Virtual Rome testbed 2014

Landscape Archaeology is a crucial topic, fundamental to understand any site. While there are plenty of projects focused on 3D reconstructions of Roman buildings, landscape archaeology is still not enough treated by virtual museums. This testbed focuses on an interested case study, that is Roman landscape.

How Romans used their territory in the area around Rome (suburbium)?
How they modified its natural aspect to comply with the urban development and the increase of population?
How were organised villas in the suburbium?

Testbed Part 3: Real time environment

In unity the process is more or less the same. U need a plug-in though, that expands the standard Unity terrain tools. Its named 'TerrainComposer'.

In terrainComposer it's possible to populate from a color map, black and white map,… So load in the height map and all vegetation maps the same way as in E-on Vue.

Testbed Part 2: High poly landscape

In our case we continue using pre-rendering software E-on Vue.

Vue is an all in one package. It’s able to produce procedural materials, have volumetric clouds, plants, water, day/night cyclus, particles,… It’s possible to animate all these elements.

At first we create a square terrain and load in the saved heightmap (define the height scale, difference between the lowest and highest point in the heightmap).

Testbed Part 1: Models and vegetation maps

Working on landscape reconstruction is a process. It can also be used as a study model, and is almost never finished at the first time. That's why it is important to build all the elements as adjustable as possible.

We start by choosing a modeling software. Procedural modelling software uses parameters to contruct the 3D. So it’s easier to adjust over time than free hand modeling software. It’s mostly used for basic shapes. If your scene contains more complex shapes, Blender , 3Ds Max,… can be a better choice.

Content

This testbed shows the synthesis of 70 years of extensive research on the site of Ename, Belgium. Focus of the attention are the site of the Saint Salvator abbey, which was used for about nine centuries, and the near settlement of Ename, which was already inhabited in ancient time due to its fortunate position.

Digital restoration of the inner decoration - Altar

We started the study and the digital restoration of the fragments of decoration founded in the Cim archaeological area.

We focus the attention on the area of the altar, defying which elements must have been present in an Early Christian church of the Balkan area.

The first reconstructed object was the marble altar table. Its fragments were identified easily by the archaeologist who excavated the site as they were the only in marble.

Identifying the audience

In its first version, the AR application is developed as a support for the visit of the archaeological site of the Saint Salvator abbey of Ename (Oudenaarde, Belgium). On the site several panel explains to visitors which function had the building whose remains they are looking at and give some general information about the life in the abbey.

The application uses the images displayed on some of these panels as target to an overlay of extra information.

A philological effort

The creation of a Roman crossroads is under way and the archaeologist gives precise references for each road about its texturing and appearance.

APA Game - a short presentation

The Apa game (temporary name) is a third-person adventure game for on-line PC platforms. It uses the open source Blender game engine to thrust players into the role of a merchant's apprentice in 13th century Italian city of Bologna. Guido, the main character, falls into a time vortex and finds himself in Roman Bologna

Virtual Rome test-bed

Landscape Archaeology is a crucial topic, fundamental to understand any site.

While there are plenty of projects focused on 3D reconstructions of Roman buildings, landscape archaeology is still not enough treated by virtual museums. This

v-must

Virtual Museum Transnational Network

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