Testing and Evaluation

During the 3D reconstruction stage human errors can occur and it is with my own user testing as well as feedback from others that allows errors and adjustments to be seen. Before the project comes to a close these errors and adjustments must be amended before the final real time environment can be created and the contribution justified to the ideas of historical reconstruction of Nottingham Castle.

Firstly the feedback gained from previous post about amending the ground texture was positive, the dull grass before was not engaging enough nor aesthetically pleasing to the eye. The new texture has significantly improved the reconstructed castle and the mood of the environment leading to encouraging results.

As it is difficult to spot some discrepancies when you have worked on a project for nearly nine months a fresh pair of eyes and user feedback is invaluable. A means of testing the real times environment was to actually show the real time environment and not just the 3D model in its creative software.

Below are 2 discrepancies that user testing found out, one shows a wall that appears to be 'floating' (this was probably occurred when altering the terrain and height. The second shows part of a wall missing (this was due to deleting a polygon by mistake). If these were not t be found a user may not just comment on how they feel about the 16th castle but also errors they saw whilst walking through it in the real time environment.

New terrain textures

This week I have been concentrating on creating a better aesthetic feel to the model by giving the ground textures a more appealing and more interesting look. As you can see from the imagery below it has greatly improved visually from previous posts where only plain grass was present.

Enhancing the experience

As discussed so far in previous blog posts 3D historical reconstructed models can be placed inside their original period of time and context using varying augmented resources such as photography, paintings, diagrams, manuscripts, models and artefacts (Boeykens, S 2008) . We have seen this can be beneficial especially in cases where a building or an area is decayed or even non existent anymore (such as Nottingham Castle). Utilizing 3D techniques recreating buildings can provide insight into the evolution of a particular building or site.
Web based presentations offer users the 'interactive' advantages whilst exploring a virtual environment. A form of this can be seen at the Virtual Old Prague project (http://www.cgg.cvut.cz/vsp/). Where, a user can walk through the application on screen and explore in their own time and pace. Other web based environments offer a multi-user experience such as Second Life (http://secondlife.com/)/ Here, users can meet others and discuss opinions, ask questions and also learn in this environment. This approach is directly applicable to real social interaction (Zara, J 2004) - as you may find in a museum.

As the Nottingham Castle project is based on a 3D real-time application where a user can walk through the castle grounds on a computer screen an advancement from this immersive and interactive experience is virtual reality. Virtual reality offers an exploration of an exhibit arranged in a virtual scene and the main difference from the previous approaches is that users virtually enter the space and get the feeling of being part of the environment, engaging a new generation of visitors (Negroponte, N 2003).

In an everyday environment we do not just have a visual element but also have spatial sound. The attributes of spatial sound can affect a users perception of an environment (Murphy, D 2001). The paper titled ' Spatial Sound Enhancing Virtual Story Telling' states the failure of a virtual reconstructed project of Cork in Ireland. It's aim was to simulate interest in the history of the area and encourage exploration of the medieval remains in the area. The evaluation of the project suggests that the level of detail of the models may not have been enough and that the users were more interested in the interactive features rather then content. The evaluation continues by stating the use of sounds (Foley & Environmental) and that these sounds are used to give a feeling of immersion in an environment. This case, to lure and persuade users to explore further. Boeykens argues this and suggests that it is not necessary to create realistic representations but to create attractive visual representations that are over layered with additional information, which will provide more insight into an environment and appeal to a wider audience.

The failure in this project has given my an insight into the Nottingham Castle project. The use of sound is a simple tool that can be used to immerse a user further than just real time interaction and imagery. An interesting concept that the Cork project used was having 'hotspots' where a user can in effect jump from a medieval model to the present day model. This could also be used for the Nottingham Castle model allowing a user to potentially see the development of the site through time.

References

Boeykens, S., Neuckermans (2008) Architectural Design Analysis, Historical Reconstruction and Structured Archival Using 3D Models.
Murphy, D., Pitt, I. (2001) Spatial Sound Enhancing Virtual Story Telling. Computer Science Department, University College, Cork, Ireland.
Nandi, A., Marcichal, X. (2000) Interactive Immersive Transfiction
Negroponte, N., (2003) Virtual Reality in Museums, Sunrise Virtual reality.
Zara, J. (2004) Virtual Reality and Cultural Heritage on the Web.


Weblinks

http://secondlife.com/
http://www.cgg.cvut.cz/vsp/

Why Historical Reconstruction? Part 2/2

Real-time computer generated 3D environments offer two basic advantages to users (Gaitatzes, A). That of am immersive experience, where the illusion of being in the projected world occurs and the user sees themselves 'living' in the experience presented before them.
Gaitatzes follows on by saying it offers a 'better than real life' or 'better than being there' experience. The argument presented by Zuffo suggests that providing enough model details to enable an accurate historical representation should be as important as the availability and usability for a diverse range of users. Some of which may not be familiar with different technology and ways of using it.
The second advantage is interaction. The fact that an audience are not merely watching a realistic historical reconstruction on a computer screen but to actively participate in the experience. As the projected graphics are simply not pre recorded and set out as a visual story but an actual real-time the user can define movement, behaviour and thus creates immersion as described above.

Having looked at the advantages of why using real time historical reconstructions, the benefit to an audience in terms of an interactive and immersive experience it can be seen as a powerful tool. The museum experience can thus be altered to benefit visitors, using computer aided real time visuals as well as traditional informative presentations such as images, artefacts and documents. Giving visitors the opportunities to explore and interact within exhibits provides a means of learning (Hall, T). They argue that using augmented methods such as combining the use of digital and physical environments enhances a visitors interaction in these 'Living Exhibitions'.


References

Gaitatzes, A., Chritopoulos, D., Voulgari, A., Roussou, M. (2001) Hellenic Cultural Heritage through Immersive Virtual Archaeology.
Hall, T., Benford, S., Bowers, S (2002) The Visitor as Virtual Archaeologist: Explorations in Mixed Reality Technology to Enhance Educational and Social Interaction in the Museum.
Zuffo, M., Cabral, M., Nomura, L., Nagamura, M., Andrade, F., Ghirotti, S., Belloc, O., (2007)X3D Experiences on Historical Architectural Digital Reconstruction: A case Study of Sao Paulo city in 1911.
Zara, J. (2004) Virtual Reality and Cultural Heritage on the Web.

Weblinks
http://www.romereborn.virginia.edu/

Why Historical Reconstruction? Part 1/2

With ever advancing computer technology, applications and the techniques to display information on varying platforms, historical reconstruction and digitization of artefacts will always play a part in our lives. Preserving cultural heritage and keeping history alive through techniques that can extend our perceptive capacity and understanding furthermore than photographic evidence could.

Virtual models can provide new perspectives and the potential to transcend from a physical location such as a museum room into a part of history using methods such as virtual reality. Various ancient reconstructed sites presented in 3D include Pompeii in Greece & Rome in Italy.

Using real-time techniques in this context offers a range of opportunities for detailed reconstruction heritage sites to be viewed and explored with a user being able to navigate through a place that is difficult to get to or does not exist anymore, thus increases one intellectual capacity of the environment and the history in that specific time period (Zuffo, M. (2007).

Virtual environments give users the possibilities of placing them in the environment and maintaining normal everyday parameters of a users height and view angle so that it is easy to understand spatial awareness and properties of buildings and artefacts (Zara, J. 2004). Other applications may allow a user to navigate freely by also flying, so that a user has total interactive freedom in the immersive virtual environment.

A virtual environment that has been historically reconstructed was Rome (Rome Reborn blog post from an earlier date). The work developed here ignited my interest in the subject of historic reconstruction. The Rome project and the Sao Paolo reconstruction of 1911 (Zuffo, M) gave me an understanding of how the process works. From the early stages of research, modelling and finally visualisation. The aim of the later was to provide an in depth 3D visual representation of how the city of Sao Paolo looked like in the early 20th century. Below is a Perspective render of cathedral (IgrejadaS´e), Germania and Casa Lebre buildings from the project.

References

Gaitatzes, A., Chritopoulos, D., Voulgari, A., Roussou, M. (2001) Hellenic Cultural Heritage through Immersive Virtual Archaeology.
Hall, T., Benford, S., Bowers, S (2002) The Visitor as Virtual Archaeologist: Explorations in Mixed Reality Technology to Enhance Educational and Social Interaction in the Museum.
Zuffo, M., Cabral, M., Nomura, L., Nagamura, M., Andrade, F., Ghirotti, S., Belloc, O., (2007)X3D Experiences on Historical Architectural Digital Reconstruction: A case Study of Sao Paulo city in 1911.
Zara, J. (2004) Virtual Reality and Cultural Heritage on the Web.

Weblinks

http://www.romereborn.virginia.edu/