research projectResearch project
What did our city look like 2000 years ago?
Answers to this question are being provided by a 3D reconstruction of Roman Cologne. The unique research project Visualisation of Roman Cologne has succeeded for the first time in producing, in real time, a model of the city at a certain point in time that is fully navigable in its entirety. It is now possible to stroll through the whole of Roman Cologne, to see the buildings in their actual urban context and to walk around them. The digital reconstruction of ancient Cologne is the result of a joint research project of the Archaeological Institute of the University of Cologne, the Koeln International School of Design (KISD) the Cologne University of Applied Sciences, the University of Potsdam’s Hasso-Plattner Institute and the Cologne Romano-Germanic Museum (RGM). The research project was financed by RheinEnergie Foundation youth/work/family.
Introduction
Roman cities were monumental and much like the cities of today made an impression on their inhabitants and visitors through their buildings. Architecture in all its variety was used to provide the framework for all aspects of life, for politics, commerce and industry and also for leisure thus shaping the public as well as the private realm. Also the people’s own self-image – even if they did not always explicitly realise it – was grounded in the architectonic framework.
Project Procedure
Interdisciplinary Approach
Interdisciplinary Approach
What is special about our project is its interdisciplinary nature. The archaeologists and buildings researchers deliver the contents, the designers put the information together and create scientifically correct, realistic 3D models, while, with their technical expertise, the computer specialists enable the real-time navigation of the model.
Outlook
There are still a series of challenges to overcome in the future: for example how transitions between Roman and modern day Cologne can be handled, how scientific findings and materials as well as remains from the ancient buildings already known to us can be incorporated in an accessible and user-friendly way, and how to didactically contrast the surviving remains with the reconstruction. Only in this way can viewers assure themselves of the limits of our knowledge.
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