Bluecadet Interactive

This was an exciting year at the American Association of Museums annual conference in Minneapolis. Bluecadet projects received four MUSE awards, hosted a session on creating interactive exhibits, and attended a party at the Minnesota History Center that included an elderly nun giving free massages.

The Financial Times is famous for keeping its readers in the know on global trends and changes in world markets. For three days they shared some of this information in a big way. From March 27th to the 29th, Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central Terminal was transformed by enormous 3D projections, including an interactive map controlled by 225 square feet of interconnected sensors. In addition to the map, the projection displayed infographic animations about the world economy, focusing on the United States, emerging economies, mobile use, recession, and recovery.

The interactive portion of the projection showed a giant map of the world.
(Photo courtesy of The Financial Times.)

We're teaming up with the Nation Constitution Center! We'll be building their new online presence in the upcoming months, so we all took a trip to their headquarters on Independence Mall to learn a bit more about our nation, its history, and the exhibitions themselves. Here are some of the things that inspired us.

In the last six weeks we have completed a race to launch four large interactive and online projects. We are out of breath but proud, and warming up for the next round. The iconic image of the Afghan Girl by Steve McCurry

We’re excited to welcome Aaron Miller, our new Producer and Interactive Technology Specialist, to Bluecadet. He boasts an impressive interactive background, and real project management chops. How he got to Bluecadet is a multimedia-studded road. Check out his artwork, installations and interactives.

We learned about the planning stages of installing an interactive installation in Part 1 of the series. Now it’s time to get to the meat. Choosing the right touchscreen is a fraught and complex process. There are a plethora of touch technologies, and if the available hardware doesn’t fit your needs, you can always just build your own; the possibilities are endless.

Creating an interactive installation involves a lot of planning. Without it, rookies and veterans alike can find themselves banging their head against the touchscreen wall. Things quickly pile up, whether it's the touch drivers acting up with the operating system or the A/V extenders not matching. But there’s hope: welcome to the first in a series of touchscreen tips blogs!