The
RVC has for some time been experimenting with ways to bring its traditional
anatomy museum to life. The facility in Camden houses a fantastic collection of
skeletons, pots, plastinated specimens and computer based animations. However,
the number of students actually visiting the museum and using these resources
is actually quite low.
Recently
the e-Media Unit has been working with academic staff to try and find new ways
of bringing these anatomical treasures to life. One of the first initiatives
was the creation of potcasts which are short video descriptions of annotated
specimens. These can be viewed on an iPod or mobile phone whilst examining the
specimen pots. Feedback from students has been really positive about these
resources with many commenting that the experience of listening to a spoken description was almost more
effective than having a face to face description.
Whilst
the potcasts have proved popular, we wanted to explore ways that these
resources could be used anywhere rather than tied to the anatomy museum. This
led to a number of innovations including publishing all the potcasts on the
WikiVet Media streaming server (http://media.wikivet.net/media/porcine-uterus-potcast). This site looks similar to YouTube but provides a secure and dedicated
veterinary video resource. Videos uploaded onto this site can then either be
viewed directly or embedded within relevant pages on WikiVet or other sites.
As
part of the recently launched Online Veterinary Anatomy Museum (www.onlineveterinaryanatomy.net) website, we were able to explore new ways of turning a museum into a virtual
space. One idea that we adopted was to create a series of QR codes which can be
read by a mobile phone or iPad and linked to web pages on WikiVet. Key pots now
have QR codes but we have also created QR categories (see the links below)
which lead to collections of videos and descriptive text. With the rapid growth
in student ownership of iPads and other mobile devices, we think these codes
could be a great way help students locate useful virtual anatomy collections
whether in the museum or in the comfort of their own homes!
Try
scanning any of the links below using a QR Code reader (free to download) on
your phone or iPad.
Thanks to Joanna Fisher and Lucy Warrell, Anatomy Demonstrators at the RVC for creating the QR Code collections.
