A Virtual World Installation in an Art Exhibition: Providing a Shared Interaction Space for Local and Remote Visitors

Visiting museums and exhibitions represented in multi-user 3D environments can be an efficient way of learning about the exhibits in an interactive manner and socialising with other visitors. The rich educational information presented in the virtual environment and the presence of remote users could also be beneficial for the visitors of the physical exhibition space. In this paper we present the design and implementation of a virtual exhibition that allowed local and remote visitors coexist in the environment, access the interactive content and communicate with each other. The virtual exhibition was accessible to the remote users from the Web and to local visitors through an installation in the physical space. The installation projected the virtual world in the exhibition environment and let users interact with it using a handheld gesture-based device. We performed an evaluation of the 3D environment with the participation of both local and remote visitors. The evaluation results indicate that the virtual world was considered exciting and easy to use by the majority of the participants. Furthermore, according to the evaluation results, virtual museums and exhibitions seem to have significant advantages for remote visitors compared to typical museum web sites, and they can also be an important aid to local visitors and enhance their experience.