New York University - Aphrodisias

Virtual Archaeology at Aphrodisias, a virtual reality installation, was created for Christopher Ratte and his team of NYU archaeologists working on the excavation of the ancient city of Aphrodisias , one of the most important archaeological sites of the Greek and Roman periods in Turkey .

New York University

Jean-Marc Gauthier teaches the creation of virtual spaces at the 3D Interactive Telecommunications Program, in New York University . He also leads several research programs on new technologies of immersive systems. The «Aphrodisias» project is an example of a virtual set for a large indoor space where virtual actors follow self-determined behaviors while interacting with the viewers. Online demos of the project can be found here.

The Application

Virtual Archaeology at Aphrodisias, a virtual reality installation, was created for Christopher Ratte and his team of NYU archaeologists working on the excavation of the ancient city of Aphrodisias, one of the most important archaeological sites of the Greek and Roman periods in Turkey . Utilizing information provided by Ratte's team, Jean-Marc Gauthier created interactive reconstructions of the agora including architectural elements, sculptures and self-determined virtual characters living inside the virtual city of Aphrodisias. The application can be experienced as an installation in a variety of settings such as a museum or classroom. It can also be used online as a communication tool by archaeologists and students.

The challenge

Aphrodisias is designed as a low cost immersive installation that can be used by groups of students and teachers to study archaeology, history and urbanism.

The most important challenge was to create an efficient realistic application at a low cost. As the goal was to immerse the audience in a virtual environment, complex systems of cameras was necessary to navigate throughout the application.

Solution

Virtools technology simplified the development process allowing to create the entire project without any C++ code, and providing the advanced navigation system through Virtools user friendly graphic interface :the navigation system is based on several interactive cameras and viewers can activate cameras by moving a «magic wand» in front of the screen. By default, the navigation goes back to the Cocktail Camera, a self determined camera. Visitors can also use a P5 3D glove or other infrared device to navigate through the marketplace.

Key Benefits

Virtools technology allowed Jean-Marc Gauthier to create a realistic application with an improved navigation system, which can be either used in a classroom environment or a museum, and also for distance learning over the internet or an intranet. The high level Virtools building blocks allowed him to become quickly proficient in creating this highly informative user-friendly learning application. Furthermore, reusable behaviors help students reproduce some functionality in their own project.

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