Google Goggles Partners With J Paul Getty Museum

The Google Goggles project has partnered with the J Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles to bring the museum’s permanent painting collection to the world.

By ‘Goggles-enabling’ the pictures, users can access and view the entire collection simply by downloading the Google Goggles App on their smartphone.

The app doesn’t just enable art lovers to view the paintings, but also to access information about the work from both the Getty’s mobile-optimized webpage about the painting and from around the web.

Instead of being limited to the amount of information that fits on the wall next to a painting, Getty museum staff can now share a fuller story that all visitors can enjoy online.

From a phone users can listen to commentary from artists, curators, conservators or from the works of art themselves (eg the anthropomorphic voice of the pig in the Adoration of the Magi. Simply snap a quick shot of the artwork and have an interactive experience with what is on the wall in front of you.

Google Goggles is a free app for Android and iPhone devices that enables users to retrieve various bits of information related to something by simply taking a picture of it. The initial idea was that it will do for images what Google has done for words and text. However, this aim has been scaled back in recent months to focus on more functional and immediate services and applications of the technology.

Comment:

This initiative sees the J Paul Getty M offer an original and enhanced gallery experience – simple to use and free from the restrictions of simple information notices and exhibition programmes. It also has the advantage of being able to be taken home by visitors and reviewed at a later date – not only in the gallery itself.

This partnership also offers Google a fantastic showcase for its new technology.

Of course, users must remember not to use their flash and respect museum photography rules. Could these restrict restrictions and limitations limit the growth of this kind of in-gallery tool?

Links:

googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/j-paul-getty-museum-collection-comes.html