Abstract
This paper discusses how a digital reconstruction of the Scottish capital of Edinburgh around the year 1544 was created and communicated to the public. It explores the development and reception of the Virtual Time Binoculars platform – a system for delivering virtual reality heritage apps suitable for use on most smartphones. The Virtual Time Binoculars system is placed in the context of earlier research into mobile heritage experiences, including Situated Simulations (Liestøl [3]) and the Mirrorshades Project (Davies et al. [4]). The eventual virtual reality app is compared with other means of viewing the historic reconstruction, including online videos and an interactive museum and educational exhibit. It outlines the historical and technical challenges of modelling Edinburgh’s sixteenth-century cityscape, and of distributing the eventual reconstruction in an immersive fashion that works safely and effectively on smartphones on the streets of the modern city. Finally, it considers the implications of this project for future developments in mobile exploration of historic scenes.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Davison, B.: Picturing the Past Through the Eyes of Reconstruction Artists. English Heritage, Stroud (1997)
Gorski, J., Packer, J.: The Roman Forum: A Reconstruction and Architectural Guide. Cambridge University Press, New York (2015)
Liestøl, G.: Augmented reality and digital genre design - situated simulations on the iPhone. In: Proceedings of ISMAR 2009 IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality - Arts, Media and Humanities, Orlando, pp. 29–34. IEEE, (2009). http://sitsim.no/. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Davies, C., Miller, A., Allison, C.: A view from the hill: where cross reality meets virtual worlds. In: Proceedings of the 20th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, p. 213. ACM, Edinburgh (2014)
Davies, C.: PhD thesis at the University of St Andrews. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8098. Accessed 26 Feb 2019
Youtube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsDRPjDwr8A,last. Accessed 26 Feb 2019
UNESCO World Heritage List, Entry for the Old and New Towns of Edinburgh. https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/728. Accessed 26 Feb 2019
Bain, J.: The Hamilton Papers: Letters and Papers Illustrating the Political Relations of England and Scotland in the XVIth Century, vol. 2, p. 326. Edinburgh, General Register House (1892)
Bain, J.: The Hamilton Papers: Letters and Papers Illustrating the Political Relations of England and Scotland in the XVIth Century, vol. 2, p. 369. Edinburgh, General Register House (1892)
Bain, J.: The Hamilton Papers: Letters and Papers Illustrating the Political Relations of England and Scotland in the XVIth Century, vol. 2, p. 384. Edinburgh, General Register House (1892)
British Library Online Gallery. http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/unvbrit/a/001cotaugi00002u00056000.html. Accessed 5 Jan 2019
National Library of Scotland Digital Image of James Gordon of Rothiemay’s Edinodunensis Tabulam. http://maps.nls.uk/view/74475427. Accessed 5 Jan 2019. National Library of Scotland Digital Image of William Edgar’s Plan of the City and Castle of Edinburgh. http://maps.nls.uk/view/74400010. Accessed 5 Jan 2019
World Machine. https://www.world-machine.com. Accessed 2 Feb 2019
Unreal Engine 4. https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/what-is-unreal-engine-4. Accessed 5 Jan 2019
National Library of Scotland Digital Image of William Edgar’s Plan of the City and Castle of Edinburgh. http://maps.nls.uk/view/74400010. Accessed 5 Jan 2019
SketchUp. https://www.sketchup.com. Accessed 5 Jan 2019
Tait, R.: Configuration and dimensions of burgage plots in the burgh of Edinburgh. In: Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol. 136, pp. 297–310 (2006)
Edinburgh 1544 Virtual Time Binoculars App. https://www.smarthistory.co.uk/Edinburgh1544/download.html. Accessed 24 Feb 2019
Homepage for Google Cardboard. https://vr.google.com/cardboard/. Accessed 24 Feb 2019. Homepage for Google Daydream. https://vr.google.com/daydream/. Accessed 24 Feb 2019
Homepage for Omeka. https://omeka.org/. Accessed 24 Feb 2019
Homepage for Edinburgh 1544. https://www.smarthistory.co.uk/Edinburgh1544/. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Vimeo introductory video for Edinburgh 1544. https://vimeo.com/208677167. Accessed 27 Feb 2019. Photosphere of St Giles’ Kirk. https://roundme.com/tour/171650/view/439692/. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Ofcom Communications Market Report for 2018. https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0022/117256/CMR-2018-narrative-report.pdf. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Homepage for Oculus Rift. https://www.oculus.com/rift/. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Edinburgh 1544 Introductory video https://vimeo.com/224189702 and Edinburgh 1544 Townscape video https://vimeo.com/208677167. Accessed 27 Feb 2019
Dalton, M.: The publishing experiences of historians. J. Sch. Publishing 39(3), 197–240 (2008)
Mair, G.: Edinburgh re-emerges from past. The Times, 18 March 2017. Milmo, C.: The really Old Town: 16th-century Edinburgh is brought back to life. i, 18 March 2017. Christison, G.: New virtual view of very Auld Reekie. Daily Express, 18 March 2017. O’Leary, D.: Step back in time as app visits capital in 1544. The Herald, 18 March 2017. Pringle, F.: Old, lost Edinburgh digitally recreated. The Scotsman, 18 March 2017
BBC Newsnight report on the Rough Wooing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=nqbdSVZ5ZME&list=PLJxnQXiytA_Qc0B57aViue2G3DPet1Z0L&index=1. Accessed 6 April 2017
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Rhodes, E., Miller, A., Davies, C., Oliver, I., Kennedy, S. (2019). Viewing the Past: Virtual Time Binoculars and the Edinburgh 1544 Reconstruction. In: Beck, D., et al. Immersive Learning Research Network. iLRN 2019. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1044. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23089-0_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23089-0_9
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-23088-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-23089-0
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)