The workshop of the British Empire

Why 

Riverside Museum updates the old museum of transport with new and imaginative ways of displaying and interpreting the extensive collections.

Riverside Museum pioneered a story based approach that brought the objects to life with emotive and entertaining stories. With over 3000 objects on display there were many rich stories to explore.

We worked closely with all the teams to bring these stories to life for the new and truly stunning Zaha Hadid building.

How

Riverside team carried out extensive research to find out the likes and dislikes of the old museum as well as investigating what people would like to see at the new Riverside Museum. Various panels were set up to ensure that all the different audiences were catered for. The four most important things wanted by visitors to the old Museum of Transport were:

1. More displays like the reconstructed streets.
2. More access onto or up to large transport, such as locomotives and trams.
3. More interactive and hands on interpretation.
4. More information, films and images about the collections on display.

Over a 2-year period we discussed, developed, tested, designed, built, played, redesigned, scripted, shot, edited, FX'd, programmed, tested, deployed, rewrote and managed a huge range of work for an amazing building. 

What 

A key requirement for Riverside was the design and content had to be unique to Riverside. It also had to be updateable with an simple back end management system to control and allow the displays to changed when new stories were available .

The backend system we developed for Riverside was called StoryPlayer. This ran everything in the museum including the 37 eIntros, these were large touch screens (iPad style) and were designed to take over from the usual printed panel displayed next to objects. Being a touchscreen we were able to display a wide range of content (images, quotes, facts, films, interviews, multi language, visitor feedback). for the Car wall eIntro each car was painstakingly photographed in 360 degrees both inside and out, allowing the visitor to spin the car around with a simple swipe. Also part of the Car Wall is a large-scale key interactive, multi-player game allowing people to play a wall of cars Guitar hero style!

Other key attractions

The motorbike wall is an interactive Top Trumps game played across four touch screens and wall of LED lit motorbikes.
Ship conveyor we brought the models of ships built on the River Clyde to life. With over 114 animations triggered by each passing ship to highlight the key stories and facts.
Out of 37 films (object stories) one stood out for emotive story and  filming challenge. Crash re-enacts the story of a motorbike crash bringing to life the events through the eyes and thoughts of each person effected by the crash. Then displayed across six screens in a circle around the crashed motorbike.

Along with the films and eIntros we also created five multi-player games, six interactive story books for the under 5s, four software/hardware hybrid interactives, customer feedback touch screens, what's on orientation screens, an interactive donor wall, a 3D-sound environment for the reconstructed Victorian street, a massive video projection featuring a ship launch.

And a BBC Documentary. For the renowned BBC Artworks series. Capturing the new philosophy and radical approach of Riverside Museum. Documenting the build, the design, the objects and the wealth of individuals who together form the impressive Riverside story. 

The results

Over one million visitors in its first six months and is highlighted as a top 20 global visitor experience by the New York Times. Riverside Won 'The Luigi Micheletti Award' the European prize for innovative museums. Best customer experience – Scottish Digital Business Awards 2012 and Scotland’s favourite Visitor Attraction – Scottish Entertainment Guide Awards 2012. Long-listed for the Art Fund Prize 2012.

Links to the films - Crash, Obree, Subway War, SS Athenia, Tram Dancing, Ship Launch, Skateboarders, The Mini, Glasgow Built. All the films were designed to be viewed within the museum environment and support the Object Stories. Viewing them online does not in anyway reproduce the Riverside environment. 

Link to software development - Tom Beddard one of the software developers on Riverside has written an excellent blog post about Riverside and the technology used.

Photographs by: Dezeen, Russ Kyle, Paul Cameron, Tom Beddard, Louise Duffy