Experience the Night Watch
Interactive documentary in which we brought the most famous painting in the Netherlands to life with our ultra-res storytelling tool Micrio.
Holland's most famous painting can now be experienced in a completely new way! For the 2019 Year of Rembrandt we developed the interactive documentary Experience the Night Watch, commissioned by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and Dutch public-service broadcaster NTR. With video tours that zoom in to the smallest detail, rich background information, highlight images, newly composed music, voice-overs, plus much more. And all built with our own ultra-revolution storytelling platform Micrio. Never before have visitors been able to explore Rembrandt's Night Watch at such close quarters!
Step across the red cord, take captain Frans Banninck Cocq’s hand, zoom in and let yourself be carried away into the world of the Night Watch. Dozens of stories will shed light on what makes the Night Watch such a unique painting.
In the Dutch version of the audio tour, actor Nasrdin Dchar guides you through the painting. TV host Ikenna Azuike is the narrator for the English version. And specially for the children a Klokhuis Tour is offered in Dutch, told by Klokhuis TV host Sosha Duysker.
As a basis for the Night Watch Experience, we used Micrio, our 'home-made' technology to easily and smoothly view huge images online. As with the Jheronimus Bosch and Escher interactives, we used an extremely hi-res photo of a work of art on which you can zoom into the crackle of the paint. Micrio cuts that huge image into small pieces, so you don't have to wait till the whole picture is loaded. If you move sideways, the required parts are quickly loaded, partly by predictive logic. In short, smart technology at the service of the experience of the end user!
Especially for Experience the Night Watch, we have equipped Micrio with new features, such as highlighting separate figures on the painting to make the stories stand out even better. The language switch is now instant, so you can immediately switch between Dutch and English.
In 2019 the website won two silver Lovie Awards, Europe's most prestigious internet prize.
