There is an amazing new experience to be had in Seattle's Sodo neighborhood. The former Living Computer Museum is now Living Computers: Museum + Labs, and the transformation is absolutely captivating.
It didn't take CJ and Annabelle long to feel at home!
"We wanted to create a space people want to hang out in," museum executive director Lath Carlson explained during our sneak preview.
Mission accomplished, Living Computers: Museum + Labs!
The kids spent a few minutes reading cards in what felt like a futuristic living room. The one above was a favorite. We love geek humor.
The rebooted first floor has state-of-the-art learning labs which will serve as a resource for area schools, many of which have the desire and drive, but lack the resources and technology to introduce computer science to their students.
Regarding the reinvented first floor, "We're most excited about our lab spaces," executive director Carlson told us. In the labs, visitors can learn soldering, coding, robotics and more. In the labs, "We'll offer in-depth experiences," he informed.
The expandable, adaptable lab space is perfect for field trips, workshops and special programs, noted Nina Arens, the museum's education coordinator. There's an affordable, flat-fee model for student groups, which includes museum and lab access and lots of opportunity "for exploring hands on," she said.
More info about field trips here: http://www.livingcomputers.org/Events/Field-Trips.aspx
The lab is outfitted with state-of-the art laptops with touch screens, and programming possibilities include Scratch, Unity and more, noted Arens.
The lab spaces are filled with colorful kits, tools and tech just crying to be tinkered with. The lab is outfitted with state-of-the art laptops with touch screens, and programming possibilities include Scratch, Unity and more, noted Arens.
A big magnet on the fabulous new first floor is an interactive display just begging to be touched. It's all about shark populations, activity and habitat.
The smart table features data and footage gleaned from a Baited Remote Underwater Video (BRUV) rig. It's a marine-grade staineless steel frame with a GoPro camera, made to capture footage of sharks around the globe.
Visitors can use sensors and their hands to launch cool videos about sharks.
We could have spent an hour at this table, alone.
Behind the doors of the Digital Studio, an immersive world awaits.
An entire wall of one room features vibrant screens and a dynamic artwork called Flowers and People - Dark by teamLab
"It's mesmerizing, and always being created, right now, in the moment," observed museum curator Aaron Alcorn, PhD.
The digital work, with sound by Hideaki Takahashi, is neither prerecorded animation nor on a loop. Rather, it's artwork rendered in real time by a computer program. Interaction between viewers and the art installation creates continuous change.
According to teamLab, "States can never be replicated, and will never reoccur."
https://www.team-lab.net/w/flowerandpeople-dark/
In the same space, adjacent to the art wall, is a circular table with a captivating display of cows, stars, rain and more that responded to touch. Human interaction is sensed by a Microsoft Kinect device mounted on the ceiling.
We had to tear the kids away.
In a room next to the interactive art, we found an oh-so-fun and familiar Makey Makey. In this instance, it was used to create a paper piano.
Not to be missed in the renovated museum are the lofty spaces in between the old and new museum exhibits.
The loft's Internet of Things space is devoted to exploring the internetworking of devices, structures and other items embedded with software, sensors, electronics, actuators, and and/or network connectivity that enable the devices or objects to collect and exchange data via the Internet.
It's all about connectivity!
An attractive corner of the main floor is all about virtual reality.
Sure, it offers a state-of-the-art, immersive VR experience in the here and now ...
but the space also points out that this 'cutting edge' technology has been around for decades, and has taken many forms.
This display is one of the many instances tying the 'old' LCM to the new incarnation.
"We're not losing sight of where we came from as an institution," curator Aaron Alcorn assured.
Though we'd all like to forget the VirtualBoy, ha ha.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Boy
The first floor has a sizable space dedicated to robots. Pictured here, Baxter is an automated co-worker designed to redifine how robots are used in the workplace. http://www.rethinkrobotics.com/baxter/
There's also a fun place to play with Dash robots. Rolypoly, these smart robots teach users coding through play.
As they sing and 'dance' about, the adorable little Dash robots seem to have personality plus. https://www.makewonder.com/
Yet another display lets visitors build their own cubelet robots. http://www.modrobotics.com/cubelets/
A display on the main floor allows users to operate a Telelpresence Robot that's rolling around upstairs. These 'stand in' robots serve as a presence for telecommuters, long distance students, and more. http://www.doublerobotics.com/
The new space thoughtfully includes plenty of ties to the 'old' space upstairs.
"The first floor wouldn't exist without it," curator Aaron Alcorn pointed out.
A sweet example of that tie is a good ol' Apple IIe running The Oregon Trail
The game is featured not only on the famliar screen of the old Apple, but it' s also projected onto a wall ... IN COLOR.
Hold it ... How is this possible?! Turns out the original game *was* in color, it's just that the VAST majority of us were playing on a system that had the much more affordable, glowing green screen.
Who knew?! Now we all do!
And check out this lovely relic. Annabelle played Ordeal of the Hangman on a refurbished Plato V. It featured an early touchscreen.
Don't you just LOVE the wood paneling? I wish my desktop had it.
OK, so it wasn't exactly the screen that was sensitive. It used infrared technology. Beams of light crisscrossed the screen, and when you poked the screen, your finger would interrupt at least two of the beams. (Think "Battleship.")
CJ flipped his geeky lid upon spying this in a tucked-away-corner of the newly appointed first floor.
It's "Tennis for Two." He explains, "In case you're wondering, Tennis for Two was one of the earliest sports video games, and one of the earliest video games ever (one of the only games that I can think of as being older would be the Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device, which predated TfT by 11 years). Tennis for Two was designed by physicist William Higinbotham in 1958 for display at the Brookhaven National Laboratory's annual public exhibition after learning that the government research institution's Donner Model 30 analog computer could simulate trajectories with wind resistance. People unaware of Tennis for Two will often mistake it for a Pong clone, when Tennis for Two predated Pong by 17 years."
No ordinary "desktop computer," the 160-A (seen below) took 'desktop' computing to a whole new, er, old level.
Designed by Seymour Cray and introduced in 1960, the 160-A was both the computer and the desk.
The 160-A had a paper-tape reader, and a punch. That's where this typewriter looking machine came in.
Oh, and perhaps we should mention there's a 3D printed, self-driving car on site.
That's right, you can slide on into the seats of the Strati and take it for a virtual spin!
Made by Local Motors, I kind of loved the fact that this vehicle was 3D printed in Detroit, Motor City. (https://localmotors.com/3d-printed-car)
Floor to ceiling, no detail is overlooked, including this gorgeous light fixture, its inner cubes made of circuit boards.
Here's what 13-year-old CJ had to say about his first visit to the new first floor.
For about three years now, my family has frequently visited the Living Computer Museum, a Paul Allen museum dedicated to (functional) computers and video game consoles of the past and present. Since we write about LCM on the blog nearly every time we visit it, and LCM is undergoing a makeover and rebranding, our family was invited to go to a special preview of the newer version of the museum, now called the Living Computers: museum + labs.
For the new version of the LCM building, we brought multiple cameras with us. If I remember correctly, these would include the iPhone 5, two Nikon cameras, a green Japanese Sony camera, and even a vintage Polaroid 600, to suit the theme of older computers and game consoles. I was very interested as to what the visit to the new version of the museum would be like.
In a couple of prior visits to LCM (such as the Seattle Retro Gaming Expo and a showcase of computers they had in storage), on the bottom floor of the building, a large, cold warehouse section of the building was used. I remember hearing a couple times before that they wanted to do something more permanent with the warehouse space, such as a new part of the museum. Prior to putting together the new section of the building in the former warehouse space, the primary "museum" part of the building was and is on the second floor, which still houses most of the vintage computers (such as the Apple ][ or Atari 400). With the new, improved version of the warehouse space, the LCM museum is now much larger, and also has a greater focus on modern-day technology and computers.
When we walked inside the transformed warehouse, we were greeted by Aaron Alcorn, Ph.D, a curator of LCM who would be one of our tour guides during our visit to the museum. Aaron often told us about the various things we were seeing, such as a replica of the original Tennis for Two machine(!). In case you're wondering, Tennis for Two, according to Wikipedia, was one of the earliest sports video games, and one of the earliest video games ever (one of the only games that I can think of as being older would be the Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device, which predated TfT by 11 years). Apparently, Tennis for Two was designed by physicist William Higinbotham in 1958 for display at the Brookhaven National Laboratory's annual public exhibition after learning that the government research institution's Donner Model 30 analog computer could simulate trajectories with wind resistance. People unaware of Tennis for Two will often mistake it for a Pong clone, when Tennis for Two predated Pong by 17 years.
According to Aaron, the replica of the Tennis for Two machine was actually built using the help of the original machine documentation. The replica that we played at LCM was apparently built using modern-day counterparts of the original components in the Tennis for Two machine. Also, some software bugs from the original TfT were fixed in this version, which, combined with the fact that the tennis ball is now circular instead of round, makes the replica at LCM a nice, if inaccurate rendition of Tennis for Two. Finally, we were told that they actually wanted to sell kits so you could build your own version of the Tennis for Two replica at home.
Personally, my favorite part of the new museum was probably the Virtual Reality section, located in the Southeast corner of the building. In the VR section of the museum, there is a large glass case, featuring several VR headsets from a set of odd-looking goggles from 1939 to Nintendo's ill-fated Virtual Boy (yes, *that* Virtual Boy) from 1995. Inside the VR section, there is a subsection with a clear floor, where you can walk around with the expensive HTC Vive headset and controllers. With the Vive, I was able to play two primary games. The first one revolved around one of the controllers in my hands becoming a spaceship, and I had to shoot incoming enemies by pulling the trigger on my controller, and dodge by moving my hand in real life. I eventually lost, so I chose to play a different game in VR. I think the next one was called Aperture Lab, and in it, you had to play as a test subject in Aperture Science from Valve's Portal series. In Aperture Lab, You had to pull various drawers out and push them back in for god-knows-what (the default male robotic narrating voice is hard to understand). Shortly after, you have to perform a repair on a stout robot known as Atlas, and if you fail, then you presumably get your room flooded with Neurotoxin.
All in all, I enjoyed the preview visit to the new version of Living Computers: Museum + Labs, and I recommend visiting there if you're ever in SoDo.
And following are 12-year-old Annabelle's observations
The former Living Computer Museum just opened a new area, the labs,
to the press. It will be opened to the
public on Friday. The labs in an area dedicated to teaching people from any age
group about technology, from ocean cameras that track sharks to learning to
program games. The labs are so cool, that I honestly can’t put it into words.
The
first thing we went to see was the 3D printed models of the Utah Teapot and the
Stanford Rabbit, two of the first 3d models ever made on a computer. We then
went to see Baxter, a large robot that could be programmed to do simple tasks
and was built to work alongside humans. We also played with the “Dash” bots, which were
small, round, cute robots that you control with a tablet. My favorite part of
the labs was the digital art area. When you walk in, there is a large screen
with flowers that will bloom more wherever the people are standing in the room.
There was also an interactive game on a table called “The table where little
people live”, which used an Xbox Kinect to track where your hand or body is. It
was super fun to interact with everything there, and I can’t wait to see it up
and running for the public!
Below is a Seattle news station's sneak video peek at the space if you're interested.
