It could also make Oamaru a leader in the use of creative new technology, including 3D and 4D filming, as well as leading to the establishment in the town of a national training centre for visitor experience.
Inside Victorian Oamaru was unveiled yesterday at two public presentations in Oamaru by the Waitaki Development Board, which is awaiting a decision from the Ministry of Economic Development on a $2.1 million grant to launch the project.
If that application is successful, the project could be operating in 12 months, Oamaru Whitestone Civic Trust chairman and project development team member Phil Hope said yesterday.
The Waitaki District Council has already earmarked $500,000 as loan-funding for "a new major attraction tourism venture".
Council chief executive Michael Ross said that had not been specifically allocated for Inside Victorian Oamaru, but it would be one of the projects the council would consider if it was shown to be commercially viable.
A feasibility study of Inside Victorian Oamaru (IVO) was carried out last year and included the economic and employment benefits to North Otago and Otago.
It was proposed IVO be housed in the Connell and Clowes building which fronts Tyne St and abuts the Criterion Hotel.
The building would be redeveloped with a mixture of historic and high-technology features.
Inside would be Victorian designs and museum-quality exhibits, boosted by live performances.
New 3D film technology would be used, together with up to life-size holograms and other innovative film techniques, to tell the stories of Victorian Oamaru.
Suitably attired guides would show visitors around.
Mr Hope also suggested 4D techniques could be used - for example wind blowing and drops of water during a film about Oamaru's harbour.
Scott Elliffe, who first proposed the IVO concept, said visitors would be "taken back in time" on a walk through early Oamaru, that combined dramatic live telling with the use of modern technology.
Mr Hope said the goal of IVO was to create a world-class visitor experience.
The project has been endorsed by the Waitaki District Council, the Otago Forward Group and the Oamaru Whitestone Civic Trust.
The creative team associated with the project included Grant Major, who won an Academy Award for production design on Lord of the Rings: Return of the King and also worked on King Kong, Heavenly Creatures, An Angel at My Table and Whale Rider.
Michelanne Forster, an award-winning script writer, Zoe Hobson, of Dunedin-based 38 Pictures, Gallien Chanalet-Quercy, responsible for the production of the 3D Experience at the Sir Edmund Hillary Centre at Aoraki Mt Cook, and Hillary Norris, an accomplished New Zealand actor and director, were also involved.
Mr Hope said the project would deliver significant value to the local economy beyond what had been projected by economists from the University of Otago.
For example, the concept of combining technology and live performance could easily be replicated at many other venues in Otago and South- land.
INSIDE VICTORIAN OAMARU
• A world-class visitor experience attracting both overseas and local visitors, based on a story-telling approach which combines state of the art film and 3D technology with dramatic live performances.
• Real stories will be told of the people who lived in Oamaru in the 19th century.
• "Oamaru will be a place to go, rather than just pass through" - Oamaru Whitestone Civic Trust chairman Phil Hope.
