Designing Interactive Transparent Exhibition Cases

Interactive technologies in museums enhance the visit experience by providing contextual information and fostering collaboration and participation. In this paper we revisit the design of the ubiquitous transparent exhibition case from a museum learning perspective. Transparent cases with interactive properties can complement other museum technologies and mitigate some of their shortcomings, such as the group isolation caused by audio guides and mobile devices. This paper focuses on the design of interactive cases and makes three contributions. First, based on field observations and interviews we present a list of requirements for interactive cases. Second, we propose a design space with dimensions grouped around the themes of hardware, interaction and information design. Our design space suggests interactive cases which present collocated information at increasing levels of detail, facilitate social interaction, and integrate with other technologies. Third, we demonstrate our design space through sample case designs and discuss the general technical challenges.