The 'Museum Guides' app is both a discision-making and navigational tool. It aims to connect people to the museum which fits their interests and current mood best. Augmented characters would roam the city ready to be noticed by anybody using this app. Potential visitors can identity a character of interest and simply start following them. On the way other characters might cross paths to provide alternatives for this cultural wanderer. The closer the potential visitor gets to a museum the more subject-specific characters are around. Thus the closer a potential visitor gets to a museum, the clearer a subject is communicated.
The specific example above was for a toy museum. However the potential visitor did encounter some other subjects on his way. Namely for an African Art Exhibition (African art lady), a Zoological Museum (Elephant) and a History Museum (Historic Airplane). He could have diverted his route to any of these other museums, but decided to keep following Legoman. Closer to the museum it became more apparent he was following his character to a toy museum as many toy-related characters started appearing. However since a museum might have several exhibitions at any given time, very different augmented characters might make their way into the same museum. This app provides museums with a gimmicky manner to advertise their exhibitions and subject in public space. Furthermore it directs potential visitors to the museums which fits their interests best.
A museum will have several characters walking, swiming or flying around the city. Museums might choose to place their characters in genre specific locations, like a toy museum might have more characters walking around in playgrounds, while a Zoological Museum might have characters walking around in a zoo and so on. Because characters of different museums cross eachother on route to their museum the user is playfully informed about all available options.
This concept alone already has a lot of potential in terms of choice for characters, locations to appear and creative interaction with public space (like a toy train on the tram-tracks or a hippo in the canals). However so much more is possible. A more 'serious' museum might opt to place virtual exhibitions in historically significant locations around the city. This would draw in those potential visitors who are charmed by this approach and also provides a meaningful extention into public space.
Finally below shows two examples for museums with a somewhat 'drier' subject matter like chess or telecom.
