Return to Our Work

The Ridges Sanctuary Interactives

Education | Entertainment | Nature/Cultural Center

The Ridges Sanctuary in Baileys Harbor, WI is the home of Wisconsin’s first land trust. For more than 80 years, the sanctuary board has focused on their three goals – education, research, and preservation. When the visitor center was being remodeled, Split Rock Studios came to Balance Studios with the beautiful story of 30 acres of ridges and swales, dense conifer forests, and open beaches. The Balance team combined the physical and digital to immerse visitors in the sanctuary’s offerings.

Emma Toft Phone

Adding physical interactives into an exhibit provides an increased variety of experiences for visitors. The Ridges was looking to share the story and importance of the early conservationists who helped establish the Ridges Sanctuary in a unique way.
Taking an old telephone and adding in special speakers and an audio player, the Emma Toft Phone Interactive autoplays interviews and conversations with Emma Toft. When the visitor picks up the handset, they experience a party-line like listening experience that gives them a glimpse into the past.

Animal Audio & Woodpecker Video

The Ridges also wanted to bring the outdoors in for visitors to experience the natural offerings of the sanctuary, even in inclement weather. Split Rock Studios created a large display featuring native animals and plants and worked with Balance to create an audio experience that added a level of immersion into the experience.

When visitors approach the display, they are encouraged to play this look and find game of the animals that live in the Ridges Sanctuary. As they get closer to a creature hiding in the display, an audio clip of their animal calls or sounds begin to play, encouraging the visitor to look closer to find the animal. It could be hiding in the bushes or up in the tree. As the visitor moves along the display, each of the animal sounds play when their motion is detected. As visitors peer inside the tree on the far right of the display, they see a video of a native woodpecker looping on a video player while hearing the sound of the woodpecker pecking at the tree.

Formation of the Ridges

Touch Screen Application

The creative team was tasked to create interesting and engaging enhancements to educate about and illustrate how the unique landscape at The Ridges was created. Balance's 2D animation showcases the creation of the unique landscape. Guests scroll back and forth, watching the famous series of ridges and swales on the Ridges property develop over centuries of movement from Lake Michigan. Visitors learn about how the geological formations came to be and the incredible, slow impact of the lake's movement is presented in an interactive and engaging medium that creates an interesting and easily understood explanation of this unique series of formations.

Donor Kiosk

Touch Screen Application

The Ridges Sanctuary became Wisconsin’s first land trust in 1937. For 80 years, the Ridges has thrived thanks to membership, stewardship funds, and donations. When they were updating their Visitors Center, they wanted to showcase the hundreds of people who have supported the preservation of the most biologically diverse ecosystem in Wisconsin.

The Donor Kiosk allows visitors to explore the different initiatives donors support and highlights the donors throughout the years. Users can explore the initiative and learn more about the current status of each project, view the donor names for each, and learn more about how they can help.

Using a custom Content Management System (CMS), admins can update the initiative descriptions and donors to share the latest happening on the projects. Custom made to make technical content additions into an easy user-friendly experience, the CMS offers the ability to copy and paste and format entire donor lists rather than a utilizing a single-entry system.

Photo Interactive

Touch Screen Application

The sanctuary wanted a beautiful representation of their nearly 500 native species of plants, more than 60 species of birds, and 12 threatened or endangered species. With a story as rich and diverse as this, there is nothing more impactful than visually experiencing their beauty.

Balance Studios created the Photo Interactive to visually tell the story of this diverse ecosystem. Visitors can explore stunning photography, featuring the sanctuary and its inhabitants throughout the seasons. Once visitors have selected a season, they are brought to the photo gallery, where they find more information about the image through the title and caption.

Wanting to continually expand as new photos of the changing landscape are taken, the entire Photo Interactive resides in a custom Content Management System (CMS). Administrators can view, add edit, and remove images as well as the photo titles and captions. They can also change the order in which images appear. Per client request, the CMS only pushes an update each morning as long there is internet available to download the latest content to allow for the quickest load times.

Listening to Nature & Butterfly Video

Touch Screen Application

The Ridges Sanctuary also wanted a more immersive experience that exposed visitors to the beautiful nature scene around them, even during the coldest winter months. The Listening to Nature Experience utilizes photo-real 3D models in a typical spring or summer scene.

As visitors venture through the center before exploring the nature paths, they encounter three large, 80-inch screens displaying an attract video. Entering the room, the video activates and sounds of nature fill the space. Local residents - squirrels, porcupines, deer, and birds - venture through the forest, stopping to give visitors a chance to experience these creatures up close in detail. Visitors may never see a baby porcupine, or porcupette, in person, but the realistic animation provides a unique chance to experience nature in this exceptional interactive.

In addition to the Listening to Nature experience, visitors can approach the magnifying glass in the log below the screen. There they will see a looping video of an enchanting butterfly the Balance creative team animated.

The Ridges Sanctuary Interactives

Education | Entertainment | Nature/Cultural Center

Emma Toft Phone

Animal Audio & Woodpecker Video

Formation of the Ridges

Donor Kiosk

Photo Interactive

Listening to Nature & Butterfly Video

Ready to Bring Your Ideas to Life?