Unless you can go back in time and become a Khmer villager in the thirteenth century, it is impossible to see Angkor Wat as it was back then. However, modern virtual reality technology and online 3D simulation has enabled us to recreate what it was like in its prime. Virtual Angkor is a website, made by a consortium of academic groups–including the SensiLab Team, the University of Texas at Austin, Monash University, and Flinders University–that takes you to a comprehensive and interactive 3D reconstruction of the Angkor Wat and its surroundings.
The primary sources used as a model for these simulations include geographical and architectural information of Angkor, along with a few textual sources. One of these written sources is a first-hand account of Chinese diplomat Zhou Daguan’s story of his stay in Angkor during the thirteenth century. It is a particularly insightful account in that it offers a peek into the city of Angkor from an outsider’s point-of-view.
Information extracted from these archeological and textual sources were processed by various virtual reality technologies, including 3D modeling, simulation, mapping, 3D scanning, and animation technology.
These digitized sources are presented on the Virtual Angkor website as an interactive map that allows you to have a 360˚ view from a fixated point. You can easily find a list of videos depicting houses, a Khmer village, a marketplace, and even a sculpture workshop, allowing you to get a very real idea of what Angkor was like many centuries ago.
The goal of this website is to transform historical sources into a digital experience where one can virtually “re-live” a 24 hour cycle in thirteenth century Angkor. Accordingly, another way that the information is presented is in the form of teaching modules, aimed for the target audience of the students. These modules are created for the classroom so that students can learn about Angorian kingship through the simulated architecture and cityscape, the climate and natural landscape, and also about how the Khmer Empire engaged in trade with its neighbors.
As a visual learner myself, I know that having visual, and especially interactive, ways to engage with the content is an extremely effective and fun way to learn new material.
This project offers an exciting experience through a part of Angkor history in a way that is perhaps the closest that we can get to the real experience of visiting the city in the thirteenth century. Unless, of course, time travel becomes a reality.
Alyssa, this post is really interesting! The way that the creators use information from a written account reminds me of the discussion on Tuesday, about how medieval mapmakers based their visual maps off of textual representations.