Bubbloo
Overview
Bubbloo is in a public area of the museum, directly outside of the Western Gallery. The intent of the experience was to create an ‘active’ area for kids and families to meet and enjoy themselves. This was an intended contrast to the galleries themselves which, at many art museums, is generally a quieter, more contemplative space.
Bubbloo is a two part experience Projected onto the floor are ‘bubbles’ that can be popped by stepping or jumping onto them. The second part is a wall projection mosaic. Whenever you pop a bubble, that flips over individual mosaic pieces, like a puzzle, to reveal objects in our collection. If you pop enough bubbles quickly enough, the whole piece is revealed and a display appears indicating the approximate location of the object in the museum. Repeat in perpetuity.
What feels like a simple experience was surprisingly complex — there are three computers (two for the floor projection, one for the wall) running three projectors, all synchronized in experience and display. We also developed a custom vision system and software that un-distorts the images from a fish eye lens and detects the presence of people. This input is then correlated with the bubble display which is partially constructed from a licensed game physics engine.
In the few months that Bubbloo has been available to the public, it has been a resounding success with kids (of all ages, 3-93) actively jumping around, stomping out and chasing the bubbles. Parents struggle to pull their kids away.