Modeling the Past: Digital Technologies and Excavations in Polis, Cyprus

This research and educational project aimed to create virtual 3-D walkthroughs of four principal buildings from the Princeton University excavations at Polis Chrysochous, Cyprus. The structures date from the CyproArchaic period beginning in the 7th century BCE to the Late Antique period of the 7th century CE. The project was conceived together with a special exhibition, a long-term exhibition in Cyprus, and a presentation on the web. In a joint Computer Science and Art and Archaeology seminar in the spring of 2012, students created reconstructions and populated them with 3-D scanned objects. The challenge was to find appropriate visual metaphors for conveying uncertainty and change in these 3-D visualizations as well as to create a computer-animated movie focused on the buildings, their spatial relationships, and possible recon-structions consistent with the excavations.