Dec. 1999
CIT Building, 4th floor, Lubrano, 3pm.
Archaeological researchers often use Geographical Information Systems (GIS) for the analysis of their findings because of the capabilities of these systems to generate spatial correlations and visualize large amounts of data. These very features become a problem when the information is not confined to a 2D plane but has a strong 3D character. In that case, the use of an adequate user interface marks the difference, either by allowing the investigator to really visualize all the information as data, or creating such cluttering that important features are not seen.
I hypothesize that the use of an immersive virtual reality interface to the GIS will allow investigators to easily perform complete and accurate spatial analysis of the data collected. Interactive navigation through the virtual archaeological site, by means of walkthroughs and flights over the model will be provided.
The system will be tested on the database created for the ongoing excavations Brown University has been performing at the Great Temple of Petra (Jordan) since 1993. The cave in the Technology Center for Advanced Scientific Computing and Visualization, as the main facility, and the workbench in the Graphics Lab at the Department of Computer Science, as a development and testing environment, will be the two VR working environments used for this project. I will begin by developing the connection between the GIS package, ESRI's ArcView, and the VR API, JOT. The next step will be implementing both the navigation interface, to effectively move through the virtual site, and the GIS interface, to perform basic operations like data overlaying and intra-theme operations. Finally, a virtual flight application will be integrated, using level of detail (LOD) techniques for terrain visualization, and more advanced GIS operations, like individual artifact identification, will be also implemented.
To test my hypothesis, several archaeologists will be asked to compare, based on their experience, typical analysis methods vs. three different versions of the system: Using direct desktop access to the GIS package, a semi-immersive version in the workbench and a fully immersive virtual environment using the cave. Post test comparison of the different approaches they took in each situation, and analysis of the results and conclusions obtained for the Petra site will be performed.