April 2022
Text: Alexandra Hörtler; Fotos: büro wien
For the special exhibition “Elector with vision” we developed an interactive app that takes adults and children on entertaining short highlight tours through the exhibition. The app was developed for Androidand iOS in a cooperation with vienom OG (programming) and in the headroom (graphics).
The visitors are taken on highlight tours (10-15 minutes each) across the 13 themed rooms by a historical personality such as Elector August, Elector Anna or a regular worker. The children are guided by animals, including the lion pictured on the coat of arms of Saxony, a hawk, a tiny church mouse, or even a worm peeking out of an apple. The app is conceived as an interactive dialogue tour, allowing users to talk to the historical personalities via chatbot. The app is available in German and English, to accommodate the international audience.
Each highlight tour explores between three and five objects. During the tour, the app switches between the chatbot and interactive elements. There are enthralling questions that need to be cracked, and the exhibition content is broken down into easily digestible bits of information.
Besides the lively experience of the chatbot communication, the outstanding feature is that adults and children are guided to the same objects at the same time. The content was created separately for each target group. This way, the children and the accompanying adults receive the same information, tailored to their age, and can discuss it. Adults don’t need to explain the more complex contexts, whereas the young visitors will be able to share with their parents, grandparents etc., the interesting facts they learned from their animal guides.
Schools can use a dedicated student mode that may be activated by inserting a code. After the tour, and upon finding the correct answers to all questions, the students will receive a certificate signed by Elector August that is emailed to them.