If I had to choose my favorite museum in the world, I don’t think I would be able to, but all the ones I’ve been to that are in old or grand buildings stand out to me. Something about the combination of magnificent architecture backing the impressive paintings really elevates museums for me. I saw a lot of this when I was in Florence this past summer, and the ones I remember especially well are museums that are in buildings that are basically full marble. For my final project, I have been working a lot in virtual reality development recently, so I was inspired to make a art gallery to walk around. I wanted a chance to further develop my learning in Unity, which is a software for things like 3D games and apps, and as I had been making a lot of games it was nice to switch it up a little bit. Having a chance to focus less on the mechanics gave me more time to source models and materials to make the museum feel really immersive.

To make this project, I started by setting up my Unity file to have the correct project settings to launch and connect to my Oculus. I then set up my basic player controls using Unity’s built in XR Rig, which comes preloaded with controls for hand integration, head tracking, and height tracking. I linked the hands so that the left hand moves the player around the room, and the right hand moves the player turn. (The set up for this project was long and completed, so I won’t get into most of it but that is the basic jist of it). After doing this, I made a simple room out of planes, and then pushed it to my Oculus so I could test the height of the room. At this point, I was able move around the basic room.

I then started sourcing my assets on Adobe Stock, finding marble material for the walls, floors, and ceiling, as well as paintings and statues to go around the museum. I imported them into my Unity file, and placed the 3D obj files of each model where I wanted it to go and then dragged the mat (the image and textures that go on the model) onto each one.

Not included in the documentation is an audio thats playing in the background that I added after. I wanted to take inspiration from our last unit where we talked about different eras of art. I included art from the contemporary, renaissance, impressionist, expressionist, and abstract movements. I also wanted to have a wide color scheme, including analogous, monochromatic, complementary, and open. These are represented through the paintings, though I also decided to add sculptures and vases to add to the museum appearance.

I am very happy with how this project turned out, I think that all the materials and models fit well together and create an immersive experience. If I were to take this project further, I would try to add a section where the user could make their own art (I originally wanted to lean more into this for my final project, but it was not working out for me so I went in the art gallery direction instead).