Delivering Gallery Interactives using Web Technologies 
Eric Bates, Victoria & Albert Museum, United Kingdom
The year 2009 was the busiest to date for the delivery of high tech interpretation in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s permanent galleries, with over 76 high tech interpretation points installed during the year. These range from individual interactives to multiple accessible interactive audio points.
This workshop looks at examples of how the V&A has delivered high tech interpretation using Web technologies for both development and delivery. Examples include gallery interactives that share content with the museum’s Web presence, delivery of video in various formats, and using APIs to harvest data in the gallery interactives.
By using Web technologies, we are tapping into our own learned experiences of delivering for the Web whilst also making the most of a larger technical community. What we see in our galleries translates very well to the Web, and with some simple lessons learned and an Internet connection, there is no reason we can’t share our gallery experience with our on-line version, or vice versa.
This workshop looks at the process of understanding what it takes to commission interactives in a way that allows for easy porting to a museum Web site. Planning for this from the start allows for flexibility from the developers.
We also look at making the most of the hardware we use and keeping things flexible.
Mini-Workshop: Gallery Interactives [on-site]
Keywords: multimedia, Interactive, video, Web, in-gallery, on-site, interactives
