A giant tortoise dancing in Animal Attic, disco moves in the Planetarium and ballet among the archives all made an appearance in Otago Museum's entry this year, set to pop song Strangers by Norwegian singer Sigrid.
Voting opened at midnight on Monday, and by about 4.30pm yesterday Otago had secured 7347 votes compared with South Canterbury's 8122.
In third place, the National Army Museum Te Mata Toa had 1129 votes, and the Air Force Museum of New Zealand and the New Zealand Rugby Museum were lagging behind, having secured 983 and 345 votes respectively.
The winning team will go to the final on May 14, and will compete against teams from around the world.
About 20 Otago Museum staff showed their quirkier side in the video, released on YouTube.
Voting in the contest, organised by the ''When You Work At A Museum'' blog, closed at midnight last night.
Otago Museum head of design Craig Scott, who shot the video, said it was a
''close call'' yesterday afternoon, but seemed to be a two-horse race.
Museum staff filmed their video over about three days.
