Robert FRANK
(virtuelle-archaeologie, Lehrberg, Germany)

 

Outline:

In the archeolocical and historical range it makes sense to reduce 3D-reconstructions in texturing and modeling to its essentials.

Informations at www.cyark.org (Project: Saint Sebald Church, Roman Bath of Weissenburg) or virtuelle-archaeologie.de.

Abstract:

Computer animated 3d models have become an important tool for the  visulisation of archaeological records. It can be observed that recent applications are aimed at generating almost photo-realistic images using highly detailed geometry and complex textures. Thus the viewer can easily get the impression that the shown example reconstruction equals the only historical truth. But in many cases there is no scientific proof that justifies such a richness of detail.  Taking into account this uncertainty, a digital reconstruction should leave much more imagination to the viewer. This can be accomplished by consequently surrendering complex textures and highly detailed geometry which emphasizes the claim for a basic ideal reconstruction. Moreover this approach significantly reduces the costs for a reconstruction project and makes it affordable even for customers with low budget. The reduced approach is shown on the basis of selected archaeological examples from northern Bavaria. This involves the medieval cathedral Saint Sebald of Nuremburg, whose 800 years long history of architetural changes has been reconstructed, a baroque bridge from Schweinfurt, which has been excavated by chance during a construction, and an abbey located in Heilsbronn, where a representation of the different building phases has been created using 3d laser scanning technology combined with computer animated geometry.

3D-reconstructions, whose texturing and modeling are reduced to  the essentials, are, seen from didactics, easier to understand for the viewer. The viewer is aware, that he is just regarding an ideal reconstruction and not a 100% solution, that nobody really knows. In the end, a presentation gets believable by that.

Believable, affordable solutions for presentations.

Keywords:

3D-reconstructions, reduced to their essentials, didactic, affordability