MAKING THE FIRST EVER VIRTUAL MUSEUM OF INDIAN CINEMA

Museums hold a monumental place in societies across the world. They house a valuable connection to the past of our civilisation. It is a connection that needs to be nurtured and passed on to the future generations as a legacy. Our most recent work is a landmark step in this direction.

Currently we as a country don’t have sufficient resources or the space to build world class museums. As cities grow denser and more populous, this challenge will become more and more pronounced. Taking a cue from PM Narendra Modi’s vision to have Virtual Museums that protect and nurture our country’s culture and heritage, we recently had the opportunity to make the first ever Virtual Museum of Indian Cinema for NFAI.

National Film Archives of India, headquartered in Pune, is the largest archives of films in India. With over 1,32,000 film reels, over 1,52,000 photos, over 23,500 posters, over 15,000 song booklets, state of the art storage facilities, and film restoration and preservation technology, NFAI truly captures the length and breadth of Indian Cinema. The task for us was to improve NFAI’s outreach and awareness of about their activities.

So we devised two immersive 360° experiences for NFAI’s audiences. One was a 360° tour of the NFAI campus and the facilities. The second one was a Virtual Museum which showcases film posters from across decades and from across numerous states in India. The architecture and the interiors were created to match the standards of a world-class museum. The sound, the music and the overall experience was tailor-made to match the ‘patriotism’ theme at the current International Film Festival of India being organised in Goa, where these experiences are being showcased for the first time.

M Venkaiah Naidu, (Union Minister for Urban Development, Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Information and Broadcasting) experiencing #VirtualReality content developed by DigitalArtVRe for National Film Archive of India. M Venkaiah Naidu inaugurated the #NFAI exhibition in IFFI2016 in Goa. 

With the advent of Virtual Museums, students, enthusiasts and individuals who are keen to explore, can access our culture and heritage sitting in the comforts of their homes, offices or schools. We have developed special phone applications for these experiences to be accessed from anywhere across the world.

Considering the scalable and expandable nature of this model we can replicate this template to perfectly match multiple functions and purposes for museums of numerous kinds. The possibilities are virtually limitless and we are eager to explore every one of them.