Digital on the Front Line: WWI, Digital Experience and Collectible Content for Formal Learners

Wednesday November 21st, 11:00am-11:25am @ Soundings Theatre

In October 2017, the Auckland War Memorial Museum opened its newest permanent gallery, Pou Kanohi New Zealand at War. A legacy project designed to remain on display following the conclusion of the WWI centenary, this gallery is the Museum’s first dedicated exhibition for formal learners studying the war. Whilst featuring a range of experiences to cater to individual learning styles, Pou Kanohi New Zealand at War also showcases several flagship digital experiences which aim to serve the gallery’s overall aim of enabling remembrance through reflection and enquiry.

Among these are two bespoke ‘Collectible Content’ experiences that are reactionary to formal learners’ needs. Through working closely with external digital vendors, the Museum has developed these experiences to enable visitors to engage with both primary source material and newly created content in intuitive experiences developed in close consultation with teachers and students.

The Letters from the Front Line interactive, allows users to intuitively access primary source material in the form of WWI letters from our collection which have been transcribed, tagged, and enhanced with additional interpretive aids, such as a glossary of military abbreviations. The Digital Chronology provides content newly created for the gallery in collaboration with historians and subject experts to provide an overview of some of the key events of WWI, with a particular focus on New Zealand’s involvement. Both of these ‘Collectible Content’ experiences enable students to quickly and easily access detailed information in an engaging and personal manner, and save or send these back to the classroom for further inspection after they have left the Museum. This was a highly desirable outcome for teachers and students who are limited on time when visiting the gallery for the purposes of researching for projects. The result allows students to enjoy the gallery fully while they are onsite, and access the detail of the information they have collected post-visit.

The gallery also features an interactive table where visitors can pilot an aircraft high above the trenches to gather reconnaissance photographs. VR has allowed us to chart the development of weaponry in the war by showcasing the Museum’s 18 Pounder QF artillery gun – too large to bring into the gallery in reality! Modelled and recreated in an immersive wartime environment, the VR version of the gun features an illustrated six-man gun crew in action. And a hi-res 3D scan of a WWI flask from our collection, embedded and enhanced, unpacks the story of Private David Iraia, who served with the New Zealand Pioneer Battalion. We would like to present to colleagues at NDF on our experience in creating these digital interactives with vendors; the challenges faced; opportunities for re-use; and present an objective look at what worked and didn’t work based on not only our own observations, but data from our Visitor Market Research team and Google Analytics data which will become available to us in the coming months.

Ben Bradford , Auckland War Memorial Museum, Digital Experience Producer

Guy Annan , Auckland War Memorial Museum, Digital Experience Manager