Experience design, virtual reality and media hybridization for the digital communication inside museums

Abstract

Experience design, both in real and in virtual museums, is very complex to be planned, even more when digital contents are juxtaposed to real collections. Researchers in this field, curators, creatives and software developers must work together in order to evolve towards a more efficient interconnection among visitors, collections and digital applications. This paper deals with such an interconnection, providing a theoretical background and practical guidelines, on the basis of museum studies and of the author’s research experience in this domain, supported by the results of surveys carried out on European museums visitors dealing with digital technologies. Media hybridization has a long and evolving tradition and it can contribute to transmit culture in engaging way to the public, respecting the scientific plausibility of contents. The choice of narrative structures and styles, as well as of interaction paradigms and technologies, is deeply conditioned by a series of factors that will be examined in detail. A general “direction” is needed to arouse in the visitor a feeling of confidence and trust, expectation and discovery that makes him/her feel at the center of an emotional and creative experience, of a progressive appropriation of meaning. Various typologies of experiences will be discussed and compared.