Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Natural History Museum, London
Purpose
- Shaping places
- Creating journeys
What we did
- Brand strategy
- Visual identity
- Experience
- Wayfinding
- Digital
- Campaign
The Wildlife Photographer of the Year is the Natural History Museum's most popular exhibition. It attracts a loyal following of photographic and wildlife enthusiasts from around the world, all of whom are eager to discover the year's winners and get into every detail of the photographs. So, how do you take something great and make it even greater? Our mission was to uphold the extremely high values of the exhibition while offering new ways of interacting with the work. We set out to do this by taking 2D and bringing it to life.
A journey through time
Our inspiration for the brand was an ice core: an extracted cylinder of ice that charts the historical natural environment of its surroundings. We created a moving image that referenced the competition’s global relevance whilst creating an enticing visualisation of the depth and wealth of the winners’ archive. This principle was complemented by a 3D approach that weaves through the space, creating a rich environment for fluid navigation, graphic interpretation and interactive digital experiences.
Innovation for interpretation
The sheer popularity of the exhibition gave us insight for innovation. At busy times visitor numbers make it impossible to read the image captions, which bring so much life to the photography. We developed a parallel digital experience available on a smart phone without the need for an App. Connecting to the museum's WIFI took visitors to a mobile ready website, with a unique keycode interface that lets users dial in the image they want to view. For every image, we provided the background story, location, technical settings and multiple language functionality. This system is now being rolled out across other parts of the museum.
