Projects that play with a viewer are some of our most favorite. The added dimension that an interactive component can bring to an experience is both powerful and engaging. When content is presented in a way that allows someone the chance to explore and discover, the overall impact is one of a kind.
MBARI, Mission to the Deep | Monterey Bay Aquarium
The sister organization to the Monterey Bay Aquarium is the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, or MBARI. And when that connection was to be showcased in the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we stepped up to help in numerous ways. From programming the 3 video games visitors play that demonstrate various research MBARI projects to providing our own uncompressed HD video player software (UnPeg) and hardware for a 3 channel video wall and while tying the whole system together so it all was synchronized with the Aquarium's show controller. The permanent exhibit has been open since 2007 and has only required one service visit from us (which had a response time of under 12 hours).
Memento DVD | New Market Capital Group
Before he was known for his work on re-energizing the Batman film franchise, Christopher Nolan was making an impression with his hit, Memento. Whatever Digital and Nolan first worked on experimenting with how the DVD spec could be used to extend an intended viewer's emotion with his first film Following. From our research, we teamed up again to produce two DVDs for Momento, the initial and the limited edition. While the authoring, encoding and most of the graphic work were handled by Sony Tri-Star, we were architects of the interactivity and provided graphic, animation, editing and rendering support.
One of the note worthy contributions by us was the recreation of the film's Flash based website into DVD motion menus as bonus content.
Zero Gravity Photo Stage | Chabot Space and Science Center
For an exhibit on the International Space Station, Chabot had a bold challenge to solve; providing a way for visitors to take a photo of themselves in zero gravity. With a budget that excluded commissioning a NASA level contraption to accomplish this goal, Chabot decided to simplify the challenge to taking a photo of someone at the height of a jump in the air. We were contracted to produce the final system that would solve this challenge. Our solution began with a utilizing a commercial grade floor mat (like the ones used for automatic doors at grocery stores). From there, we used a high speed scientific camera to record every frame between someone leaving the mat during a jump till when they landed back on the ground. The system then would select the 3 frames from the peak of their jump (when they would be neutral to gravity) and presents those images for the visitor to select and email to themselves and their friends. And for Chabot, they get monthly update for their mailing list of visitors that opted into receiving their newsletter.
The final piece was hugely successful and is still one of the most popular installations at Chabot with an average of 60,000 photos taken annually. Due to its success, it led to the Maryland Science Center reaching out to us for their own antigravity stage.
GrundStueck | Einstuerzende Neubauten
For over 30 years, Neubauten has been pushing boundaries in all forms of media. Dubbed the Godfathers of industrial music, this German group turned to us to produce a band DVD unlike any other. The project started with hundreds of hours of videotape from their studio developing a new album and to a multi-camera production of a private concert in the Palast Der Republik in East Berlin. After we completed all the editing and menu design, we set off to make a DVD that allowed many unique views into their process through randomly selected segments and hidden gems.
The final DVD was mastered and authored natively in both NTSC and PAL.