Tallinn Trip – Virtual Reality Tour 1944
I’ve decided to post entirely out of order of how events actually unfolded during Tallinn, but as no-one will know other than the people there, I feel that it’s unlikely to concern my two loyal blog readers. I thought that doing an AI tour would be a marvellous idea, as the cost was included in the Tallinn Card that we had all purchased. I looked vaguely brave here, although I probably wouldn’t go much further than that.
It’s fair to say that none of us were really quite aware what the tour would entail and I know a few of us thought that it would take place in a closed environment. However, we were walked to the main square and positioned in one place to be given a brief introduction. Three of our party were doing the 1944 tour, the other two as well as someone we didn’t know, were doing the 1939 tour. I privately hoped that no-one would notice us, but I suspect that we were hard to avoid noticing.
Bev and Susanna were having a lovely time. There were four AI parts to each tour and we moved position each time to a new location. Sometimes this made more sense than others, but they had to tie two different tours together.
I was impressed that Steve had managed to video them both, simultaneously watching the fourth part of the 1944 tour and videoing them. The tour Bev and Susanna went on involved more interaction and looking odd, so I was glad that I picked the tour that I did.
As it was included in the Tallinn Card, I’d say that this was an interesting experience as I’ve never done anything with AI before. It was an intriguing use of the technology, although there was perhaps a limited need to actually be outside in the actual location at times. On the AI itself, it was all rather exciting as I hadn’t done it before and it is an all encompassing visual and audio experience, there’s no way of knowing what is happening around without taking the headset off.
I thought that one of the four sequences we saw was less exciting than others, but the first one which showed the Nazi guards walking about before the 1944 bombing was particularly sobering as to a great degree, it did feel like being there. There have been attempts made to ensure accuracy and seeing the bombed street at the end was also something that I’ll remember. It’s possible to get one of the tours free with the Tallinn card, and you can pick which one, then pay to try the other one. I can imagine just how much this will all be developed in future years and suspect that it will become more common in museums and tourist attractions to try and engage visitors.
