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West MacDonnell Ranges Visitor Centre Project

  • The West Macs website screenshot
  • The West Macs internal page
  • The West Macs - Collection of stories

Purpose

The West MacDonnell Ranges Visitor Centre project was developed to create both a physical and virtual interpretive visitor centre focussed on this iconic region between Alice Springs and Uluru in the Northern Territory’s Red Centre. The combination of a physical and virtual visitor centres served two primary purposes; to inform, attract and entice national and international visitors to the ‘West Macs’; and to provide rich, engaging interpretive material to visitors once they are in the region, both at the physical Visitor Centre site, and throughout their journey through the use of mobile devices.

Interpretive content development

Captovate has recently wound up the interpretive content development process for the West Macs Visitor Centre, which involved the interpretive design and development of literally hundreds of pieces of digital content. These brought together the social, cultural, natural and historical stories of the region through a variety of media expressions that aim to deliver the authentic sense of place of this unique physical landscape effectively within a digital environment.

This process was co-ordinated by Captovate’s lead interpretive designer, Wendy Cowan, with her long history and experience in interpretive design and development. The team worked closely with a local Cultural Advisor and Traditional Owner who advised on appropriate stories and storytelling methods and provided liaison and consultation with the local Traditional Owners, the Central Land Council and the project team.

Local content producers were engaged to create each of the pieces, which included 180 audio stories, 28 videos and 370 images around various sites and themes in the region. The content was designed and packaged to be delivered through multiple digital platforms including onsite kiosks and smart phone devices, as well as through the main Online Visitor Centre website. 

As a local Territory company, it’s been a real thrill to be involved in the West Macs project, the biggest digital media project in the NT to date, and we can’t wait to see the content revealed to the world through the virtual and physical visitor centres in the coming months.