Authoring Animated Interactive 3D Museum Exhibits using a Digital Repository

Abstract

We present the prototype of a software system to streamline the serial production of simple interactive 3D animations for the display in museum exhibitions. We propose dividing the authoring process in two phases, a designer phase and a curator phase. The designer creates a set of configurable 3D scene templates that fit with the look of the physical exhibition while the curator inserts 3D models and configures the scene templates; the finished scenes are uploaded to 3D kiosks in the museum. Distinguishing features of our system are the tight integration with an asset repository and the simplified scene graph authoring. We demonstrate the usefulness with a few examples.