI NG OF BARNEY EXHIBIT I ONBY TOTAL NUMBER OF INTERPRETIVE OFFERINGS USED IN THE EXHIBIT I ONANDBY FAMILIARITY WITH BARNEY’S ART

TOTAL NUMBER OF INTERPRETIVE OFFERINGS USED IN THE EXHIBITION

NO OFFERINGS( n = 1 6 )

1 – 2 OFFERINGS( n = 7 2 )

3 - 4 OFFERINGS( n = 8 8 )

5+ OFFERINGS( n = 6 2 )

MEANS MEANS MEANS MEANS

7 _

_ 6 .1_ 5 .9

6 _

_ 5 .6_ 5 .7

n 5.6S _ 5.4C

A n 4.8L

5_

_ 4.6E n 4.3

_ 4.04_

n 3.3MEAN SCORES:

_ Familiar with Barney’sArt

3_

_ 2.6 _ Unfamiliar with Barney’sArtn Combined

2_

1_ 7-POINT RATING SCALE: 1 = UNFAVORABLE / 7 = VERY FAVORABLE

Number of offerings: F=5.671; p=.001Familiarity with Barney’s Art: F=36.578; p=.000Number of offerings * Familiarity with Barney’s Art F=2.48; p=.062Model: F=12.500; p=.000 R2=.276

Statistics Courtesy Randi Korn & Associates

Or put another way:

Use Pattern / Value Rating of Barney Interpretive Resources

0102030405060708090

Introductory wall textExhibition brochureLearning Lounge

Audio tour (3 options)Exhibition Web site

% of visitors using resource

01234567

Visitor rating of resource value

USED (%)

RATING (1–7 scale)

This is ourOpportunity Space!

Is it time to re-train our visitors? Change their expectations?Change our approach? All of the above?

Next Tests: Traditional audio tour vs. iPod

When visitors were given the choice…

Exhibitions in 2007 (in sequence)

Antenna XP - “Classic”(mp

3)

iPod

Picasso & Brice Marden

59% 41%

Matisse 55% 45%

Eliasson /Cornell / Wall

51% 49%

Do we detect a trend?

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

1. Picasso & Marden 2. Matisse 3. Eliasson /Cornell /Wall

XP-Classic (mp4)iPod

Fast forward to summer 2008 (right now):

Enter

Frida Kahlo

MENU: analog + digital mix• Brochure• Wall texts• Multimedia tour with low

price barrier to entry• Learning Lounge• Supplementary galleries

to add context • Kiosk / Website• Video • Podcasts

Visitor Feedback

iPod-Touch and iPhone

Using PDAs to harvest visitor feedback

• Tate SMART Tours for school groups• Favorites, drawing, even voice commentaries• Mesh with website for after-visit classroom assignments / follow-ups

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are needed to see this picture.

iPod-touch interfaces

• Tate Liverpool’s Klimt exhibition

• Stops are a series of short enhanced podcasts mapped to the default iPhone interface

• Meshing of linearaudio tour with selected visuals

QuickTime™ and a decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

iPod-touch interfaces

• Museum of Modern Art (New York)’s MoMAudio program

• Wi-Fi throughout the galleries

• Download in advance or on the spot

• Optimized for iPod-Touch & iPhone; plays on other devices as well

Soon to come… an SFMOMA iPhone title:

In the meantime…

The beginnings of custom design using the iPhone SDK

Planning Today/State of the Art

Words of Wisdom from Chris Tellis, founder& former Chairman of Antenna Audio

• “People go to museums often to get away from technology.”

• “The subjective is always more powerful than the objective.”

• “Never be the early adopter… What’s hip is to have a program that works!”

A url to remember: http://tate.org.uk/modern/multimediatour

New Book

Digital Technologies & the Museum Experience: Handheld Guides & Other Media

Editors Loïc Tallon & Kevin Walker, AltaMira Press

Available now through amazon orhttp://www.altamirapress.com

Thank you.