Merging Art and Science to Recreate the Past

The ruins of the ancient port city of Ostia in Italy hint at past splendor: it was once a thriving center of trade, merchant guilds, brothels, shops, and temples. Ostia was at its most prosperous during the second and third centuries A.D., a period followed by centuries marked by earthquakes and tsunamis (the second half of the third and fourth centuries), sacking by Goths, Huns, and Alans (fifth through seventh centuries), capture by the Saracens (early ninth century), and foreign visitors who rummaged through the remains for artifacts and statues (15th to 18th centuries). In the 1930s, Mussolini ordered hurried excavations in preparation for a world’s fair — which never took place.

Imagining the life of this once vibrant city and the mixture of wealthy, middle-class, freedmen, and slaves who lived there is the challenge awaiting students enrolled in “Visualizing the Roman City,” an interdisciplinary course taught by a team of faculty from the college’s classics program, the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies, and the School of Architecture.

For two semesters, they will use their imaginations, along with the latest tools technology offers — from photogrammetry and laser scanners to advanced software such as AutoCAD and 3D SutdioMax, a rendering program — to construct a three-dimensional model of temples, baths, and apartment buildings in Ostia.

Documenting what is still standing and creating a highly accurate record of the existing buildings are of immediate value to ongoing preservation efforts. As students rebuild the city, based on what still stands, they will also put back what’s missing: second and third stories, marble facing, columns, and mosaics.

The goal: to better understand how and why Romans built their cities and how those cities affected the people who lived in them. They will delve into diverse fields — history, art, archeology, the classics, architecture, science, and surveying — to finish this ambitious project.

“We need to move beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries and join together the skills and sensibilities of the artist and the scientist, the architect and the historian, the novelist and the builder, the classicist and the computer,” says Fred Llimp, holder of the Leica Geosystems Chair in Geospatial Imaging.

Joining him in teaching the course are Jackson Cothren of geosciences, Tim de Noble in architecture, and Dave Frederick, director of the humanities program in Fulbright College.

During the first semester, students are learning the basics of laser scanning, used to measure everything from entire buildings to clay pots. They will study Roman history and construction as well as learn the basics of terrestrial photogrammetry.

During the second semester, they will study decorative mosaics and other art work, design a Web site for the course, and finish their reconstruction of Ostia.

At the end, they plan to add their work to the Internet Group Ostia Web site (www.ostia-antica.org) and integrate it into the existing satellite imagery of Ostia on Google Earth.

Frederick says they also hope to win a European heritage grant down the line in order to continue this high-tech preservation effort.

He and Tim de Noble, together with Malcolm Williamson of the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies and four students, visited Ostia during summer 2007. Using two laser scanners, they measured buildings and other structures to prepare for the start of the course this fall.

Katherine Ablan, a student in the course, says that after watching architecture students in action, she had “an architecture itch to scratch.

“We are using software that architects use, learning to think of things in more technical terms, and in doing so, discovering new things about Roman culture and the Roman way of thinking. At the same time, I find the technical aspect of the course to be one of the more challenging points. However, I look at it as an opportunity to make myself a more well-rounded student,” says Katherine.

David Brophey, a student in the course who is studying to become an archeologist, was immediately interested when he first heard of the class.

“The most challenging aspect of the class for me is the use of AutoCAD. Coming in, I had no idea what AutoCAD even looked like. Now, I’m using it to create 3-D representations of ancient buildings.”

The innovative course was made possible by not only technology, but also funding from the Honors College and equipment now available at the computer laboratories in the recently completed Center for Academic Excellence on campus.

 

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