Magic Mural: An Interactive Installation for Yale Peabody Museum

In an amazing class called Making Spaces, I built Magic Mural, an interactive installation for the Yale Peabody Museum. As the museum underwent a major renovation, the class worked as a design agency to envision the future of the museum.

For me, the most iconic part of the museum was the dinosaur mural in the Great Hall. It was featured in 1953’s Life magazine, and influenced the design of the Godzilla. Awing at the mural’s breathtaking design, I wondered what if the mural comes alive? What if the visitors can create and interact with the mural in real-time?

Using the Unity engine, I created a virtual world where dinosaurs roam free. Controlled by the AI algorithm, dinosaurs breed, befriend, and devour each other in a Darwenian manner. I also built a sketching app that allows visitors to paint their own dinosaurs on an iPad, and spawn the dinosaurs into the virtual world to disturb the balance of the ecosystem.