Cornwall's Maritime Churches

Website launch!

For the past two years, our interactive website has consisted of pencil etchings – until now.

Now I am proud to boast of a brilliant new site which showcases all the project’s brilliant and innovative new research. From oral history recordings being eagerly organised this coming term with our photography students studying at Falmouth university, to publishing our first professional promotional film with local film maker Kyle Richardson – the interactivity of this animated map will facilitate and set the bar for all audio visual material.

What is the interactive map?

The interactive map is your first point of contact with the Cornwall’s Maritime Churches project. It greets you with a beautifully designed illustration of Cornwall and the ten selected churches, hand drawn by second year Falmouth art student, Selina Jenner. As you hover over the churches, their names will appear, and when you’ve decided which one you’d like to explore, you simply tap the church icon.

The ultimate output of the project has always been an online, interactive map. Tet the trick has been to produce a learning tool that will engage not only students but also local communities and families simultaneously. Essentially, we aimed to create an accessible resource on the web, that would enable, encourage and facilitate a greater awareness of maritime church history.

Describing the digital map – initial ideas

Initially, the interactive map contained a few more gadgets – from GIS technology, hotspots to 360-degree panorama. Yet as we started developing, we soon realised the quaint, unique quality of the map combined with the richness and wealth of research material was simply, the most valuable content . So with the help of Exeter’s design studio and in particular, our web developer, James Vyne, our interactive map flourished to what you see today.

Why an interactive map?

Our whole goal has been to make this project as accessible as possible. By building an interactive map, we offer young people the chance to gain valuable digital and marketing skills, whilst others profit from the content production which will ultimately populate the site. Additionally, an interactive map showcases the project’s ethos in the best possible light. We promote fun, adventure and new methods of research! By pioneering fun activities to really sink your teeth into whilst researching certain landmarks, we also want to be pioneering digital research, and specifically, start promoting the integration of digital humanities into Penryn campus.

 

If you have any more questions, or perhaps advice for the continued development of our website and interactive map, please contact myself – Victoria Jenner.