CMC_Process

Overview

The Cincinnati Science Museum renovated its iconic Union Terminal building and re-designed all of its main exhibits including the dinosaur gallery. Four new impressive fossils were added to the collection, including one discovered by the museum’s curator of vertebrate paleontology. The exhibit team was tasked with designing this centerpiece of the museum.

The Cincinnati Science Museum is located within an hour and a half of the Creation Museum, a young earth creationist museum focused on a literal translation of the book of Genesis. A significant segment of our members are also active members of the Creation Museum. In order to both present the research and current understanding of paleontology while also accepting where museum members may be coming from was a key driver in the development of the exhibits content.

Our key directive was to engage museum guests on the scientific process of observation and testing that is at the core of understanding. If guests leave excited having engaged with the scientific process for themselves, seeing how we arrived at our understanding and being clear about the questions we still have, then that curiosity will lead them towards a lifetime of learning.

Goals

• Engage guests of all ages with the specimens beyond just looking at them from a distance.

• Engage guests of all ages the process of scientific discovery by letting them see the process.

• Engage guests of all ages in the process of discovery by using their own hands to join in.

Outcome

• Exhibit opened as the main feature of the renovated museum, hosting both kids programming and fundraising galas.

• Recognition for Accessibility in Exhibit Design specifically for tactile information, audio content and physical interaction suitable for wheelchair access.

• Bill Nye liked it! He came to tour it shortly after it opened.

• ASTC Business Innovation Award for for debuting one of our dinosaurs in a brewery while the exhibit was under construction.
  

Team & process

Anything important and big takes a whole team. As a designer, I was responsible for exhibit interactive elements. I worked under the lead architect/principle exhibit designer and alongside the Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology, Director of Exhibits, Content Copy Developer, Project Manager, and Exhibit Fabrication & Maintenance team.

• Physical Layout

• Interaction Brainstorm

• User Journey Map

• Feature Prototypes

  • What am I looking at? Point and feel what we can learn from fossils

  • What was it like? See dinosaurs moving and walk with them

  • How did we find this? See the actual notes from the dinosaur dig and map them to the fossil in front of you

• Development (fabrication) handoff

Design for Collaboration
At the beginning of the design process we had six fossils, two main story lines, several design themes and several passionate experts. After getting blank looks presenting a polished slide show with design concepts. I build a rough foam core scale model where anyone could move things around and engage. We held our next brainstorm around this model, inviting them to touch and move things around. This proved to be a much better way at gathering feedback than a presentation. After the session we had lots of ideas on post its stuck all over the model and more importantly everyone seemed to be able to envision the goal in a way we hadn’t been able to show before.

User Journey Map: Visualizing the User Experience in Physical Space
A different style of map, this one deals not just with time but also with space. Based on the outcome of our brainstorm, these ideas began to shape the flow and usage of the space.

Three Interaction Prototypes

What was it like? Engage with Gross Motor Movements
Walk like a dinosaur, walk alongside a dinosaur! The idea here was to give guests of all ages a way to experience the scale of the dinosaurs by walking like them. Different footprints taken from each of the dinosaurs on display are one the ground spaced at gate we observed. The second part of the experience used an array of projectors to have animated silhouette on the wall giving context to the cephalopod on display in the middle of the room. See the footprints and the animation each invite participation and any age can join in.

What am I Looking at? See and touch what we can learn from this specific fossil
One of the special parts of this exhibit was this rare Galeamopus fossil, excavated by the museum team over a decade and finally on display. A source of significant scientific interest, our goal was to empower every guest to see some of the things that are of interest for this version. For example, two vertebrate near the hind legs have fused together. This is likely the result of an injury or attack that the dinosaur survived and healed from. Three kiosks stationed around the fossil light up the areas in questions while a bronze model of the piece in available to touch and observe up close while the label explains the detail you can observe.

How did this all get here? Dive into the process
As the guests move from the top of the ramp down through the exhibit the story focuses more and more on how we search for what we know. A personal favorite of the exhibit is a large screen that shows an actual field drawing of the dig where the Galeamopus fossil was excavated. Guests ca touch different bones and see how they came together in the fossil. The label is also very clear about which parts of the display are fossils and which parts are reproductions. The goal here is to fall in love with the process of discovery and share a bit of the passion that drives this work.