Horridus: Fate of the Dinosaurs
In partnership with Melbourne Museum, Sandpit created the third act of Horridus: Fate of the Dinosaurs, focusing on the dinosaurs’ only living descendants: birds.
We created an immersive projection-mapped experience that covers the walls and ceiling of the third and final stage of the Horridus exhibition.
It focuses on native Victorian birds and includes three nooks visitors can enter to have a one on one encounter with an animation of a bird in the wild. Each nook is themed around a habitat: City, Water or Bush.
When visitors enter a nook, they are instructed to stand very still so that a bird might visit them. Beautiful animations by illustrator Chris Edser then play out. The experience is highly interactive and visitors are invited to ‘talk bird’ by doing their best to imitate the sounds the bird speaks to them.
To make this interactivity a reality, Sandpit built an immersive environment in Unreal Engine and collaborated with Brendan Woithe (KLANG) to design a sweeping bird soundscape.
Outside the nooks, the entire space is projection mapped to showcase the flying silhouettes of dozens of birds from around the world.
Sandpit worked closely with Melbourne Museum and Kulin Nations elders to include the image of Bunjil in the exhibition. Bunjil is the creator spirit of the Kulin Nations and takes the form of a wedge-tailed eagle. He has his own tree incorporated into the exhibition design and flies around the room with the other birds, keeping watch over all.
