Behind the scenes on a medieval weapons shoot
Tonight is the third night when you can catch Museum Secrets: Inside the ROM broadcasting on History Television (Canada) at 7 PM ET/PT. But before or after you do, you can hear from director Kenton Vaughan for a behind-the-scenes perspective on the filming of one of my favourite stories in the episode, the mystery of why medieval warriors put down a trusted crossbow and picked up the gun.
Watch our director commentary video with Kenton Vaughan.
Not to be missed:
Test out different crossbows in our first person shooter game on a simulated battle field the Museum Secrets website.
Here’s what Kenton had to say about the crossbow story:
“When we did a story about a 15th century crossbow at the ROM, the fact that curator Corey Keeble (who studied the objects for years,) had never actually shot a replica crossbow or a musket before, surprised me. Then, when I spoke with Corey and other museum curators, I found out that this is one of the challenges that curators have. They work with these priceless delicate objects that really can’t be used and tried out for the purposes for which they were created.”
“The curators have to study them in an abstract way and it’s not part of the museum culture to go out and make replicas and give it a whirl.”
“So the opportunity to see Corey use this crossbow for the first time was really interesting and it was a discovery moment for everybody involved.”
