Game Masters Digital Program

Museums and related cultural institutions hold the keys to the collective knowledge and the private and public memories of our social and cultural life. Traditionally, museums have concentrated on educating and entertaining the public through the display and interpretation of artefacts in Museums and related cultural institutions hold the keys to the collective knowledge and the private and public memories of our social and cultural life. Traditionally, museums have concentrated on educating and entertaining the public through the display and interpretation of artefacts in curated exhibitions.
For hundreds of years, the museum experience has been synonymous with static objects and text based interpretation, with few, if any, opportunities to participate and interact.
The ACMI developed Digital Program funded by the Broadband Enabled Innovation Fund (BEIP) of the State Government of Victoria’s Department of Business and Innovation, extends the opportunities and abilities of the general public, educators and students to engage with cultural exhibition content in the new modes and spaces enabled by ubiquitous, high?capacity broadband networks.
The project establishes an innovative high?bandwidth content ecosystem for the production and distribution of museum exhibition content and demonstrates its value by delivering five major outputs:

• interactive video-based masterclass program for education users (educators and students)
• multi-location public events program
• e-catalogue publishing application
• high-bandwidth interactive website
• rich media multi-user game

Using an action learning model, the project develops and deploys the new content, applications and infrastructure in conjunction with ACMI’s major public exhibition Game Masters, opening on 28 June, 2012. The project uses the opportunities presented by ubiquitous, high bandwidth networks to transform the bandwidth constrained multi?media and interactivity that has restricted the reach and uptake of digital content from public cultural institutions. The major project outputs are designed as digital products and experiences that demonstrate in different ways the potential of new modes of interaction enabled by high bandwidth ICTs to enrich user engagement and learning.