Product

Artverse

Artverse revolutionizes the way we engage with culture and art through Augmented Reality (AR). This pioneering app brings together immersive AR experiences from diverse cultural institutions, enabling users to interact directly with artworks and artifacts, thereby fostering a deeper personal connection with cultural heritage. Artverse serves as a multimedia guide into new dimensions, merging interactive technology with traditional cultural exploration.

Interactive Experiences

Artverse redefines cultural engagement by blending innovative interactive experiences with classical audio guides, enriching the appreciation of art and culture.

Multimedia guide

Visitors control their journey, choosing multimedia guide content at their own pace, for a tailored exploration of cultural treasures.

Custom CMS

Our bespoke Content Management System (CMS) offers unmatched flexibility, allowing you to effortlessly curate and update content to keep the experience fresh and relevant.

Flexible Content Control

Enjoy the freedom to directly edit and authorize content, engaging your target audience in a collaborative curation process.

Download our App

Download the «Artverse» app from the links above and click on «Images to scan» to view examples directly in AR.
Images to scan

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Features

You can choose from different features, according to your needs.

Diverse Media Content

Enrich your exhibitions with a wide range of media: audio, video (including transparent), images, GIFs (including animated), 3D objects, and text, for a comprehensive narrative experience.

Unlimited Content Possibilities

Add an unlimited number of different contents to each artwork to tell its story in diverse ways.

Thematic Tours for Every Audience

Create individual experiences with multiple thematic tours, specially tailored for different target groups.

Interaction with Social Media

Allow your visitors to immortalize their experiences by sharing photos on social media.

Insights Through Analytics

Gain valuable insights into visitor behavior with anonymized, quantitative analyses of user interactions with the content.

Multilingual Platform and CMS

Overcome language barriers by making both the app and the content management system multilingual, to reach an international audience.

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Impressions

The following images and videos show the software Artverse with content from our customers in action.

3D objects in AR - freely placing the Freisicht cottage in the garden.

How do the same shapes appear with different colors?

«Bitfabrik» - Artverse is suitable for use in workshops.

A holiday course for 9-14 year olds - shaping your own world in three dimensions and bringing it to life with Augmented Reality.

«Renoir unplugged» in the Museum Langmatt.

3D scan with Artverse available at any location.

«Magical Windows» - a comprehensive AR tour through the collection of the Aargauer Kunsthaus.

«Art Catch» - rediscovering works of art in public spaces in the city of Winterthur.

«Renoir unplugged» in the Museum Langmatt.

Product

FAQs

What is Augmented Reality (AR)?

Augmented Reality is a digital technology that allows digital content to be displayed over reality, thereby merging reality with virtuality. AR should not be confused with Virtual Reality (VR), which enables immersion into completely virtual worlds and where the reality of the user's immediate surroundings plays no role. An example of AR: With a smartphone or tablet, an artwork is targeted through the camera. The AR app installed on the device recognizes the artwork. On the device's screen, additional information is now displayed over or next to the work, in the form of images, animations, videos, or text. It is also possible to play sound upon recognizing the image – noises, music, or spoken text.

What is the significance of AR?

Augmented Reality (AR) is one of the most powerful and forward-looking digital technologies. It will permeate all areas of our lives in the foreseeable future. The widely communicated step by Mark Zuckerberg to rename his company from Facebook to Meta and to declare the so-called "Metaverse" as a possible replacement for today's internet demonstrates how strategically AR is viewed. This is further emphasized by the fact that many of the largest digital players are working on AR projects, including glasses that could replace today's mobile devices. AR allows for the ideal use of the advantages of both the real and virtual worlds by merging them together.

Why is the use of AR in the cultural sector exciting?

Technical progress, including the advent of AR, does not stop at culture and museums. While AR in the cultural sector has long been dormant, the technology has increasingly come to the forefront in the last one to two years. AR is an ideal tool for presenting and conveying cultural content and allowing visitors to participate in cultural events. AR enables content to be presented in direct dialogue with an object, to open up new perspectives in an accessible and sensory way, to make the invisible visible, and to turn visitors into discoverers. By allowing content from outside to enter the museum via AR or by enhancing objects in the outdoor space with AR, the museum space can be opened in both directions. Since AR involves, and even requires, the real environment, it keeps museum visitors' attention on the objects instead of distracting them.

What requirements are needed to implement projects with Artverse?

Since the content for Artverse is stored in the cloud and dynamically accessed during app usage, a stable, reasonably fast, and easily accessible Wi-Fi connection is required in the museum. To manage the content through the web-based administration tool, a computer with an internet connection is needed. No further technical prerequisites are generally necessary. To ensure objects are well recognized, they should be well lit.

How sustainable is the use of AR for a museum or another institution?

Due to the fact that AR recognition is integrated into the two most widely used operating systems for mobile devices (iOS and Android), the most important component for using AR experiences is already available by default on almost all newer mobile devices. This indicates that AR is considered by device manufacturers as a strategic and thus sustainably usable technology. With AR, the same objects in a collection can be repeatedly reinterpreted and presented in various ways without needing changes to the underlying technology. This makes the use of AR particularly attractive for collection objects and can help enhance the positioning and perception of in-house collections. All content can be created and published by the museums themselves. Depending on the complexity, the creation of this content can take more or less time. It is possible to create exciting content with very simple means and little time. Freisicht keeps the software up to date at all times, so museums don't have to worry about it. The necessary work is included and covered by the licensing fee. Museums can commission functional extensions of Artverse. These extensions are then available to all other museums as well. Thus, the product continuously evolves for all participants.

How can AR be combined with existing digital offerings (e.g. online collection, audio guide ...)?

AR can be used both inside and outside the museum space. It can be an ideal complement, and in some cases a replacement, for existing solutions. The use of Artverse is extremely flexible, it can be used as a multimedia guide as well as an audio guide. Thanks to the possibility of offering several tours, it can cover different purposes and contents. In principle, it is advisable to develop an appropriate digital strategy for the use of digital technologies. If required, we will be happy to advise you on this.

What are the limitations of AR in general?

AR recognition is constantly being refined and therefore works better and better. Nevertheless, there are objects that can currently only be recognized with difficulty or not at all. For example, a plain-colored work of art is difficult for AR. On the other hand, objects with clear structures, good contrast and a certain amount of detail work very well in AR. It is generally important that the objects to be detected are well illuminated; reflections such as on glass covers or shadows can make detection difficult. Currently, an app is needed for AR offerings. There is WebAR, but the possibilities are currently still very limited, which is also the reason why Freisicht offers Artverse as an app and does not yet make it available on the web.

We have a very limited budget - can we afford it?

Since Artverse is used by several (and increasingly more) museums, the maintenance and development costs are spread over several shoulders. Therefore, the costs for a single museum are comparatively low. Visitors can use AR offerings as needed with their own devices or with devices provided by the museum. In the case of a BYOD strategy ('Bring Your Own Device'), there are no hardware costs for a museum. The AR content created is uploaded to the cloud with the help of an easy-to-use, web-based administration tool and stored there. So there is no need for any technical infrastructure on the part of the museum in this respect either.

We have limited resources and no employees with special digital training. Can we still use Artverse?

The more resources and the more digital expertise available, the more diverse and technically sophisticated content can be created. But even with basic know-how in photo editing and a small investment of time, meaningful and exciting content can be created that offers visitors added value. In many places, there is also quite a bit of exciting content already available that can simply be uploaded to our CMS and thus made available in AR. In a free consultation, we can show you some variations on how content can be created and published.Since AR can certainly cause a stir, it is worth considering and budgeting for an AR project as an effective marketing measure as well. Especially its use in combination with exhibition posters makes it possible to promote exhibitions in a completely new and exciting way.

Is there a demo version of artverse?

At https://freisicht.ch/ar you will find examples of how AR can be used in an art museum or gallery. It is possible to test Artverse without obligation. We will be happy to open a time-limited trial account for you, which allows you to try out and experiment internally (without publication). If you are interested, please feel free to contact us at any time at info@freisicht.ch.

Are there other providers and how does freisicht stand out from them?

There are other providers of AR offerings. However, most providers are not focused on the cultural sector. The employees of freisicht cover the necessary technical as well as the cultural and mediation know-how. This allows us to communicate with museum representatives efficiently as well as on an equal footing in terms of expertise and content.

What kind of support does Freisicht offer?

If you are interested in using Artverse, we will be happy to provide you with a no-obligation consultation. We provide consulting support for the planning and implementation of your projects. If you have Artverse in use, we offer you appropriate support services in the event of problems or queries. If required, we can develop individual AR experiences or entire projects on your behalf. In addition, we offer to conduct AR workshops at your facility, both for employees and for visitors or school classes.

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