Charting the 33 missions of Atlantis – including maintenance of the Hubble Space Telescope and the building of the International Space Station – a new exhibit at the Kennedy Space Centre Visitor Centre features the shuttle itself.
Key to the US$100m is the ‘multimedia history’ of the craft, including immersive 3D audio spatialisation, which relies on a pair of TiMax SoundHub audio showcontrol matrix systems.
Visitors enter the 90,000-sq-ft exhibition through a full-scale vertical replica of Atlantis's external tank and two solid rocket boosters, which tower 15-stories above the three-story building. They then move through a learning area to wait for the start of a pre-show presentation, which describes the role Atlantis played in the Space Shuttle Program and how it paved the way for NASA’s next generation of manned space flight.
The pre-show theatre features a vast cinema screen, which surrounds the standing visitors with panoramic and overhead video mapping to fully envelop them in the experience. The first 16-channel TiMax SoundHub is installed here, and applies delay-matrixed Image Definitions to the static 7.1 Pro Tools mix created by sound designer Jon Baker to spatially enhance his immersive soundscape via the 18 speakers and four subwoofers distributed around the theatre. Triggered by a time-code link from the video servers, a number of special spot effects are also played directly from the TiMax hard-drive and dynamically delay-panned across the space for added impact.
From the pre-show, visitors encounter the Atlantis orbiter itself. The shuttle is housed in the main exhibition space and is supported by numerous artefacts as well as interactive and simulation exhibits and two further theatres.
The Hubble Space Telescope is also a huge draw and a life-sized model is on view with its own movie wall giving a close-up account of the telescope including some of its stunning images which are displayed via two high-definition projectors. The attraction was designed by PGAV Destinations, installed by Electrosonic, and uses a second TiMax SoundHub to provide enhanced audio spatialisation across the eight speakers distributed around the screen.
