A presentation of various studies carried out on immersive experiences recently hosted at Hangar Y, the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle and the Musée national de la Marine was made during the event. Museum Connections January 14, 2025. Given the lack of studies and analytical returns on the subject of cultural digital immersion, this presentation revealed some valuable trends on: the diversity of digital devices implemented, the importance of venues and spaces hosting these experiences, the complementarity of the different methodologies implemented as part of these studies with regard to these immersive initiatives, and, finally, sharing the results of these studies to better grasp the typologies of audiences who have used these experiences and their practices. The diversity of locations and results will enable us to identify a number of trends in visitor behavior when faced with an immersive experience.
How do the French perceive the integration of immersive tools in museums and heritage sites? Report on the GECE 2024 barometer
GECE conducted a survey of 1,002 French people over the age of 18, from March 4 to 13, 2024, to gather their opinions and figures on digital and immersive projects. First and foremost, the results show that the digital offer satisfies two-thirds of visitors, with expectations more pronounced among young people (36%). However, as Olivier Allouard, Director of GECE, points out: “Digital technology has taken the lead, but there are still obstacles to moving towards an all-digital world”. Indeed, 53% admit that digital technology and immersion are interesting, especially if they are integrated as a complement to the visit, as these projects should not replace the physical works. On the other hand, 37% are not at all interested in this type of offer, preferring to come for the physical works or objects present in a museum or visitor venue.
A further 9% of French people have already had an immersive digital experience. However, among those who have, we can see that this type of public is already close to an existing museum public: people from the Paris region (15%), from a CSP+ category (16%), who are passionate about these visits, having made at least 8 visits in the last 12 months (22%).
What’s more, half of those questioned would be willing to pay for this type of experience, 11% of whom would be totally interested, including 23% of young people and 21% of enthusiasts. Conversely, among visitors who would not be willing to pay to see these immersive and digital experiences, 67% of those questioned are so-called “detached” audiences, i.e. those who have not made a cultural visit in the last three years.
Finally, even if the French see in these projects a sense of wonder at the experience (21% totally agree, 54% tend to agree), the feeling of isolation remains shared by the majority of them (28% totally agree, 38% tend to agree).
This study provides a clearer picture of how the French perceive these new digital and immersive projects. The results are still mixed as regards the full introduction of this type of tool and the desire to pay to participate. On the other hand, as a complement to a visit, immersion seems to strike the right balance, attracting a majority of visitors who are already passionate about museums, as well as young people. Nevertheless, isolation remains a major constraint, and this may pose some limits to this type of experiment, especially as we will see from the feedback from Hangar Y, the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle and the Musée National de la Marine that the majority of visitors are families, or come to visit a museum or venue as a group. The full study can be found on the GECE website.
Between December 2023 and December 2024, GECE also carried out an audience study in collaboration with Hangar Y to gain a deeper understanding of the socio-demographic and cultural profiles of its audiences, analyze visitors’ opinions and thus evaluate the activities set up by the venue, including their immersive experience L’épopée du Hangar Y.
The Hangar Y epic
Reopened in 2023, the Hangar Y estate and space, located in Meudon, was closed for over forty years, not including the last two years of renovation. Unveiling new spaces such as the park, the hangar, a workshop, catering areas and a playground, Hangar Y has become a real place of conviviality, where experience is at the heart of the visit. The installation of an immersive digital experience The Hangar Y epic fits perfectly with the vision of this site, listed as a historic monument since 2000. This experience is very different from the Musée National de la Marine and the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle: Hangar Y has no permanent collections. The integration of an immersive technological experience, based on a program of events and exhibitions, highlights a history that has no permanent tour.
Based on the question “What contribution do digital and immersive projects make to the museum experience and visitor numbers?”, Hangar Y teamed up with GECE to carry out a study of its audiences and experience. The Hangar Y epic. Using the principle of mixed reality, mixing past and present, The Hangar Y epic, created by Realcast, retraces the history of this heritage site and its hour of glory: with the beginnings of aeronautics in the 19th century, the experience takes visitors back in time to the design and launch of the world’s first closed-circuit flight.. In this 30-minute experience, the public is invited to interact with objects or answer quizzes to continue the story. Also, under the headset principle, this mixed reality device makes use of the real to feed the past: a way of isolating visitors less, who can take account of their space and still see what’s going on around them during their experience.
This immersive experience was the first to be installed at Hangar Y. With a view to improving public perception, a global study of the visit and an evaluation of the system were carried out jointly with GECE to gather participants’ opinions. Questionnaires were self-administered face-to-face by Hangar Y staff or sent by email to visitors who had purchased their admission ticket on the Hangar Y site, and QR codes were installed at strategic points around the site for the public to scan as they visited. This study was carried out on a sample of 1,670 visitors between December 2023 and December 2024.
For all Hangar Y’s visitor areas, trends in visitor numbers and behavior emerge: firstly, 59% of visitors are first-time visitors, which may be explained by its very recent opening. The average age is 51 , and visitors are mainly families (48%), 40% of whom come with one or more children under 18, or couples (29%). These results seem to show that Hangar Y’s visitors are very individual, but mainly come in groups, which can also be explained by the site’s desire to be a convivial space with a variety of activities: walks, immersive experiences, Iris Galerie… In terms of socio-professional category, the two largest groups are CSP + (56%), followed by retired people (23%).
GECE also provided a specific study for the Hangar Y Epic experience. With 24,000 participants in this experience, this audience represents 13% of visitors since March 2023. With an admission ticket costing 12 euros, no fewer than 100 people come to take part in the experience every day. What’s more, 44% of the public are from outside Haut de Seine, whereas in the overall study, the public was more local, with 37% of visitors from outside Haut de Seine. The experience attracts audiences from further afield, who will consequently engage in more activities once on site (2.9 vs. 2.6 activities for overall audiences at Hangar Y). With an overall experience rating of 8.7/10 and an average recommendation rating of 8.4/10, L’épopée du Hangar Y is perceived as relevant because it is integrated into a place and its history, encouraging the use of other projects and boosting the average length of stay of visitors, thus allowing the immersive experience to ripple through to visitors at the site itself. The results demonstrate the importance of highlighting a heritage with L’épopée du Hangar Y, offering a more memorable experience and encouraging word-of-mouth thanks to a satisfactory recommendation score.
On the other hand, other cultural sites are already attracting large numbers of visitors, such as the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, which offered an immersive Expedition Disappeared Worlds, attracting a majority of visitors who had already visited the site.
Vanished worlds at the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle
This expedition comes to life in the Jardin des Plantes geology and mineralogy gallery. As a means of welcoming visitors to the Gallery, this expedition finds its place in one of the unused spaces, not housing any of the Gallery’s collections. By devoting a specific exhibition space to it, Disappearing Worlds does not get in the way of other programming schedules, and gives it the means to remain on display for longer periods.
With its immersive expedition Vanished WorldsThe Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle has decided tofully immerse visitors in vanished worlds using HTC Focus 3 virtual reality headsets, with the choice of a free wandering experience. Co-produced with the Excurio agency, this 45-minute expedition retraces the earth’s history over 3.5 billion years, from the rise of animal life and the great forests of the Carboniferous to the great dinosaurs of the Cretaceous and the arrival of human life on earth. An expedition rich in discoveries, with the reconstitution of around 100 plant species and over 120 animal species. In addition to an impressive visual reality, Missing Worlds takes on a sound universe where fiction and reality merge to plunge into wild and dense environments. With the involvement of 35 scientists from the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle and a specialized team of 40 people at Excurio, the project took 18 months to produce. A project capable ofwelcoming 100 visitors per hour.
Following this expedition , deployed from October 14, 2023 to June 16, 2024, the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle carried out a reception study of the experience and an evaluation of audience typologies. Two sources of information were used throughout the duration of the experience: the GuestViews guest book at the end of the visit, andan email questionnaire sent to online ticketing customerson D+1. The Museum collected 4328 opinions on the guest book and 2885 responses (15%) out of the 19,362 sent for the questionnaire.
Mondes disparus attracted 80,000 visitors, representing 4% of the annual 2.5 million visitors to the Jardin des Plantes. The first interesting result directly concerns the data collection tools. On the guest books, 54% of respondents were under 15 years of age: this seems to be an invaluable tool for collecting opinions from audiences that are more difficult to reach because of their age. According to this study, the audience most frequently mentioned and the one that accounts for the majority of the Museum’s visitors remains the family, with a very high proportion of children: 58% of visitor groups included children. The Disappearing Worlds expedition was a discovery of the virtual reality system for 63% of participants. The Museum has a responsibility to ensure that the experience goes smoothly, so as to build their loyalty later on. After all, the audience for this expedition was already familiar with the Museum, particularly in terms of profile (age, geographical origin, level of education and CSP) and familiarity with the site(87% had already been to the Jardin des Plantes).
Of all the offers evaluated in recent years, Disappearing Worlds is the most popular with Museum visitors, resulting in a satisfaction score of 9/10, 0.4/0.5 points higher than for their more traditional exhibitions. With a recommendation rate of 75%, word-of-mouth is the most effective means of communication (24%). With this expedition, the Museum has introduced more than half of its public to a new immersive observation and visit tool, which is proving to be appreciated and recommended by the public. Nevertheless, it’s important to point out that, for the public, this experience is more akin to a leisure offer than a cultural one, which can divert the visitor’s attention despite the rigorous scientific content. Despite this, 7 out of 10 visitors feel that the immersive offer enriches the way they approach these subjects, in line with the GECE trend that immersion should be a complement to the visit and the works.
An immersive sound trail with La Boussoleau Musée national de la Marine
The Musée national de la Marine closed in 2017 for renovation. When it reopened on November 17, 2023, there was a desire to give its audiences additional content and thus free their gazes from their smartphones. A new sound system is to be integrated into a permanent itinerary and thus remain a long-term feature of the museum’s offerings. To test the effectiveness of their young visitors’ program, the Musée National de la Marine teamed up with doctoral student Mélissa Matthieu to carry out a study on audience development.
The Musée National de la Marine, wishing to attract more specific audiences in comparison with the above experiences, is developing a new audio tour created by Unendliche Studio with the La Boussole application, in which visitors aged 7 and over are invited to follow a video-guided tour. A free application, accessible from a smartphone and requiring no download, this approach takes shape in the Musée National de la Marine’s idea ofaccompanying children in their observation and understanding of the work, but also enabling them to experience an immersion in sound. In this rendition, the Musée National de la Marine is focusing on the young visitors’ trail developed by Unendliche Studio, where young visitors follow and listen to a mermaid to reveal the secrets behind several works.
The aim of this study was to find out whether for a children’s trail, with musical composition and sound design, how does it enhance visitor reception and attention? Mélissa Matthieu then drew up a protocol combining several methods: an interview and a questionnaire on immersion, to correlate qualitative and quantitative data for a holistic view of the visit experience as it is lived, and the cognitive and emotional contributions of the sound visit that they imply. The children were equipped with headphones and oculometric glassesThese devices, which record the visual field, allow us to observe the visiting experience through the eyes of the child. 44 children aged between 7 and 12 were observed at the Musée National de la Marine. First, during a 1h45-minute protocol, the children visited the museum on their own , and were then interviewed by a CNRS researcher. Then, two weeks later, they were interviewed by videoconference (30 minutes) to observe what the children had retained from the visit. The only limitation of the methodology is that recruitment was carried out using museum tools, which are not necessarily representative of French society.
Between November 17, 2023 and November 17, 2024, Musée national de la Marine welcomed over 400,000 visitors. A success after six years of closure, but above all one that has won over a very large family audience , with almost a third of visitors under 18 and their accompanying adults.[1].
Mélissa Matthieu’s experiment focused on two characteristics: the overall experience linked to the physical journey, and the experience linked to the child’s appropriation of the content. Firstly, children are more enthusiastic about the experience when there is fictional content, like the mermaid for example, but they drop out as soon as they are left to their own devices, despite the fact that they have no difficulty in appropriating the tool (headset and tablet). When it comes to fictional content, the children interviewed are able to verbalize their emotional feelings to a greater extent, by describing the atmosphere a great deal. On the other hand, even if they enjoy recognizing certain sounds in the description section, the sound dimension remains absent in the rendering, compared with the informative content. These results were also highly relevant in understanding the limitations associated with age and visit path. The museum noticed that the recommended age was perhaps too low, and that the works were sometimes hung too high for children. These recommendations made it possible to reframe certain decisions and ensure that the works were able to properly attract the eye, and to revise the communication strategy by adapting the discourse to an older audience, to also reinforce the emotions that were most felt during this experience, the anecdotes, the tones of voice…
In conclusion, these three studies, based on different devices and venues, provide a better understanding of the types of audience present at these venues, their behavior in relation to these digital and immersive tools, and their opinions on the relevance of the experience, their satisfaction and their reasons for coming. However, these studies are still few and far between, and a deeper understanding of these types of audience and their potential loyalty could be confirmed with other studies, but also with new immersive experiences.
[1] https://www.musee-marine.fr/fileadmin/user_upload/Reseau/professionnel/presse/2024/2024-11_MNM_PARIS_CP_1_an_reouverture.pdf
