Cultural Technology Development Lab

The Cultural Technology Development Lab is an R&D program where university faculty and students, museum professionals, and other partners work together on technology and design solutions for cultural institutions.

The Museduino is an open source hardware kit developed in-house by CTDL. It is built to support robust public exhibits using the arduino IDE and the Arduino Uno footprint. It’s currently deployed around the country in museums, national parks, and installations. Information, tutorials, schematics and kit purchasing is at museduino.org.

Contact us at info.ctdl@gmail.com (project inquiries, museduino information or questions)

Past partners include: SITE Santa Fe, The Carlsbad Museum & Art Center, The Bradbury Science Museum at Los Alamos, the NM Museum of Natural History and Science, Colorado National Monument, Acadia National Park, Roswell Museum & Art Center,  Manhattan Project National Park in Los Alamos, Las Cruces Museum of Nature and Science, and the New Mexico History Museum.

The CTDL has been artist- in-residence at Grinnell College, Kenyon College, and College of the Atlantic.

CTDL Projects

Stockpile Stewardship

Video player application for Surface Pro 8 tablets. Stockpile Stewardship exhibit, National Atomic Testing Museum  

ButtARfly

ButtARfly is a prototype web app that is part of the Cooper Hewitt Interaction Lab’s Activating Smithsonian open access initiative. NMHU faculty  Jonathan Lee project lead, Rianne Trujillo, web developer, Miriam Langer, content developer and Lauren Addario, audio advisor and content developer worked together to develop this project.

The Doomed Balloon Flight of S.A. Andree

Albuquerque International Balloon Museum The balloon flight of S.A. Andree Interactive Touch Tables

Oldfarm Mobile App

Oldfarm Mobile App Acadia National Park

Trackways Projection

Las Cruces Museum of Nature and Science, Trackways Exhibit Step on a track to highlight extinct reptiles found at the Prehistoric Trackways National Monument.

Trackways Animation

Las Cruces Museum of Nature and Science Trackways Exhibit Animation

Segesser Hides

NM History Museum, Segesser Hides Interactive http://hides.nmhistorymuseum.org/ The Segesser Hides are paintings on tanned bison hides that depict early Spanish colonial life in the New Mexico.  The interactive allows users to zoom in to get a detailed look of the hides and learn more about the unique sections of the paintings. This project was built …

Shifting Boundaries

NM History Museum Shifting Boundaries Interactive This project was built with HTML5, CSS, Javascript and open source Javascript libraries. It uses assets from the original Adobe Flash version of the Shifting Boundaries interactive. Adobe Flash is outdated, proprietary and not supported on modern browsers and devices. By converting from Flash to web programming languages, the …

Weather Lab

Albuquerque Balloon Museum Weather Lab interactive design design by graduate student Eli Menchaca

Explore Aston

NM Roswell Museum & Art Center Explore Aston A beacon based mobile app for exploring the Aston Collection

Little Carlsbad

Carlsbad Museum Little Carlsbad Exhibit built with Museduino Carlsbad Museum and Art Center

Acadia Interactive Rail

Acadia National Park Interactive Rail In this exhibit, visitors compare and contrast sounds of Marsh life and Open Ocean ecosystems. We used Museduino, our own open-source system for building exhibits. The rail is embedded with buttons to trigger over head speakers and LED lights to illuminate the left and right side of the exhibit panel.

Acadia Bird Matching Game

Acadia National Park Bird Matching Game In this exhibit, visitors are invited to match a shorebird’s egg to its image. The egg is embedded with an RFID tag, which when read correctly, triggers the sound of the bird’s call. The wrong egg triggers a “incorrect” sound clip. Each set is stand-alone, so highly motivated visitors …

Museduino

Museduino Kit Museduino is CTDL’s open-source system for exhibits and installations. Museduino boards are printed in Oregon, assembled on-site in Albuquerque, New Mexico. museduino.org

Kinect Baumann Marionettes

NM Museum of Art Kinect Baumann Marionettes documentation site: http://www.riannetrujillo.com/marionettes/