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The Shark and Ray Touch Tank of the Trust Family Foundation is situated at Boston. In this aquarium house there are various kinds of sharks and rays in a mangrove themed tank which is surrounded by low level or shallow edges and viewing windows. It allows the visitors to touch the sea animals and have a close encounter with them. In this aquarium the spectators can see the sea animals are swimming gracefully in the crystal clear water of the tank. They can touch the cownose rays, bonnethead shark, Atlantic rays and along with these epaulette sharks. Apart from that there are African Penguin, American Lobster, Atlantic Harbor Seal, Giant Pacific Octopus, Green Anaconda Green Sea Turtle, Leafy Seadragon, Moon Jelly, Northern Fur Seal, North Atlantic Right Whale, Rockhopper Penguin and Sand Tiger Shark. 

After reading the first paragraph you may get astonish why I am writing this on a magazine which is totally dedicated to SketchUp? Or what will SketchUp do with the touch tank? Yes my friend there is a connection between SketchUp and Shark and Ray touch Tank. Google grant SketchUp Pro license to this non profit organization. They want to help the New England Aquarium Design Department. The organization planned a total renovation of the aquarium. And SketchUp has made this step possible.

The new exhibit was totally designed by SketchUp Pro. SketchUp helps them to create a place where they can presents the wonderful species of the deep sea in a healthy eco system of mangrove and lagoon. The space is available for private function in evening. It is emphasized the value of conserving essential costal habitant like mangrove, lagoon and many more sea species.

Designers faced great challenges while designing the aquarium. There are various other types of requirements in this tank. That’s why they need a modeling program which is quick as well as less complicated and accurate to deliver the right message. And SketchUp is the only way out in this problem. The quick modeling capabilities of SketchUp help the designers by giving extra time to explore the multiple design ways for this project. With the help of the SketchUp, designers can have new exhibit’s sense of aesthetics quickly and very easily. Apart from this SketchUp is very helpful to create quick rendering and importing actual material sample in the models. This give a sense of scale and of how significant will be the interaction with the animals.       

Our traditional design aesthetic for the Main Building is to make the visitor feel like they are submerged underwater, looking through portals to all the fish. The new exhibit needed to be airy and bright, allowing visitors to feel that they are no longer submerged but at the beach level interacting with the animals. To achieve this we revealed the once covered up skylights and installed a significant amount of energy efficient lighting. With natural and artificial lighting we simulated the feeling of wading around a beach touching sharks and rays.