The Ngadji Drum

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The above video is a VR experience developed in 2022 based on an artifact that is hidden in the British Museum. It's an African Kenyan drum, called the Ngadji Drum. It belongs to the Pokomo people and has great spiritual, cultural, historical, symbolic, and religious significance. The drum, like many similar objects of cultural value, was stolen by the British in the late 19th century during their occupation. The experience we developed sheds light on this piece's historical and heritage importance and the need for its return to its community.
This Ngadji drum is a sacred drum. Only an initiated few have the privilege to play it or even to look at it. Also being hidden away from visitors or viewers, I wasn't sure I should represent it. The story we created for the VR experience is inspired by some myths that surround this drum and by animism (a system of belief that associates a soul with every object in the world even inanimate objects like rocks). The Ngadji drum is alive, it has a soul, and will try to communicate with you, the visitor to the museum, showing you the place of the stick and encouraging you to play it. Because only then it will have the power to break through the walls of the museum and to force its way to the place where it belongs, where it has originated from.



Sandboxes
Using the Fourier transform I extract frequency and amplitude values from the emitted soundtrack and feed those values to the force controlling the cubes.
The growth and appearance of trees are triggered every time the user hits the drum. I use a shader where I control the value which causes the appearance of the texture.
After the user hits the drum a number of times with force the cracked walls will explode. Using a tool in Blender I created the cracked wall and the moment the user hits the drum, rigidbody is added to all the objects. Which alone without the need for other forces creates a repulsive force scattering the walls in pieces.
