Culture communication via 3D app
Developing a virtual 3D universe for Geopark Odsherred.
In 2014, we developed an app for Geopark Odsherred which uses augmented reality and a virtual 3D universe to allow the user to travel thousands of years back in time. We have made it possible to use your smart phone or tablet as a window to the past, through which you can view the landscape in Odsherred as it would have looked during the ice age and stone age, among other points in time.
Client:
Odsherred Municipality
Project:
Geopark Odsherred – The Landscape the Ice Created
The nature in Odsherred is a classic example of ice age landscape. The characteristic Odsherred arches are terminal moraines created by glacier movements at the end of the last ice age. Now, they loom above the low surrounding landscape.
The 3rd highest point on Sealand is Vejrhøj (a burial mound on top of one of the arches), where an impressive view can be enjoyed of the flat, drained Lammefjord and Sejerø Bay.
Vejrhøj is a popular site for tourists, school classes and locals to visit. Geopark Odsherred wished to communicate to visitors how the landscape has changed throughout the ages – as a result of both the ice age and man-made initiatives – in a captivating way that would engage especially the school children.
- Thorough research: We sought counsel from, among others, a geologist at The University of Copenhagen in order to learn more about ice age landscapes. We also studied photos from Odsherred local archives to see what Vejrhøj and the surrounding agricultural landscape looked like in 1920.
- The 3D universe: We constructed landscapes belonging to four different points in time (from 25,000 years ago up till the year 1920) the way they are assumed to have looked from the place where Vejrhøj is today.
- The technology: By means of the compas and gyrometer of the mobile technology, we made the app into an interactive experience, in which the user can use their mobile device to explore the virtual landscape around them in all directions.
So far the app has been tested on a group of school children who used it on a school trip to Vejrhøj. Overall the students were extremely thrilled, and they became greatly immersed in exploring the virtual landscape. The mammoths were particularly popular!
Subsequently, 75% answered that they find it meaningful to use the app in an educational capacity.
