Category Archives: Touch Table

First Annual Boston College Libraries’ Maker Contest

Who: Boston College undergraduate or graduate students

What: This contest challenges students to “bring history to life” by using digital tools to create multi-modal content that can be accessed online and featured on the Boston College Libraries’ Digital Studio multitouch table. The table is a large interactive display that enables multiple people to explore and interact with contact. Although the contest does not require development specifically for the table, students may create projects that may use the table in unique ways. This contest encourages students to consider the ways in which we might experience history through different mediums or formats, such as games, digital exhibits, visualizations, or media. We encourage cross-disciplinary collaboration and team submissions.

Students are encouraged to create a project using any of these type of tools, methods, or applications, but are not limited to this list:

  • Physical computing (Computer-human interaction)
  • Digital exhibits
  • Gaming/VR
  • 3D images/models
  • Application development
  • Visualizations (e.g. mapping)
  • Digital art & media (music)

Proposal narrative: Submit a short abstract (max. 500 words) about your project that describes the goals and scope of the project, tools, methodology, statement of significance, project team, and any other relevant information. Proposals will be accepted on a rolling basis.

When: Completed projects must be submitted by May 15, 2019.

Prizes: A total of up to $500 in prizes will be awarded! Each winner will be featured on the Boston College Libraries’ website, social media, multitouch table, and digital displays. Contest winners’ work will also be archived.

Note: Submissions must be your original work (though they may include component materials by others for which you have permission or that you are excerpting under fair-use copyright terms).

Questions? Contact: Anna Kijas (anna.kijas at bc dot edu) or Sarah DeLorme (sarah.delorme at bc dot edu).

Bapst Library

New Exhibit: For Here All Are One

We are exciting to announce the launch of a new touch table exhibit, For Here All Are One: Boston College Buildings & Community. 

The foundation of Boston College is its Jesuit Catholic tradition. Buildings and open spaces are the places where reason and faith are nurtured; they are the locations – indoors and out – in which Boston College worships, teaches, studies, celebrates, plans, and reflects. As our community has evolved, so have its settings. This exhibit is an invitation to explore the locations where our students have become “men and women for others.”

The exhibit is now available on both touch tables, located on the 3rd floor lobby of the O’Neill Library and the lobby of the Burns Library.

Header: Clifton Church, Bapst Library exterior: Ford Tower, side view from Linden Lane, photograph, undated. Box 1, Folder 64, Boston College Building and Campus Images, BC.1987.012, John J. Burns Library, Boston College.

Eizan Kikukawa, Three Fashionable Beauties Cooling Off in the Evening. Woodblock Print, ink and color on paper, circa 1814-1817. Box 2, Folder 9, Japanese Prints Collection, MS.2013.043, John J. Burns Library, Boston College.

Newest Touch Table Exhibit: For Everything, There is a Season

The Digital Scholarship Group is pleased to announce the newest exhibit on our touch table, For Everything, There is a Season: Japanese Woodprints in the Ukiyo-e Style.

The exhibit draws from the Burns Library’s stunning collection of Japanese prints. Featuring twenty prints, the selection highlights woodblock print art from the 17th-19th century Ukiyo-e period in Japanese art. This period focused on the “floating world”— “the emerging culture of pleasure, parties, and a preoccupation with the present moment” —of cultural elites, such as sumo wrestlers, kabuki actors, and courtesans (6). The chosen images depict a transition from abundant snow, to torrential downpours, to, finally, the blooming of cherry blossoms.

Come visit the exhibit, available on the 3rd floor lobby of O’Neill Library and in the lobby of the Burns Library! A special thank you to Ayoola White, our ARL Mosaic intern, for coordinating the exhibit.

Header image: Eizan Kikukawa, Three Fashionable Beauties Cooling Off in the Evening, woodblock print, ink and color on paper, circa 1814-1817.  Box 2, Folder 9, Japanese Prints Collection, MS.2013.043, John J.Burns Library, Boston College.