"An amazing union of online and offline worlds. Pure genius!" —juror Todd Purgason

"Combines virtual and physical interaction in a really engaging way. It's both informative and fun and transforms learning into something that kids will want to spend time doing." —juror Susan Easton

Overview: This intriguing museum exhibit allows visitors to view radio frequency-tagged plants, insects and animals embedded in clear protective pucks. Once a puck is placed on a display table, rear-projected images appear on the tabletop and users can view the specimens by responding to a variety of prompts.

• 42-month development time
• 14 specimens in total
• 4 separate activities per specimen

Comments by Graham Plumb:
"Producing this exhibit was like assembling a complex jigsaw puzzle, the pieces of which needed to be laid down in a carefully sequenced order for them to finally come together at the museum almost three years later. Complicating the already challenging aspects of combining physical objects with digital media was a production schedule dependant on the seasonal rhythms of Hawaiian nature. Plants needed to bloom and insects born into the wild if they were to become part of the story told by the software.

"With the design team, software developers and electronic engineers in San Francisco, a fabricator in New Jersey and a client in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, the project crossed 3 time zones and 9,000 miles of land and sea. Spiders collected in the mountains of Hawaii traveled halfway across the world and back again, stopping off along their journey to be preserved, photographed and embedded in clear resin disks tagged with Radio Frequency Identification chips. Once in the hands of the museum visitor, each spider became both the subject and interface to its own story—exhibit and tool in a single parcel."