Virtual Heritage Environments Research Articles

Interaction and Navigation in Immersive Virtual Heritage Environments for the First and Third Person Perspective

Immersive capabilities in virtual applications have been attracting huge interest from researchers and developers. In this paper, we discuss interaction and navigation, which are the key elements creating a sense of immersion, for first and third-person perspectives in immersive virtual heritage applications. We design and develop an immersive virtual application for user experience from which we take and analyze user feedback on the mentioned interaction and navigation aspects. The results indicate that in some purposes and interactive applications, the first-person perspective is the appropriate choice and vice versa, with spatially wide applications, the third-person perspective is better.

Restoration and Development of Urban Heritage Sites (Rehabilitation of Middle cities and Heritage towns)

There are various restoration methods and techniques that would help specialists whether planners, designers and archeologists to study historical sites and their valued heritage buildings in various cities at Egypt as Alexandria governorate which is considered as one of heritage towns. One of these techniques is Virtual Reality (VR) that could be used to improve the field of Virtual Heritage (VH) which is directed towards accurate representation of historic structures in urban heritage sites, objects or artefacts. Beside, using Geographical Information System (GIS) and Google earth model to define these urban heritage sites accurately with all database related to the specific area under study. Digital models of historical buildings and its urban spaces only give a sense of precision for their historical values. Yet, human attitude and cultural traditions remain a gap in current research and advanced technology in heritage visualization. So, Virtual Heritage Environments (VHE) suffers from the lack of ‘thematic interactivity’ due to the limited cultural heritage content and engaging modules largely used in photorealistic systems. So, this paper focuses in using various digital restoration techniques and methods to investigate and incorporate a cultural-feed into digital platforms of VH especially at Alexandria in Egypt as Qaitbay castle plaza. This site discusses a conceptual and practical workflow for the development of virtual heritage platforms as a research area, educational purpose. The study includes engagement tool of historic conservation in Alexandria, brings historic spaces and buildings to users in detailed studies whether researchers or students. The results of the research would be used for the renewal of the current plaza of Qaitbay castle by making it more attractive. Also, this plaza is considered as a tourist and historical area as well as the organization for paths of movement and transforming the work places for sale from street vendors to organized markets. The scenario was realized by integrating low-cost Virtual Reality (VR) techniques, as the Kolor Panotour Pro software, some tools as Oculus Rift DK2 and the Leap Motion controller. Further, the 3D virtual model was implemented by integrated steps through Virtual Tours and Informational Modeling (VT/IM) to improve real urban data of heritage sites. The paper describes the process for optimizing the 3D virtual model, the implementation of the interactive scenario and the results of a proposed 3D VT/IM of redesigning model for the Qaitbay Castle Plaza. Finally, the paper predicts future research directions for virtual reality, with a particular focus on interaction interfaces and explores the implications for the cultural heritage domain.

The effect of immersion towards place presence in virtual heritage environments

Despite the advancement of digital technology in virtual heritage (VH) projects, there is still a paucity of research in methods to support sense of place in architectural virtual heritage environment (VHE). This paper argues that studies on the sensation of place in a virtual environment (VE) could be linked to the ever-expanding presence research domain. The impact of the level of immersion and realism in VE towards evoking the sense of presence could be considered to be one of the most discussed topics in presence research. This paper presents the methods and findings from a qualitative experiment designed to analyse user’s real-time feedbacks from three levels of immersive systems. The experiment aims to measure the significance of virtual presence in contributing towards user’s sense of place experience in a VHE. Based on the findings, the system that produces a better virtual presence such as HMD may not be suitable for all type of users even if it delivers better learning experience of cultural heritage places. It may, however, only be determined by personal preferences and immersive device factors.

A proposed methodology of bringing past life in digital cultural heritage through crowd simulation: a case study in George Town, Malaysia

One of the heritages can be denoting to the values of human activity in the past and its cultural oral narratives. To virtualize these heritages, it means to actualize the heritage into the digital content. When attempting to understand a particular cultural heritage site, the challenge here is that the connection to the past is non-existence due to insufficient historical information of the heritage sites. On the other hand, crowd simulation has been widely applied for the purpose of construction and reconstruction of tangible and intangible digital heritage. Therefore, the main objective of this research is to bring past life into digital cultural heritage and it would need the inclusions of the visual information of the surroundings and the people in the past. This paper also investigates the phase-by-phase methodology to deal with crowd simulation of different ethnic groups with heterogeneous behaviors in digital cultural heritage. The crowd is modeled and simulated based on the classical particle-based boid algorithm in virtual heritage environment that includes social behaviors of heterogeneous crowd transpired in an old trading port. With respect to bringing the past life into digital cultural heritage, microscopic based crowd simulation is applied to the complex case such as a multi-ethnic trading port, involving distinguished behavioral patterns through a heterogeneous crowd simulation method. In the simulation, a high-level control method, hierarchical state-machine and group formation model are introduced through inter-ethnic interactions formalism. The results of the assessment and validation have shown that the proposed schemes, models and methods have successfully been deployed in George Town, Malaysia through the proposed methodology. Such a simulation can be beneficial for virtual walkthrough and virtual museum applications. Through several investigations, the advantages of applying this approach in simulating the digital George Town are demonstrated as well as its potential for future developments are identified.

A Conceptual Framework for Designing Virtual Heritage Environment for Cultural Learning

Virtual environment has the potential to be used as a medium to facilitate cultural learning. However, this requires guidelines on how to design the environment. This article provides a conceptual framework that guides the design of a virtual environment that facilitates cultural learning for casual users. The exploratory sequential mixed-method design approach was used as the basis for the overall research design. Five studies involving experts and end users were performed to identify and evaluate the framework components. The framework consists of four important components: (i) Information Design, (ii) Information Presentation, (iii) Navigation Mechanism, and (iv) Environment Setting, and outlines two types of design elements: basic elements, which are essential for cultural learning to take place, and extended elements, which provide options for enhanced user experience. Results from the framework evaluation suggest that the proposed design elements are useful in facilitating learning and that the experience of using the virtual environment affected the end users’ sense of awareness and appreciation toward heritage value and preservation.

VIRTUAL PLATFORMS FOR HERITAGE PRESERVATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST: THE CASE OF MEDIEVAL CAIRO

Much of the effort in VH is directed towards accurate representation of historic structures, objects or artefacts. There is little attention is paid, however, to the human aspects of city life, the intangible heritage to which people can actually relate. Digital models of historic buildings and spaces only give a sense of precision. Yet, rituals, human attitude and cultural traditions remained a gap in current research and advanced technology in heritage visualization. Virtual Heritage Environments (VHE) suffer from the lack of ‘thematic interactivity’ due to the limited cultural content and engaging modules largely used in photorealistic video gaming systems. In order to approach virtual fidelity and accurate reproduction of historic environments, this paper reports on a research process to investigate and incorporate a Cultural-feed into digital platforms of Virtual Heritage. In doing so, the paper focuses on the Middle East in general and Medieval Cairo in particular. It discusses conceptual and practical framework for the development of virtual heritage platforms as a research, educational and engagement tool that brings historic spaces and buildings back to the recognition of the public eye of the ordinary user. It analyses current practices and projects of the virtual heritage technologies and reports on field work that took place in Islamic Cairo with Five Start-Up entrepreneurs.

Design of a virtual tour for the enhancement of Llíria’s architectural and urban heritage and its surroundings

<p>The Information Technology and Communications (ICT) have revolutionized the way to present and promote the heritage sites. These ICT also offer scholars, students and visitors unprecedented access to architectural, historical, geographical, archaeological, iconographical and anthropological data, among other. It is noted also that virtual heritage environments are inherently fascinating and possess essential properties to have a positive effect on supporting heritage conservation and education. This paper is concerned with the potential of these ICT developments for improving the enhancement of the heritage sites of the town of Llíria and its surroundings (Valencia, Spain) by mean of a virtual tour (“Edeta 360º”) based on 360º panorama photos. The “Edeta 360º” virtual tour is an immersive application that places the viewers inside the image, enabling them to significantly enhance position awareness and providing the highest level of functionality for viewing, capturing and analysing virtual data. It can appropriately and effectively be utilised to facilitate intellectual and physical access to public by bringing knowledge, awareness and appreciation about the heritage of Llíria while, at the same time, authenticity is preserved. The undertaking method to create this interactive virtual tour is based on an easy procedure with off-the-shelf equipment and using both freely available software to address the process of photo stitching that combines multiple photographic images with overlapping fields of view to produce a segmented panorama or high-resolution image. Each panorama contains hotspots that enable the users to further explore the surroundings. The virtual tour provides the user the ability to navigate a scene through the rotation and zoom functions. This application results very appealing and has been adopted as a mean for information, dissemination, education and tourism purposes.</p>

Defining Cultural Agents for Virtual Heritage Environments

This article describes the primary ways in which intelligent agents have been employed in virtual heritage projects and explains how the special requirements of virtual heritage environments necessitate the development of cultural agents. How do we distinguish between social agents and cultural agents? Can cultural agents meet these specific heritage objectives?

Modelling Virtual Heritage Environments using Hierarchy-Embedded Virtual Objects

Nowadays, heritage is eventually inexistence, inaccessible and design decision due to the constructions of new buildings and sites. Various techniques in virtual reality have been proposed in producing virtual heritage. Improper management of virtual heritages in their virtual environments in terms of location and link may cause delivering information unsystematically. This paper is purposed to model virtual heritage environments for one case study of sheltered pavilion using Hierarchy-Embedded Virtual Objects technique. This technique is a hierarchical, tree-structured approach that emulates a tree structure with a set of linked nodes. Three different virtual heritage environments have been published through the tree structure in HEVO Editor. Organizing Editor has enables virtual heritages to be managed in terms of location and link. The resulted virtual heritage environments can be visualized, interacted and navigated through Viewing Editor. These virtual heritage environments are believed to be significant for learning the VH and presenting the values inculcated inside them. Challenges of the modelling technique, research quantification, modelling goals and VH attractions also have been discussed for advanced consideration to model VH.

Factors Facilitating Cultural Learning in Virtual Architectural Heritage Environments

Besides being a medium for exhibiting three-dimensional heritage objects, the design and development of virtual heritage environments could also facilitate cultural learning. The aim of this article is to present some consideration on factors that could facilitate cultural learning in virtual heritage environment. Cultural learning in the context of this study refers to the acquisition of knowledge that encourages cultural awareness and appreciation. In this study, we explore virtual heritage environment design features, and cultural information characteristics and presentation formats that are important to facilitate cultural learning, from the casual user's perspective. We conducted experiments that required users to explore virtual heritage environments (focusing on architectural heritage) from selected heritage-related websites, followed by interview sessions. Four contributing factors were identified: information design, information presentation, navigation mechanism, and environment setting. The results suggest the need to reduce users’ cognitive load when exploring virtual heritage environments while simultaneously presenting information that adds value to their understanding. The results also suggest that the inclusion of cultural information in virtual heritage environments is essential for cultural learning to take place.

The Palenque project: evaluating interaction in an online virtual archaeology site

This case study evaluated the effect on cultural understanding of three different interaction modes, each teamed with a specific slice of the digitally reconstructed environment. The three interaction modes were derived from an initial descriptive theory of cultural learning as instruction, observation and action. A major aim was to ascertain whether task performance was similar to the development of understanding of the cultural context reached by participation in the virtual environment. A hypothesis was that if task performance is equivalent to understanding and engagement, we might be able to evaluate the success of virtual heritage environments (through engagement and education), without having to annoy the user with post-experience questionnaires. However, results suggest interaction in virtual heritage environments is so contextually embedded; subjective post-test questionnaires can still be more reliable than evaluating task performance.

Exploring the relationship between presence and enjoyment in a virtual museum

The Augmented Representation of Cultural Objects (ARCO) system, developed as a part of an EU ICT project, provides museum curators with software and interface tools to develop web-based virtual museum exhibitions by integrating augmented reality (AR) and 3D computer graphics. ARCO technologies could also be deployed in order to implement educational kiosks placed in real-world museums. The main purpose of the system is to offer an entertaining, informative and enjoyable experience to virtual museum visitors. This paper presents a formal usability study that has been undertaken in order to explore participants’ perceived ‘sense of being there’ and enjoyment while exposed to a virtual museum exhibition in relation to real-world visits. The virtual museum implemented was based on an existing gallery in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK. It is of interest to determine whether a high level of presence results in enhanced enjoyment. After exposure to the system, participants completed standardized presence questionnaires related to the perceived realism of cultural artifacts referred to as AR objects’ presence, as well as to participants’ generic perceived presence in the virtual museum referred to as VR presence. The studies conducted indicate that previous experience with ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) did not correlate with perceived AR objects’ presence or VR presence while exposed to a virtual heritage environment. Enjoyment and both AR objects’ presence and VR presence were found to be positively correlated. Therefore, a high level of perceived presence could be closely associated with satisfaction and gratification which contribute towards an appealing experience while interacting with a museum simulation system.

Crowd Rendering Optimization for Virtual Heritage System

Previously, crowd simulation plays small part or probably ignored in virtual heritage. Architectures or artifacts bit more focused to be reconstructed into virtual environment. By inserting crowd into simulation of virtual heritage, it will give more impact and achieve higher realism level to the reconstructed site. Before inserting the crowd into virtual environment, a research needs to be done to manage the complex environment of virtual heritage and the crowd itself. This paper presents a framework with a vision to reduce the computation cost for rendering crowd simulation in virtual heritage environment while maintaining realisms of the scene. We first review the existing acceleration techniques applied on crowd rendering. Then we introduce a framework that will integrate acceleration techniques for crowd simulation in virtual heritage.

Evaluating cultural learning in an online virtual environment

How can we develop and evaluate contextual cultural learning through exploration and participation in a virtual heritage environment? This article discusses one way of evaluating cultural learning, through measuring the cultural understanding of participants who learn about the same environments but via different methods of interaction (observation, social instruction, and activity-based exploration). Task performance, understanding of local cultural practices, memory of what was written and memory of events and objects, were recorded. Issues arising from the chosen internet-based technology, and how these issues could have been avoided, will also be discussed.

Reconstructing traditional Inuit house forms using three-dimensional interactive computer modelling

Virtual heritage environments provide researchers and the general public with a tool for exploring archaeological data in a dynamic and interactive fashion. This paper discusses recent attempts by the authors to construct a prototype three-dimensional interactive computer model of an Inuvialuit sod house based on archaeological, ethnohistoric and ethnographic data from the outer Mackenzie Delta area in Arctic Canada. Such computer models have the potential to provide significant insights into the design principles used in traditional Inuit architecture. They can also be integrated with three-dimensional scans of cultural artifacts and other recorded media to create an interactive virtual heritage environment. In addition to providing an armature for the collection of oral histories and traditional knowledge, these web-based virtual environments allow members of the general public to experience cultural sites in inaccessible areas like the Canadian Arctic. Virtual environments may also provide archaeologists with new insights into the role that human senses may have played in the design of small-scale dwellings. This paper will focus on how the computer model was constructed, and presents examples of how the model can be used both as a research and education tool.