Imagine you’re packing for a trip to Paris, France and plan to visit The Louvre (www.louvre.fr) while you’re in the city. Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could get more out of the experience with your Windows Phone? That’s exactly what ArtGuru – Louvre does. It’s a companion app, which serves as a guide of sorts for the museum. Tour on pass the break to see what it's all about.
If you’re not familiar with The Louvre, it’s one of the largest museums in the world, located in Paris, France. So what exactly does ArtGuru do and what can you do with the app on your Windows Phone? Being an unofficial museum guide for The Louvre, you’re able to enjoy the overall experience with a personal touch, wrapped up in the Modern UI.
By pointing your camera at nearby artwork while walking around the museum, a guide will tell you everything you need to know (through speech too). The content is entirely dynamic and adapts to what you’ve already checked out. It’s a really neat solution, albeit rather useless unless you’re physically inside the venue.
Surely all this content requires a stable Internet connection? Not at all, which is a huge bonus for those of us who would be visiting from outside Paris (or even Europe itself – International data plans/fees can be rather expensive). The entire app supports offline mode, which is available as an optional in-app purchase.
Some other features included in ArtGuru:
- Multiple languages are available (English, French and Italian)
- Museum map with pointers available so you don’t get lost
- Search through authors, artworks and famous
- Selectable tours (best paintings, Italian paintings, etc.)
As a product of the AppCampus program, the app is already worth checking out. You can download ArtGuru - Louvre Edition from the Windows Phone Store. Did we mention that it’s free? Fear not if you're not visiting this venue as more locations will be supported in the future.
Reader comments
Visiting The Louvre in Paris? Bring the museum to life with ArtGuru for Windows Phone
Wow, that is cool and it would take a fair amount of effort to program. I want to get to the Musee d'Orsay even more than the Louvre but this should help with the Louvre visit.
Hello mythos13,
this is Marco, one of the makers of ArtGuru :) First of all I want to thank you for appreciating our work.
The bad news is that, unfortunately, Musée d'Orsay doesn't allow cameras during the visit, so we can't provide ArtGuru for that museum.
Good news is that we're launching a portal by which every user will be able to contribute to ArtGuru: if there's a museum you really love (which allow photographs, of course), you can provide us the pictures and some text, and you'll have an ArtGuru audioguide published for that museum.
People interested can visit http://artguru.me website and apply for being an ArtGuru Ambassador.
Cheers,
Marco
Very nice app. Great idea. I wish I had a trip planned for Paris, now. I hope The Getty Art Museum in Los Angeles is on the expansion list. MOCA and LACMA would be cool too.
Hello dalydose, please take a look at the comment above :)
Fantastic idea! Now I want to go back to Paris!