It is far behind the time when, in order to enjoy a historical and cultural experience, it was
necessary to visit a museum or to buy a guide to check the information about the monuments
and historical buildings in a city. Despite the importance of these institutions and options, the
technology allows the expansion of the concept one step further, and the cities itself can be
considered open air museums.
The spread and importance of mobile devices, as smartphones, on everyday activities is well
known. It is possible to list several features that allows people to navigate and access contextaware
information, such as GPS, QR code scanners, augmented reality (AR), just to mention a
few.
But the combination of augmented reality and cultural heritage content it is still not clear, from
the effectiveness perspective. Some apps are already displaying touristic information using AR,
such as Wikitude, Tripwolf, Junaio and others.
With the Wizart CMS Tool, which combines different media files (audio, video, 3d, text, links,
etc) elements with Junaio, it is possible to use AR to achieve cultural information, creating a
different approach on current AR apps, which could lead for interesting investigations. One
possibility, among others, is the use of iconographic elements (combining comics characters,
icons and text) that would trigger the information according to the proximity of the user, based
on GPS location.
The target content for this project is a combination of touristic information with cultural
heritage content. The content can be applied for different city backgrounds, from UNESCO´s World
Heritage Sites to Mythology, as can be seen on the developed project on Belgium and Greece (below).
This project aims to explore new tools and ways to present historical content for mobile users.
The Wizart CMS Tool creates an ideal scenario to
experiment cultural content using AR, being a perfect opportunity to go beyond, towards
something more pragmatic, and where it is possible to empirically validate some of the
developed propositions, offering a unique opportunity to analyze the use of AR and Cultural
Heritage content.
This project was developed using the WizARt CMS Tool, developed by Luciano Pinna.
Wizart consists of an intuitive web-based CMS and a Junaio channel with which the AR can
be experienced. With the CMS users can upload images, 3D models, audio and even video to
be displaced somewhere in augmented space. These can be further enhanced by adding all
kinds of animations and realtime lighting.
AR objects are placed in Wizart according to the bubble principle. A bubble is defined at a
GPS location via the CMS. Once a viewer enters the bubble all objects that are attached to that
bubble are displayed. The objects are unloaded when the viewer leaves the bubble again. This
principle provides a robust way of experiencing AR and enables almost endless content.
Among the more advanced features of Wizart are built-in routes, dynamic lightning, stop
motion animation, multi-user asset management, realtime sockets connection, multiple file
uploads, powerful search functions. Furthermore, you can build and test individual pois or
objects from anywhere with anybody. Wizart is running on a LAMP platform with a node.js
server in parallel for realtime interactions, and using Junaio as the primary AR browser. Junaio
is available on iOS and Android, for mobile phones and tablets.
To know more about WizARt:
http://augmentnl.com/wizart-in-art-education/ The developed App works in this way:
Contact
Profile
Degrees
Teaching
Projects
Workshops
AR objects are placed in Wizart according to the bubble principle. A bubble is defined at a
GPS location via the CMS. Once a viewer enters the bubble all objects that are attached to that
bubble are displayed. The objects are unloaded when the viewer leaves the bubble again. This
principle provides a robust way of experiencing AR and enables almost endless content.
Among the more advanced features of Wizart are built-in routes, dynamic lightning, stop
motion animation, multi-user asset management, realtime sockets connection, multiple file
uploads, powerful search functions. Furthermore, you can build and test individual pois or
objects from anywhere with anybody. Wizart is running on a LAMP platform with a node.js
server in parallel for realtime interactions, and using Junaio as the primary AR browser. Junaio
is available on iOS and Android, for mobile phones and tablets.
To know more about WizARt:
https://www.youtube.com/v/ECeQSZnKmKE?start=164&end=218&version=3
