Now Available: Smithsonian American Art Museum Releases “Renwick Gallery WONDER 360” Virtual Reality App

From the Smithsonian:

The Smithsonian American Art Museum has launched an immersive 360-degree virtual reality (VR) app for Apple and Android mobile devices, “Renwick Gallery WONDER 360.” It allows audiences to explore in 3-D the entirety of the museum’s 2015 blockbuster exhibition, “WONDER,” presented at its Renwick Gallery.
[Our emphasis] It is the first VR mobile app that the Smithsonian has published.
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“Renwick Gallery WONDER 360” offers users a virtual walk-through of the museum with 360-degree, 3-D panoramic views of all nine artists’ installations and videos of the artists discussing their works.
“‘Renwick Gallery WONDER 360’ is our first major experiment with VR, and we’re excited to keep exploring the potential of this emerging technology,” said Sara Snyder, chief of the museum’s media and technology office. “The app captures the ‘WONDER’ exhibition as a moment in time and lets you carry the beauty of that experience around in your pocket, anywhere in the world. It represents a whole new way of sharing art with the public.”
The app content was created by the museum’s media and technology office; the technical development came from software tools developed by San Francisco-based InstaVR Inc. It is available for free download via iTunes for iOS devices and Google Play for Android. Although a VR headset or viewer is not required to use the app, the 3-D feature can only be experienced when using such a viewer, such as Google Cardboard.

Additional Info and Links: Direct to Renwick Gallery WONDER 360 Information Page

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