Liquid Galaxy at the World Oceans Summit
By Gerard Drazba
February 24, 2012
Jenifer Austin Foulkes, Product Manager for Google Ocean contacted End Point for the purpose of using Liquid Galaxy as a presentation platform at ocean-centric conferences around the world. The World Oceans Summit was held at the Capella Singapore Resort, February 22nd through February 24th, 2012 and Liquid Galaxy was there: World Oceans Summit
Josh Tolley of End Point specially developed a Google Earth tour for the Liquid Galaxy featuring Hope Spots:
“Hope Spots are special places that are critical to the health of the ocean, Earth’s blue heart.”
—from the Sylvia Earle Alliance website
The Underwater Earth Seaview Project was unveiled for the first time in Singapore. Liquid Galaxy showcased some of the amazing panoramas created by the project. The panoramas are beautiful in the immersive format that a Liquid Galaxy provides.
“We’re on a mission to reveal our oceans. Why? Because the biggest threat to life in our oceans is the fact that it is out of sight and out of mind.”
—from the Underwater Earth website
Gap Kim from Google Singapore worked hard to get approvals to bring a portable Liquid Galaxy to the World Ocean Summit and also to have it subsequently installed at the Google Singapore office.
The green light for proceeding came just 13 days before the beginning of the Summit. Work on Ocean tours and conversion of the panoramas had been underway for some time but a Liquid Galaxy needed to be built and ready for shipment in 5 days, so a full court press was needed! Adam Vollrath and Ben Goldstein spent many hours compressed into a few days assembling and testing the system and packing it for shipment. Josh Tolley continued work on the panoramas and tour. Kiel Christofferson had been out in the field upgrading several Liquid Galaxy systems and he provided some crucial last-minute upgrades for this Singapore Liquid Galaxy while flying back to New York from California. (Hooray for WiFi on airplanes!) For my part it was all about providing shipping/receiving, import specifications and coordination for delivery of the Liquid Galaxy in this very short time frame. I knew it would come together. With this crew it always does.
Cut to February 23, Singapore. Adam was there but the monitors (another story) and the Liquid Galaxy would not be there together until late. Adam adapted and worked overnight before a full day of presentation at the Summit. Jenifer provided this video on the closing day of the Summit:
My favorite part of this video is at the very end when we hear Jenifer say “Yaaay!” You always like to hear the client say that. After reaching across the globe to help her save the oceans it feels particularly good.
Comments