Bethel Woods, NY, home to the original Woodstock festival, is now the location for the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts. In June 2008, a new museum dedicated to this historic festival and its significance in the transformative 60s was opened, containing a number of interactives created by Second Story. One of my last projects while working full time was creating an animated, birds-eye view of the 3-day event.

Early in the concepting phase, we knew the client wanted some sort of interactive map of the festival grounds. But how would this look, especially for an event that takes place over the course of 3 days? After watching parts of the Woodstock documentary, I thought that a time-lapse would offer the best visual and informative approach for the viewer, highlighting the fluctuations and evolution in traffic, crowds, and weather.

After weeks of studying photos, videos, interviews, and current satellite imagery of the grounds, we designed a map of the area containing all the specific hot-spots the client wanted to cover, as well as certain elements of the 1969 landscape that no longer exist today, a view from an estimated 10,000ft.

A frame from the start of the animation.

It was then a matter of animating the time-lapse. Matt Arnold helped with the 3D elements, creating structures, crowds, and weather systems, as well as replicating the shadows cast during sunrise and sunset. I composited these elements with other atmospheric effects and added subtle psychedelic pulses throughout the landscape timed to specific events during the festival. All three days (and nights) pass by in just under four minutes.

Viewers interacting with the map table.

The viewer interacts with the map via small touchscreens surrounding the circular table. These screens act as a remote for a colored cursor overlayed on the looping animation, accessing the hot spots and their respective content.

CLICK TO WATCH ANIMATION EXCERPT:

Credits to come…