Good Evening Susan,
I am the Chairman of Dartmouth Museum in South Devon and we are
small, all-volunteer and operate on the basis of two volunteers on duty -
one can then walk about between our three rooms.
We are moving into the 21st Century and one of the earlier
improvements (major changes to one room++) made use of some built in IT.
Like you we are in a Grade 1 listed building so do have limitations, but not
too bad so long as things are not too permanently fixed to certain walls.
We got our Accreditation last year and are starting on a new project - with
funding promises coming in now - to redo the other two rooms. In one we are
intending to set up a WW2 'air raid shelter' with a DVD continuously running
(apparently silently) at one end on a built in flat screen. The current
idea is to use cordless headphones for visitors to use which are chained to
appropriate points. The cost of flat screens is now very low, around the
£100 + mark depending on size, and the headphones are very cheap as are DVD
players. The company I use for many things is
www.aria.co.uk
I would consider DVD format rather than CD for this purpose as it can
also take commentary and recorded interviews etc - we have quite a few of
local wartime memories for our purposes - and still photos can, if required,
be presented as if they were movie.
Hope this may give you some ideas. Suggest reply off-list if you
need more info.
Regards,
David Lingard
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Susan Buhr" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2009 11:06 AM
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Mini-emergency re: Listening posts/audio equipment
> Hello,
> We're overall a pretty low-tech museum here in Hampstead (mostly cos we're
> poor) so until now we've just been using a regular old laptop chained down
> to a radiator to display audiovisual materials. It's obviously not ideal,
> but it's worked fine for over a year now- until it was stolen over the
> weekend!
>
> As it happens I am submitting an application TODAY for a grant from the
> HLF Your Heritage programme to do an oral history project and exhibition.
> The exhibition, which would take place in Sept/Oct this year would be
> built around oral history interviews and would of course involve some form
> of listening post (or posts) in the gallery space. To be honest we're not
> the kind of place where we can ask people do download podcasts at home,
> and as a Grade I listed building our options for building things directly
> into the gallery space are pretty limited without getting loads of
> planning permission (and even then, we don't have audio-visual elements to
> all of our exhibitions, so we need something flexible).
>
> The trustees are investigating CCTV and augmenting our alarm systems, etc,
> but the biggest issue is that we are unable to have direct invigilation of
> the gallery space during all of its opening hours; there is always at
> least one volunteer steward for the building we are in, but they sit on
> the ground floor and I don't think most would accept the responsibility of
> (for example) handing out ipods or headsets to individual visitors.
>
> Can anyone give me some quick suggestions and general prices for what sort
> of options we might consider for in situ listening equipment?
>
> Thanks!
>
>
> Susan Buhr
> Curatorial Assistant
> Hampstead Museum at Burgh House
> phone: 02074310144
> www.20thcenturylondon.org.uk
> Please note my usual working days are Wednesday through Friday only.
>
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