If you’re a bit of an armchair science buff who enjoys the odd David Attenborough doco then this newest release from the Google Arts & Culture Institute should tickle your fancy, with a new partnership with more than 50 of the world’s leading natural history institutions.
The institutions included in the launch are prestigious with the London Natural History Museum, American Museum of Natural History on board, as well as more local museums such as the South Australian Museum and GeoScience Australia on board.
The Google Arts & Culture Institute was revamped in July with a new website and app, letting more people access the combined knowledge of the world, contained in museums around the world. Todays announcement furthers that, adding 150 interactive stories from experts, 300,000 new photos and videos, and more than 30 virtual tours.
The new content includes 360° video, which can be viewed in Cardboard or VR from places like Berlin’s natural history museum. The exhibit there includes a documentary on the Brachiosaurus / Giraffatitan, a 13 metre tall dinosaur who lived from 145 to 150 million years ago.
In addition you can also view heaps more content including:
- Turn back time by 4.6 billion years with the help of the Natural History Museum by scrolling through the history of life from the origins of the solar system, through the rise and the fall of prehistoric worlds.
- See the giant sloth jaw that led Darwin to his groundbreaking theory of natural selection.
- Explore the diversity of nature from the Lion fish to the Paradise Birdwing and learn from birds about the art of flirting.
- View 3,000 species on display in one giant cabinet or find out how our own predecessors may have looked.
- With Street View, walk around dinosaurs in New York, explore 30+ natural history museums from to Australia to Russia and even go underwater with turtles in Brazil.
- Join YouTube’s Vsauce2 to discover the story of Martha, the last passenger pigeon.
Google has also updated their educational resources for the launch, adding more than 20 Expeditions for teachers to use in their classrooms.
You can view all the new content on the Cultural Institute website at g.co/naturalhistory or by downloading the Cultural Institute app from Google Play (or the app store).
