Reaching Behind the Glass

I've long admired the creativity and ingenuity of the Manchester Museum—following their exploits from inviting a hermit to live in the museum for forty days and forty nights and while engaging the public in an examination of what might be removed from the collections; to recruiting a fashion design firm to plan the reinstallation of their natural history collections. Now they've tackled the haptic frontier—using technology to simulate the experience of touching objects that visitors are not allowed to actually handle. Today Sam Sportun, collection care manager and senior conservator at the Manchester Museum, tells us more about this adventure into the realm of digital digits.

In recent years, Manchester Museum has pursued a philosophy of making more of its collection available for visitors to handle and touch through object handling sessions and tactile displays. As is well known, this approach benefits all visitors, as the sense of touch physically connects the visitor to the object and enhances an intuitive and natural curiosity to learn more. However, as a conservator I also know that some objects will not survive long term use as a handling object. Complex, beautiful objects often have the most captivating histories, but when displayed behind glass, they can be very difficult for a visually impaired visitor to appreciate.

With funding from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, we tackled the challenge of providing access to objects that can’t actually be handled by developing a Haptic Interactive. Haptics consist of a touch-enabled computer system which allows the user to investigate and explore the topography of an artefact within a 3-dimensional digital environment through a tactile feedback stylus. The Manchester Museum’s interactive provides a digital experience using objects from our new Ancient Worlds galleries.

We realized that the end user had to be involved in the process of developing the interactive from the very beginning. Over the past 18 months Christopher Dean and I worked with an enthusiastic focus group from Henshaws Society for Blind People. Members of the focus group chose three objects for the interactive: a faience shabti [380-343 BC], Greek jug [500-475 BC] and Pre-Dynastic hippo bowl [4000-3500 BC]. Even more importantly, they helped to guide us through the process of creating an easily navigable 3D digital space.

Michael handling a museum object and the Henshaw’s focus group choosing objects for scanning

Laser scanning the pre-dynastic hippo bowl (4000-3500BC)

The haptic interface enables users to explore the digital scanned form of objects, using their sense of touch. We enhanced the digital content with sounds, video and the spoken word, creating a rich experience as the object’s story unfolds. We are also developing activities within the interface that enable the user to explore the silhouette of an object to enhance their understanding of its overall form. A portable version of the system is used for outreach to groups that may have problems getting to the museum.

Haptic unit in the new gallery

We found that when visitors use the device for the first time, unless they take time to explore and understand this space, the experience can feel unrewarding. So we introduce users to the 3 dimensional digital space with an introductory screen that uses sound and everyday objects. Once passed this first screen the interactive has a series of “rooms” which deal with different aspects of the objects history, manufacture or use.

“Room” where object selection can be made and story of the object can be extended

The Probos haptic unit is now a permanent feature of the Manchester Museum’s new gallery, offering a new stage for the visitor (whether visually impaired or sighted) to explore. We are at the beginning of understanding how we can use haptics to create a truly meaningful experience—there is still much work to do and numerous exciting possibilities for using this technology to illuminate real objects and their stories.