At 01:11 PM 5/14/97 UT, you wrote:
>Hi museum-l'ers,
>
>How many of you use hand held audio tour units at your facility? If so, do
>you rent them to visitors, hand them out for free, or are they for special
>purposes such as translation? How many of these units are in use at your
>facility?
>
>How do you keep them from walking out of the building? Do you get a credit
>card# or drivers license? How well do they held up? How often do you change
>the messages? What type of content do you use them for... exhibit
>interpretation, daily schedule of events, activities, other?
>
>What do you feel are the pros and cons of these systems from your own
>experience.
>
> Mark C. Vang : Freya Ventures : (757) 340-0099
>
Having put together and used audio tours for two "blockbuster" exhibits I
can share some experiences:
1) Do you rent them to visitors, hand them out for free?
Unless you are blessed with a very high budget you have to rent them out.
We charged $2.50, or cranked the cost into the admissions ticket for
special exhibits.
2) How many of these units are in use at your facility?
We purchased 60 cassette players and recycled them as soon as they can
back in, checking the batteries on a tester and winding the tape to the
start of the program. They were equipped with sponge rubber ear sets that
wre large enough not to go into the ear and create health problems. We
replaced them fairly often.
3) How do you keep them from walking out of the building? Do you get a credit
card# or drivers license?
NEVER take a credit card as a less than ethical employee could use the
credit card
numbers. We had no problem taking a drivers license, student i.d. or SSN
card. We kept the cards in a metal file box divided alphabetically.
4) What type of content do you use them for... exhibit interpretation,
daily schedule of events, activities, other?
We used them for special exhibits and "permanent" installations.
A few other words. We looked at equipment and tours put together by
professional audio-tour companies and rejected them. First, you can get a
cassette tape player (NOT player/recorder) at Radio Shack that is perfectly
useable and about 25% as expensive as the units auto tour companies sell.
They even make a "Y" plug so two persons can use one player.
If a player breaks, toss it.It's a lot cheaper to buy one than spend the
average $60 to $80/hr. audio repair labs charge. We even got a quantity
discount rate and eventually bought discontinued models at a discount. They
didn't match, but who cares. After three months the failure rate was about
10%. And they are MUCH cheaper than renting commercial units. Pick up a
gross of AA cells and a battery tester plus headsets and rubber ear
replacements and you are in business. Volunteers with a technical bent have
fun maintainging the equipment.
Second, after looking at their $150/hr, plus talent, plus, plus, plus
charges we collaborated with local radio stations for voice talent (often
donated), wrote our own tours (turn right and stop when you see ... now turn
off the recorder until you are ready to proceed) and had the tapes
duplicated at a local duping house. For less than $700 hard money we
produced a 30 minute tour that a commercial company asked $12,000 to produce
-- and they had the nerve to demand copyright (meaning we could not have
sold copies in the museum store). Why so expensive? "Music" they said, not
expecting us to know that radio stations could donate transition music from
their stock library. "Voice talent" they said. Paying a big premium to get
Richard Burton as narrator (I know, he's dead) is not worth it. The audience
is just as tickled hearing the voice of the curator, director, or a local
weatherman with whom they are comfortable. "High quality production values
and great signal-to-noise ratios" they said. But who cares if a bat can hear
the high frequencies -- any recording facility can turn out acceptable
quality master tape and 90% of the visitors won't know the difference.
We have also heard of many order fulfilment problems. At a previous museum I
watched while a new museum that counted heavily on audio tours as the key to
its interpretation had to open WITHOUT the tour their exhibits were designed
around. The commercial company could not fulfill the order on time
(technical difficulties, you understand -- no discounts) and the new-fangled
"Star Trek" style computer chip playback units they used could not be
supplied in quantity. They wound up putting temporary labels up for the
first 5 months.
When the tour was finally delivered it was AWFUL and did not even match the
exhibit. Changes had to be made after the audio tour was already past the
point of no return in its l-o-n-g production schedule.
I am sure some will sing the praises of the $3,000 apiece Apple Newtons,
randomized computer chip playback units and the rest. But they are primarily
interested in high dollar clients like museums in the top 2% of budgets
bracket. One company bragged to me that their minimum annual cost was
$45,000 a year rental plus tour production costs. Get real. The West
Stumpchuck Historical Society can turn out a perfectly serviceable taped
tour for a minimum of money using local talent. And if something doesn't
work, the cost of editing the tape and changing it is minimal. The first
tape may be a little like Tim Allen and "Home Improvement," but I guarantee
the second will be better.
----------------------
Byron Johnson, Director
Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum
P.O. Box 2570, Waco, Texas 76702-2570
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]
------------------------------
"...Unless a people are educated and enlightened it is idle
to expect the continuance of civil liberty or the capacity
for self-government."
Texas Declaration of Independence, March 2, 1836.
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