A music and popular culture museum in Seattle is banking on fans of the Oscar-winning film “Avatar” to take in a new exhibit on how director James Cameron brought Pandora and its inhabitants to the big screen.
The exhibit at the Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame opened Saturday.
The goal is to educate and entertain, but not go so deeply into the “Avatar” world that it resembles an amusement park, museum associate curator Brooks Peck said. It will be the first of its kind to showcase artwork and props from the blockbuster film.
The exhibit at the museum — built by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen — should also appeal to people interested in the science and technology behind movie making and set design. Visitors can try a virtual camera, like the one Cameron used, to see how the motion capture filming of the actors fit in with the virtual world created on computers. The gadget was created especially for the exhibit, which took more than a year to develop, Peck said.
Another interactive allows visitors to take the place of an actor from the film using motion capture technology. Cameron “directs” the guest actor in a scene and afterward they can watch themselves and their avatar on a video screen and post a copy on YouTube.
The main part of the exhibit experiences night and day with the lighting cycling back and forth about every 20 minutes. Light tube “tendrils” hang from the ceiling and change colors as the time switches.
The 40 artifacts on display from the film include the skeletal robot weapon used as a weapon in the film and the motion-capture suit worn by one of the actors. The robot is only 13.5 feet tall in real life, but everything in the movie is larger than human scale. A giant backpack and some giant shoes illustrate how this works.
One of the coolest parts of the exhibit is located before the entrance: a large screen showing what appears to be a film of the Na’vi forest, but when visitors step closer, they’ll be able to interact with the playful “woodsprites” floating around.
The exhibit will be at EMP until late 2012.
Get tickets
EMP is at the base of the Space Needle at 325 Fifth Ave. N., Seattle. The Avatar exhibit is included in admission to the museum. Tickets are $12 to $18 and may be purchased online at www.empmuseum.org/index.asp or at the box office.
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