Taiwan’s Department of Cultural Affairs (DOCA) teams up with Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA) to film a series of “4DViews Chiang Wei-shui Clips”. They adopt 4DViews technology and utilise the latest 3D video capture technology in the world. The filming process includes four green screens and uses 32 camera sets to capture the entire 360-degree of the filmed subject. Currently, only Japan and Taiwan have studios outfitted with this system.
They use this technology to recreate a standing, 3D full-body presentation of Chiang Wei-shui at the cultural facility, Wei-shui Station in Dadaocheng. Chiang Wei-shui was a doctor, social activist, and democracy pioneer who led several cultural movements against Japanese colonial rule. The project also commemorates Taiwanese Cultural Association’s (TCA) 100th-anniversary celebrations established by Chiang.
The digitalised Chiang serves as a virtual guide for the permanent exhibition, sharing life stories as well as his views on a democratic Taiwan. The audience can have an interactive and immersive experience with their gadgets in hand.
In Taiwan, 4DViews technology is mostly used in video and virtual reality games. This initiative marks the first time this advanced technology has been applied to a national cultural exhibition. This proves that technology can be utilised in all public sectors to improve their efficiency and performance.
The Wei-shui Station is one of these endeavours, established right next to the site of the former Daan Hospital, a clinic founded by Chiang himself. The building housing the station used to be the General Circulation Office of Taiwan Minpo. It served as a solid foundation of Chiang’s Taiwan New Cultural Movement. The “Hello, Wei-shui” permeant exhibition inside the Wei-shui Station introduces visitors to the life and achievements of the political pioneer.
In recent years, the city government has been working on the concept of creating wall-less museums to highlight the urban living environment. At the same time, They also aim to strengthen the cultural and human aspects to uncover the city’s less-obvious characteristics.
This programme is in line with the main policy objectives of Taiwan’s Ministry of Culture. The Ministry states that policies should employ the latest technology to more effectively spread the knowledge of Taiwan’s unique culture and customs both domestically and internationally. To cultivate culture as an instrument of national power, the Ministry aims to ensure the cultural rights of citizens, create an environment that fosters creativity, build and maintain cultural values, and bolster the cultural and creative sector’s competitiveness.
To help Taiwan achieve these objectives, the Ministry will adhere to the following three fundamental objectives when developing cultural policies; staying true to the roots of culture, building the nation’s international image, and harnessing the power of technology.
According to the Annual Policy Plan 2020, the Ministry fosters cultural development through multiple grass-roots programs, from the preservation of cultural assets, development of local knowledge to the promotion of cultural experience and education. It enhances the art and cultural development ecosystem with improvements of art and cultural venues and its support for art and cultural creativity.
To foster the development of the ecosystem of the cultural content industry, it sets up intermediary organisations, expedites the application of technology innovation, and creates professional financing mechanism for cultural activities.
The Ministry also incorporates cultural technology into the development of local cultural history. They carry out cross-discipline integration of development projects of different ministries or overall development projects of local government. Therefore, they can rebuild the link between the land and the historical memory of people to revive the cultural ecosystem.
