Immersive Virtual Reality As A Resource for Unaccessible Heritage Sites

This contribution highlights the potential contribution that modern technologies offer for virtual reconstruction and immersive navigation of monuments that are unavailable due to catastrophic events or other causes. We propose a design and implementation methodology for the enjoyment of the Cultural Heritage sites through three-dimensional and photorealistic modeling, visualization and rendering in a immersive virtual world enriched with extra content. The project of virtual reconstruction of monuments damaged by catastrophic events arises from the need to continue to enjoy the architectural asset during the stages of safety-laying, reconstruction and finishing, large-scale interventions that usually take a long time, especially for buildings belonging to the Cultural Heritage. The experience of the earthquake in L'Aquila of 2009 has reflected on the importance of Heritage and collective identity that changes whenever a cultural asset is not used anymore. Santa Maria Paganica in Virtual Reality Project implements a freely navigable virtual model able to let discover and rediscover one of the monuments of L'Aquila, damaged by the 2009 earthquake, which during the past had a most important role for the social, economic and cultural life of L'Aquila people, and that stays still today, 2018, not reconstructed. Here we present the results and the methodology of the process which allowed us to get a model available in a immersive virtual reality environment. The chosen VR engine is the Unity software, which allows to implements models compatible with the two most common adopted VR headsets: HTC VIVE and OCULUS RIFT. The final VR artifact is an executable software like a videogame, playable on a PC; virtual lighting systems have been projected in order to get a better graphic performance avoiding to alter the mesh model, and the navigation system in VR has been implemented with specific C# scripts.