Alive Museum Singapore & Hong Kong 3D Museum

November 2, 2014 by Kylene Wu

Museums have always appealed to me, even though most of my friends don’t seem to get why. There’s just something about the history and stories behind the exhibits that really interest me. I’m just a little nerdy like that. :)

3D museums are a whole other type of museum of course, more about fun illusions and poses than history or art. I actually heard about 3D museums a few years ago and visited my first one, the Trick Eye Museum, in Seoul. So I was really excited when 3D museums were launched in Hong Kong and Singapore, because now I get to enjoy them in my own cities. :) I checked out Hong Kong’s HK 3D Museum earlier in the summer and also went to Singapore’s Alive Museum last month and although they share the same concept, the experience is slightly different!

*Update: The HK 3D Museum I shared about in this post has rebranded as of July 2016. They are now called Magical World and is now a Disney/Marvel/Pixar themed 3D museum, not a Hong Kong themed museum any longer.

Please note that photos and information of the HK 3D Museum in this post are old and do not reflect Magical World.

Note: For comparison purposes, I visited both museums during weekday afternoons.

ENTRY

I’ll start right at the beginning to point out that HK’s 3D museum has a specific time for entry, due to crowd control purposes. For example, I bought my ticket on site at about 4pm but had to buy tickets for the next available time which was 4.15pm. So I couldn’t enter until the stated time on my ticket.

For the Alive Museum, I booked my tickets online and turned up and was let in right away. From what I observed, those buying tickets on site entered right after buying tickets too.

ARTWORKS

AM definitely has a wider variety in terms of the types of artwork they feature in the museum, with 3D, digital and object art. My personal favourite were the object art pieces because I found it more fun posing with objects than on a flat wall surface, but that’s probably just me because I get a little awkward posing for photos!

Most of HK3DM’s artwork are 3D paintings which made for very fun photos but had less variety. The good news is that many of HK3DM’s 3D paintings are Hong Kong themed which I really loved! It felt more specific to HK compared to AM’s 3D paintings, which were mostly generic popular images (although there were a few touristy Singapore themed ones).

One more thing about the artworks, AM’s artworks are placed further apart from each other while HK3DM’s are very close, which is very annoying when you take several shots and someone’s arm or leg ends up in your photo. More on the crowd situation below.

LIGHTING

AM – Very dim lighting! I stood at where the photo points indicated to snap pictures but most of my photos still came out dark.

HK3DM – Much brighter lighting!

CROWD

I think anyone who’s been to HK has gotten a taste of the city’s crowd situation. You’re going to laugh at this but I used to be very EXCITED over the crowds when I moved to this city three years ago. What was I even thinking?

The crowd was the worst factor about the museum experience at HK3DM. I went on a mid week afternoon and there were more people than I expected. I had to wait between almost every single painting because there were at least 1-2 pairs/families ahead of me. It didn’t help that there was a boy who kept running around the museum the whole time and ran right into my sister’s and my photos when we were mid-pose several times.

AM was so much less crowded! For reference, I read a review online with photos of the weekend crowd at AM, and judging from the photos, AM’s weekend crowd is equivalent to my HK3DM weekday experience.

PRICE

Prices are comparable between the two museums but they vary according to age group.

~~HK3DM~~

~~Adult (12+): HK$149~~

~~Child (3-11): HK$100~~

~~Senior (65+): HK$100~~

~~Infant (Below 3): Free~~

Adult and Senior (13+): S$25

Child (3-12): S$20

Infant (Below 3): Free

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When comparing between these two visits, I had a better experience at AM but I had to settle for quite a number of darker photos even though I tried taking them several times at different angles. I did really like the Hong Kong themed 3D paintings and better lighting at the HK3DM though.

Apart from the Hong Kong themed photos, this photo of my sister is one of my favourites at HK3DM. Hahaha, it’s just hilarious to me! She came up with this idea that instead of posing as a singer (there is a microphone prop for this painting) for this underwater rock band, she was going to be a air guitar playing headbanger instead. I’m pretty sure we got a few weird looks but that’s okay because we were having so much fun swinging our hair all over the place. :D