London, UK — Holovis worked closely with the British Museum to create a touring 3D theatre experience that immerses the audience in the ‘virtual unwrapping’ of a 3,000-year old mummy and brings to life the story of this ancient Egyptian priest. The company created a unique turn-key 3D solution for Mummy: Secrets of the Tomb which is currently touring around the world including venues in Virginia, Brisbane, Mumbai and Singapore, accompanied and supported technically by Holovis every step of the way.
The 3D film experience is focused on the priest Nesperennub – whose original cartonnage coffin has never been opened – to unveil the story of his life and death, complete with a digital reconstruction of his facial appearance.
At each location on the tour, a theatre of up to 200 seats is constructed and becomes the entrance point into the overall exhibition for visitors. The 3D theatre was an essential part of the overall experience, setting the scene and bringing ancient Egypt to life in ultra-high resolution 4K 3D immersive media, before visitors entered the second part of the exhibition where they could get up close and personal with artefacts from the time and the actual cartonnage coffin containing the mummy.
Holovis created a solution using a 10 metre front-projection silver screen and three Sony 4k-resolution projectors to bring this transformative experience to life. Two of these were used in each show to create the passive stereo 3D effect, with the third on standby as a backup. This was complemented by an immersive 5.1 theatre audio system, bespoke Holovis control system and for both elements of the event AV setup Holovis ensured that everyone had the same high quality experience, no matter where they were seated.
Stuart Hetherington, CEO of Holovis explained,“This was a prestigious project to be involved with, the ground breaking nature of the content and the requirement to be a touring system meant that the immersive 3D solution needed to be custom designed to be simple and rapid to setup whilst being robust and reliable as it tours all over the world. We carefully designed the solution to ensure that it delivered a transformational experience for everyone in the auditorium and that the guests were fully immersed in the media taking storytelling to the next level and creating a truly memorable experience for everyone.”
John Taylor, Exhibition Curator, British Museum, commented, “The British Museum’s collaboration with Holovis provided the perfect match of subject and technology, bringing together unique material evidence from the remote past with the expertise and versatility which Holovis has demonstrated. Using non-invasive scanning we have been able to peel away the layers of wrappings surrounding the body of this long-dead man and to see his face creates a truly moving experience, and the reaction of audiences worldwide has been overwhelmingly positive and enthusiastic.”
