Recognition

“Turn to the adjacent interactive monitor to rotate a beautifully detailed image of the vase, which you can enlarge and move around with a touch of the finger...Eight mural-size paintings, called ‘The Conquest of Mexico,’ depict Hernán Cortés’s 1519–1522 mission of subjugation. Created by an unknown artist in the last quarter of the 17th century, the paintings glorify the Spanish empire. They include detailed sub-scenes set into the large drama, like sidebars telling the back story—just as the accompanying interactive displays illuminate the events and characters portrayed in the work.”

“Second Story was recently tasked with creating Arago, an online database for the National Postal Museum that would amass their collection of over 300,000 objects and present them in a user-friendly interface. With elaborate data import scripts to translate data from a third-party collection management tool, all the logic involved in managing researcher contributions, and the website itself, it was a large and complicated project.”

“Second Story fuses databases, artifacts, animation, Web technology, video, text and breathtaking graphics into stories that adapt to different learning styles and interests. Named for two-way storytelling that empowers audiences, Second Story supplies characters, information, music, imagery and atmosphere. Designers let museum-goers expand and steer stories in unpredictable directions.”

“Brad Johnson of Portland’s Second Story [has] succeeded in the evolving world of UGC,...working directly with audiences to create powerful, collaborative work.

One of Second Story’s many UGC-based museum projects, the exhibit...features nearly a dozen interactive installations that explore freedom of speech and the First Amendment. Visitors can listen to banned music, create their own personalized bill of rights, and hear America’s Founding Fathers as they struggle to draft the Constitution. But that’s just the beginning. They’re also invited to record their own stories about freedom of speech. These stories are monitored for content, and those that are approved become part of a larger archive, which also contains video clips from Oprah Winfrey, Barack Obama, past presidents, and other public figures. This ever-changing archive of videos is displayed outside the museum, on a large plasma screen above Chicago’s Michigan Avenue.

Second Story created an intuitive touch screen interface inside a recording booth. From there, visitors could record their own videos, which were instantly added to the live archive. Johnson chose to display the videos outside the museum,on a bustling city street, because he believes that successful UGC involves more than allowing users to make something interesting for themselves and their friends. ‘To me,’ he says, ‘the true power is when they can share their creations with the public.’”

“[M]useums have begun using overhead projectors to create interactive tables that are far more effective than their stand-up predecessors. Not only does a table fill the center of a room, it also provides a way for many people to get involved at the same time. Outstanding examples include one done...by Ralph Appelbaum Associates (produced by Second Story Interactive) for the National World War One Museum.”

“There are two Issues Tales, which enable visitors to access vast stores of information and to participate, individually or in groups, in a sequence of educational activities and projects. Each table is functionally a custom video theatre with a horizontal screen and multiple projection sources. It has six interactive multimedia stations and accommodates up to 24 people at a time.”

“The ultimate collection of awarded designs, the AIGA Archives are the recorded catalog of annual juried selections in design excellence. Featuring 3,269 hand-picked entries..., the entire site is a graphic designer’s goldmine. The best part is the Flash-built interactive navigation which allows you to browse and cross-reference entries by publication date and category...and even lets you lightbox your favorites. Pretty...no, very damn cool.”