So far a lot of the virtual museums I've seen can be classified as collections of super-informative web pages. They're all great and tell some interesting stories, but none quite mimics the experience of a real museum visit. None, that is, except the Adobe Museum of Digital Media.
Visiting Adobe's museum actually feels somewhat like walking through a museum building. The museum and its exhibits are set up as a 3D structure that's highly interactive - for example, the exhibits are laid out in a floating, rotating formation that move toward your mouse as you scroll through. There are even several exhibits whose content changes as you move among them.
Right now the museum has five exhibits plus a video by the museum's founder. Each exhibit includes text and audio commentary from the curator and spaces where visitors can leave comments and share each piece in their social media networks. The current exhibits are InForm, which displays colorful and random infographics; Journey to Seven Light Bay, a virtual tour of the artist Mariko Mori's work Primal Rhythm; Valley, a collection of digital art by the artist Tony Oursler; A + B = C, a video by Rhode Island School of Design's president on the intersection between real and virtual worlds; and Making the Impossible, which tells the story of how this museum came to be. I really can't do these exhibits justice by describing them, so I'll let you explore them on your own.
The Adobe Museum of Digital Media is an ideal of what virtual museums can be, and what I imagine they will look like in the future. I realize that this museum is made possible by Adobe's deep pockets, and that most of the virtual museums out there aren't nearly as well funded, but I think we can pick up some great cues here about how to bring museums online to the wider world. Pay close attention and take notes, because this might just be the future of museums.
Adobe Museum of Digital Media
Mission: The mission of the Adobe Museum of Digital Media is to showcase and preserve groundbreaking digital work and expert commentary to illustrate how digital media shapes and impacts today's society.
Website: www.adobemuseum.com
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