Zubr Curio and the SS Great Britain Trust are proud to present your ticket to the 1843 launch!
We’re delighted to announce that this summer, SS Great Britain visitors will be able to experience the ship’s launch like never before!
This is a collaborative partnership between Zubr Curio and the SS Great Britain Trust which seeks to explore the possibilities of fusing technology, engineering and art. We’re combining cutting-edge augmented and virtual reality techniques to present the 1843 launch via our innovative virtual binoculars.
Share in the excitement by simply stepping up and peering through the binoculars. Give them a wiggle to explore the 19th century dockyard packed full of expectant watchers, reimagined via Joseph Walter’s painting and augmented with a sprinkling of AI and some 3D magic!
Social Media Filter
Put yourself in the picture!
Ever wondered what you’d wear to the 1843 launch of the SS Great Britain? Try our AR social media filter to find out!
180 Degrees of History
See the past and present collide
This exciting collaboration has let us test the limits of AR, animation and even AI!
When we were first challenged with creating a digital experience from a 19th century watercolour, our team were intrigued… we frequently create augmented reality experiences from artworks, but it’s not often we work with an artefact that’s both so removed from modern technology and yet so representative of historic innovation.
Brunel was such an iconic innovator and so prone to experimentation that we can’t help but think he’d be enchanted by our combination of analogue binoculars and futuristic VR technology.
We used traditional animation techniques to add movement and depth to Bristol artist Joseph Walter’s watercolour of the launch. To create a more immersive scene we added atmospheric sound effects and used AI to extend the image, giving us more of a 180 degree view.
Inspired by Victorian peepshows, the final result when viewed through the binoculars retains some of it’s 2D appearance but is overlaid with the real-world ship and calibrated so that it digitally replaces the modern day view and ‘launches’ the viewer back 180 years to the ship’s own launch in 1843.