YDreams Brasil’s latest interactivity project involves gorgeous butterflies – virtual ones that is! The Virtual Butterfly Gallery, crafted for a permanent exhibition on butterflies native to the Atlantic rain forest in Rio de Janeiro state, inaugurated this past July 30th at Quitandina Palace in Petropolis, an historical city nestled in the forested hills north of Rio de Janeiro.
The exhibition was sponsored and put together by SESC (Social Services for Merchant Commerce) a non-profit Brazilian institute founded in 1946 that caters to the social well-being of mercantile and service industry professionals and their families. SESC organizes activities related to areas such as education, health, recreation, and culture.
YDreams solutions for the exhibit include butterflies of all shapes and colors projected onto a leaf-like sculpture that react as visitors approach by fluttering about and away. Visitors are also treated to eight 32” touch screen totems that feature extensive information about the different species, as well as the chance to create their own virtual butterfly, which they can then email to friends and family.
I was thrilled to see Obama’s inauguration ceremony, not only because of his charisma and what he represents, but also because it was the beginning of a digital era in the presidency of the United States. The White House changed its website to a more collaborative one and CNN joined Microsoft to use Photosynth (MS’s latest photo 3D navigation technology) as an interactive collective album dedicated to the ceremony.
The result was amazing, a very rich collection of pictures of D.C. the Mall sent by people that were there at that very specific moment. I may say that even though the technology was not new for me (as I´ve seen some videos about it before), that was the moment where it really caught my attention.
Later on I thought - Why not use YDreams’ hardware solutions to interact with such a rich interface? In the same week I got a call from Rene de Paula, a Microsoft Brasil User Experience Evangelist, asking for a meeting. What a coincidence. I had no doubt, he needed to see this idea working. So I teamed up with Renan at our Rio de Janeiro office to build this prototype.
The main idea was to use hand gestures to control the navigation in a more appealing scenario than a computer desk. This video illustrates the result, I hope you all enjoy it.
