Norman Rockwell VR Exhibit
KEYWORDS: USER EXPERIENCE, INTERACTION DESIGN, VR DEVELOPMENT
PROJECT TIMELINE
TECHNOLOGY USED
LINKS
15 WEEKS
- Unity
- Adobe Photoshop
- Adobe Illustrator
Project Description
This project was created as part of a studio project combining the resources of the Game Development Departments and the Web + New Media Departments. We were sponsored by the Norman Rockwell Museum in Massachusetts. The museum is having a moving tour of Rockwell’s Four Freedoms paintings and they wanted a mobile-VR piece to go along with the tour. We created four distinct environments; each based on one of the Four Freedom paintings along with a gallery space modeled after the gallery where the Freedoms are hung and a tutorial.
The Four Freedoms Paintings
The Four Freedoms is a series of four 1943 oil paintings by the American artist Norman Rockwell. The paintings—Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear—are each approximately 45.75 inches (116.2 cm) × 35.5 inches (90 cm), and are now in the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.
Freedom from Fear
Freedom of Worship
Freedom of Speech
Freedom from Want
CONCEPT ART
Our team of concept artists created our preliminary environments using references of what the homes and furnishings of the 1940’s.
Interaction Thought Process
The UX designers then met with the concept artists to create concept wireframes of how the major interactions could happen in the various environments. This is a first draft of the Freedom From Want environment which was Norman Rockwell’s most re-created painting. The museum wanted to show how much influence Rockwell’s work had on future generations, so we decided to start with a photogrammetry version of the painting mapped to a modeled dining room. The walls would then fold down and reveal a gallery of all of the parodies and other re-creations of Rockwell’s work.
Models and Scenes
Once the interactions were fleshed out, our modellers and scripters got to work creating the assets in Maya and the interactions in Unity. The modellers used the same assets the concept artists used to create the furnishings and environments. When the assets were in Unity, the scripters were able to divide up the interactions needed and create the interactions based on the wireframes created by the UX designers.