How this exhibit has developed and evolved from the original concept.

This exhibit started with a model of the LFC and has grown from there, as my research has taken me down many paths and through many fascinating facts and data. The LFC is a lovely object to have in an exhibit as it so clearly displays its’ process without the need for explanation. It was important to me that the data used in the exhibit (on the water barrels) includes one example that people can easily relate to, especially if – like me – they have never been to Chile or Peru. This gave rise to the fascinating data on the fog collection studies at Monterey. I have garnered many facts both fascinating and relevant during research for this project, and chose to include on these barrels facts easy to assimilate and salient to the basic need for human survival. Issues of child survival are highly emotive and therefore easy to connect with, and so I chose to use the data available on these countries in the UNICEF Progress for Children Report 2006.  The flags were not my first choice; I originally wanted map shots of the countries involved. I could not find shots of Peru and Chile which I liked so I opted for the flag/country as these added an extra dimension, some indication of the personality of the country in the colors and design of the flag for example. My original sketch, which you can view on the Assets page, shows that I wanted to use data from the Fogquest sites of Yemen and Eritrea, and from San Jose. Data availability means that this has changed to Chile Peru and Monterey, without any loss of quality or message.

I love the fundamental simplicity of Fogquest’s idea; that there is moisture in the air that can be harnessed as water. The research, trails, construction and implementations are far from simple of course, but depending on where we live fog/dew/clouds are something that we see on a daily basis and the basic science of this process can be understood at a young age. All of this means that the exhibit and Fogquest’s concept can be easily understood by an audience wide in both knowledge and age.

The water bottle person started its’ life as me mulling over an idea while in SL and playing at making a water bottle while I mulled. After conversations with the Team and Bean about recycling and water bottle sculptures and walls, I decided it deserved to stay, as did the message it carries. The water bottle person, including the two bottles already in its’ recycling bag is made from a total 38 water bottles – and let’s assume they are all one liter bottles. I have since found out that in terms of one liter water bottles, the equivalent of 5 billion of our water bottle friend are discarded each year without being recycled!

My original idea included playing a video from the Fogquest site through the LFC, but once the fog and water were all in and looking so fantastic I didn’t want to spoil it. It was then that another LFC was moved to the rear of the exhibit for the video stream, where it adds another dimension to this interactive display, which with the fog billowing out through this LFC screen too really brings the images to life. It is unfortunate that technical problems in RL have meant that the actual video is not available in SL, but I feel that the six careen shots which have been carefully selected from the video tell its’ story very well.

The cloud was a last minute addition to the SL exhibit, when a team discussion brought to light that we had this fun and interactive element of creating the fog in the RL exhibit but not in SL.

Please read the following sections to see how this concept has been realised in SL, can be realised in RL, and more information on this award-winning organisation.

Images and graphics are available on the Assets page.

We hope you enjoy this exhibit!

The We Can Dew! Team.