Archives | May 2009 | Bemusement - The Attractions Industry Blog

Wednesday, May 20, 2009 Museum Design: Who is this Man? A photograph caught my eye today. It shows a man on the roof of a men’s lavatory in a California State Park. Why is he there? Why is he in black and white? Is he spying on someone through the skylight?

On closer investigation, we find that the man is not on the roof because of some inappropriate interest in men's hygiene. Neither is he a miscreant cat burglar nor indeed a member of LA’s finest out on an entrapment mission. No, this lanky fellow is none other than Jonathan Katz, CEO of Cinnabar Inc. and lifelong conservationist. Whilst many in the last few years have put on the Green mantle as it has been fashionable or politically expedient to do so, Katz, who executive produced “Altered State” and other natural history exhibits for the internationally acclaimed standard-setter in green-built museums, the California Academy of Sciences, has always walked the walk and talked the talk - as evidenced by this photo of 30 years ago. The picture dates from 1979 when Mr K (an enthusiastic bicyclist who retains his athletic physique today) organized a Solar Technician Training Project for the California Conservation Corps, during which period he was part of Jerry Brown's gubernatorial administration. They built solar hot water panels and installed them on state parks buildings around the Golden State. Interesting to note that Katz’s commitment to a low-carbon lifestyle stretched to his wardrobe: check out those solar flares… See also: Museums: An Outpouring in Paper and Pencil - Visitors to Calif Academy Get to the Point on Climate Change Museums: Jonathan Katz, exec producer of groundbreaking “Altered State” exhibit (Cal Academy of Sciences) to speak May 30 at JFKU “Risk” colloquium At the New California Academy of Sciences, Cinnabar's Climate Change Exhibits Speak Up About State's Environment and Future
Posted By Charles Read -- At 12:47 PM \| Comments (1) \| Trackbacks (0)
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Categories Attractions Business, Museums, Science Centres , Themed Design Tags california academy of sciences, environmental, green, katz, lavatories, solar
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Sunday, May 17, 2009 Amusement Parks: Going for a Thong The themed entryway into a Disney park, Universal’s Islands of Adventure, SeaWorld, Alton Towers or indeed any well-designed amusement park property contains images, signs, sounds and symbols that promise thrills and high adrenaline experiences and build a heightened sense of anticipation in the visitor. Guests at Love Land, “China's first sex theme park,” will be greeted by a pair of huge, disembodied legs...

Perhaps there will also be the cheery faces and extended hands of amusement park employees at the gate – but there will also be this arresting view: a set of lady’s legs and hips with a red thong, revolving on a circular platform. No upper body. She’s big on the derriere this girl, no décolletage to speak of, indeed no head… Love Land's leggy icon will certainly build a sense of something powerful in the park-goer and perhaps make him (or her??) receptive to the Chongqing based amusement park’s other attractions, the naked sculptures and exhibition of the history of sexual practices in various countries. One high spot promises to be, as a story in The Guardian immodestly relates, the “oversized replica of a set of genitals” leading to the question of what is the optimum size for a set (pair? package? portfolio?) of genitals. Long live astounding cultural differences! See also: Amusement Parks: Let's talk about Marty Sklar Amusement Parks: Between a Rock and a Hard Rock... Amusement Parks: What do you mean we don’t have all the rights in the former Hard Rock Park?
Posted By Charles Read -- At 3:58 PM \| Comments (1) \| Trackbacks (0)
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Categories Amusements Parks, Attractions Business Tags China, entrance, marketing, sex theme park
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Tuesday, May 12, 2009 Museums: An Outpouring in Paper and Pencil - Visitors to Calif Academy Get to the Point on Climate Change For the new California Academy of Sciences, my company, Cinnabar Inc., produced the exhibit “Altered State,” which focuses on climate change and California.

By Jonathan Katz, executive producer, “Altered State” The exhibit has been very well received by the public and garnered a critical writeup in the Los Angeles Times (A Museum That Shouts Climate Change) and quite a bit of coverage in the industry media as well. Defining an interactive as a venue with a screen is limiting, and most often puts the museum at a comparative disadvantage. Although “Altered State” contains several high-tech interactives of which we are very proud, “Share Your Ideas,” one of the outstanding successes, is decidedly low-tech, involving little more than paper and pencil. It's located at the center of “Altered State,” within the Arena for Engagement where the content focuses on communities, families and individuals, so it was an obvious site to invite folks to contribute to the exhibit. In this simplest and most direct of interfaces, visitors write and sketch their own suggestions and ideas for conserving energy, reducing carbon footprint and combating climate change. Pencils and slips of paper about the size of luggage tags are supplied by the Academy for this purpose. Visitors hang their completed entries on hooks for others to view. People respond to the succinct format: each individual entry has the feeling of a work of art. This community outpouring of messages on a vital topic that touches us all has been so successful that the museum has had to work to keep up the supply of pencils and paper. In search of a sustainable source for the tags, the Academy's creative services department recruited their printer, Paragraphics, to cut them from make-readies (paper that has been test-printed on one side). Interactives in the built environment should be literally active, having some quality of physicality. Visitors have to move their arms, their legs, their bodies, and their minds. The idea for “Share Your Ideas” arose from conversations with our lead exhibit developer Darcie Fohrmam, Emily Routman and myself. We had been looking for simple and direct ways for visitors to contribute content, and had noticed lots of informal efforts at other museums, i.e. sticky notes on foamcore, to let visitors leave messages and comments. We wanted people to see their work in its rightful place, so the design of hooks in rows was used to make the display self organizing, yet give each contributor the freedom to choose where on the board to place their tag. The simple act of writing and mounting the tag for others to see is a meaningful experience for the visitor. But the tags themselves – already numbering in the tens of thousands - will also go on to help spread the word in various ways. Some will be scanned and posted on the Academy website. Others will be used to aid classroom projects. The tags are being saved by Carol Tang, director, visitor interpretive programs for the Academy, as the basis for a research paper (educators interested in obtaining access to the tags can email Ms. Tang: ctang@calacademy.org). This prolific outpouring will not go unheard. Photos: Joe Fletcher See also: Museums: Jonathan Katz, exec producer of groundbreaking “Altered State” exhibit (Cal Academy of Sciences) to speak May 30 at JFKU “Risk” colloquium Eco-friendly Immersive Theater Launched at New California Academy of Sciences Digital Innovator Mindi Lipschultz Creates Interactive Media Experiences for New California Academy of Sciences Rana Creek Raises the Roof on the California Academy of Sciences At the New California Academy of Sciences, Cinnabar's Climate Change Exhibits Speak Up About State's Environment and Future
Posted By Jonathan Katz -- At 6:55 PM \| Comments (1) \| Trackbacks (0)
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Categories Attractions Business, Museums, Planetariums, Science Centres , Themed Design Tags california academy of sciences, cinnabar, climate, katz
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Saturday, May 09, 2009 Special Venue Media: Musings on the Fulldome Market "So, what's the fulldome market like these days?" That's a question we hear at Loch Ness Productions pretty often--and it's a serious topic of conversation any time two or more fulldome theater folk (or those who want to be in fulldome) get together. In the past year I've had conversations with several media producers at various meetings who expressed some interest in "getting into the fulldome market."

By Carolyn Collins Petersen, Loch Ness Productions They asked many good questions, but it quickly became apparent that their queries belied a mindset of movie producers looking for new venues to repurpose content into. They reminded me of an article in a musician's magazine called Keyboard about concerts in planetariums. The person writing the story seemed to assume that planetariums were like night clubs and that the "club manager" would put up a tip jar for the road-show musicians who were performing on the planetarium "circuit." Clearly the author had not researched what planetarium facilities did (and do) in real life. Certainly planetariums have hosted concerts, but that's not their main raison d'être. And, there was (and is) no "circuit" that hopeful musicians could "break into" for performances. It's a useful illustration of how people who aren't familiar with the planetarium/fulldome theater often make assumptions that don't fit with the actuality of the place. The fulldome market has important differences from other media markets. To have a good chance at success in this one, a producer must learn and take many factors into account: subject matter/concept, target audience, specialized formatting, production, budget and distribution potential. Based on a number of actual conversations I have had, here's an imaginary (but) typical dialog between me and a hopeful fulldome producer (HFP): HFP: So, I've got this content/project/movie that would go really well in fulldome. I need to get some idea of the market. Me: What’s the show concept? HFP: Well, it's a kiddie show based on a cartoon/puppet show/play that I saw at a festival last year. Me: Is it about science? Astronomy? Educational? HFP: Well, no. Does it have to be? Me: Given that nearly all the fulldome theaters out there are in schools, colleges, museums or other educational or cultural facilities and whose mission statements are to bring astronomy to public audiences -- that's the first question they're going to ask about your content. HFP: Schools? Me: Yes. They are still very tuned into getting content that helps them teach science -- particularly astronomy. They also don't have a lot of money -- most of them don't charge admission or if they do, it's very low. HFP: Oh… well…what about the big theaters? Me: In the fulldome world, "big" is a theater dome 15 meters in diameter or more, and so far there are only about 100 big theaters of that size throughout the entire world. Sure, most do buy content; some produce their own. The big domes are more able to afford license fees or pay gate-share. HFP: Only 100? How many fulldome theaters are there altogether? Me: If you include portable fulldome video planetariums with inflatable domes as theaters, about 500 or so. That’s in the entire world. HFP: This project is going to cost me a million dollars to put together because it's all animation and I have celebrity voices and so on. I need to make that back somehow. I've been told that I can make a half million dollars in gate-share the first year if I have the right property. Me: Well you might, but that depends on a number of factors: how much you want to charge for your content, how long you license it for, whether or not it’s something that theaters might want, and so on. Maximizing distribution and revenue in fulldome is complicated. Not everybody who might be interested in buying or leasing your show charges admission so you can't do the gate-share model with everyone. And what resolution can you make it available in? Will you allow your content into smaller theaters with lower resolution projection systems? Do you know about the different resolutions and formats that fulldome producers have to work with? Do you know what the fulldome theaters want and/or need? Are you considering the overseas market and language translations? HFP: Ummm... hmmmm.... You can see that this conversation is going right to Rude Awakeningville for the prospective producer or even the new fulldome theater operator who hasn't researched the "market" for fulldome shows. The Market Has Answers That theoretical conversation is useful to spur a discussion of essential issues in fulldome marketing. Those issues are as follows: • the numbers of theaters (as of this writing, there are about 550 fulldome theaters "out there"; • the breakdown of those theaters into various categories (school, museum, public) -- and whether they charge for admission or not; • the resolution those theaters can project; • the numbers of those theaters that can afford to buy content; • the content that's available – and at what prices; • the content that's appropriate for a given theater's usage and audiences. You can slice and dice a number of different scenarios, but no matter what you do, you come up with a pretty small market compared to the numbers of regular movie theaters out there, or even the specialty theaters like IMAX. To my mind, the biggest factor to consider when thinking about producing fulldome content is that last category: the content that's appropriate for a given theater's usage and audiences. Simply put -- and as the conversation above indicates -- fulldome theaters are largely used to communicate about the science of astronomy. They're associated with that topic and it's why facilities install them. So, the content is still largely tracking that need. Yes, there is other non-astronomy content out there, but it's still mostly science. This may change as we bring more new artists and producers into the medium, and I've seen a couple of interesting efforts by people who do understand the domed medium and what it can lend to a project. But, to any folks coming into the scene from other media, I suggest that it's best to really study what content out there already, then figure out how to approach the market with your content. That's not to say you shouldn't try new things. But be aware of the constraints that buyers face when getting content for their theaters. Price is important, of course. Find out what content these places are buying (and at what price point). And be prepared for a bit of reverse sticker shock -- particularly if you are used to working with budgets of at least a million dollars for content and licensing it out for high prices. The fulldome community isn't set up to afford high license fees. Prices for existing show licenses range from the low thousands of dollars to tens of thousands of dollars. All that being said, the fulldome market is growing. The beauty is that it will continue to evolve, and I can't wait to see where all of us who produce for fulldome will take it next!
Posted By Carolyn Collins Petersen -- At 10:32 AM \| Comments (0) \| Trackbacks (0)
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Categories Attractions Business, Museums, Planetariums, Science Centres Tags astronomy, fulldome, marketing, Planetarium
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