As part of a recent exhibit, a GeoDome Portal provided a social, collaborative way for visitors to explore immersive stories about the ways Jewish people have contributed to the space program. Audiences were surrounded by awe-inspiring space imagery, and could choose their own adventures with an interactive user interface. This was the first touchscreen-driven installation in the US of OpenSpace, the open-source, NASA-funded software for astrovisualization, which powers planetarium experiences in leading institutions around the globe.
We designed and created this exhibit using WorldViewer, which let us layer videos about Jewish astronauts over OpenSpace’s visualizations of mission data. So when guests learned about the accomplishments of Jessica Meir on the Artemis mission, they also explored the surface of the moon, and they interacted with the MIR SpaceStation to see where David Wolf cast the first vote from space. OpenSpace works in GeoDomes and GeoDome Globes using WorldViewer’s Open Playground extension, which enables third-party application launching through a straightforward user interface. We’re development partners in the OpenSpace Project – learn more in this video.
The exhibit, JEWS IN SPACE: MEMBERS OF THE TRIBE IN ORBIT, ran from October 2022 through February 2023. Links to local press coverage:
- TMJ4 Milwaukee (thanks for the photo accompanying this post!)
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
- Shepherd Express
OpenSpace is funded in part by NASA under award No NNX16AB93A. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.