QTVR Panoramas of World Architecture
(Columbia University)

Overview

ARTstor and Columbia University have collaborated on a project to encourage the use of Quick Time Virtual Reality (QTVR) for teaching, learning, and scholarship by distributing more than 1,400 QTVR panoramas of world architecture in the ARTstor Digital Library. These 360° spherical QTVR nodes will enable faculty and students to complement traditional side-by-side image comparisons with a mode of representation based on space and context. The Visual Media Center (VMC) at Columbia University's Department of Art History and Archaeology has taken a lead role in developing QTVR panoramas to document a variety of monuments and sites around the world. These include: Ancient sites such as the Pantheon, Domus Aurea, and Forum in Rome; Early Christian and Byzantine sites such as the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, the Orthodox Baptistry, Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, Sant'Apollinare in Classe, and San Vitale in Ravenna, as well as Hosios Lukas in Greece and Fethiye Camii in Turkey; Islamic sites including the Hagia Sophia and the Bam Citadel; Medieval cathedrals from Amiens to York; numerous Renaissance and Baroque architectural monuments; and important 19th and 20th century sites including the Paris Opera, Le Corbusier's Church of Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, Rem Koolhaas' Seattle Public Library, and many others.

As part of this collaboration, ARTstor has also sponsored photographic campaigns to produce new QTVRs. In 2007, ARTstor sponsored a new campaign in Venice, Italy, which produced over 340 panoramas of a range of historically significant sites from various eras in the city's history. This campaign was conducted under the aegis of the Columbia University Center for Study in Venice at Casa Muraro. A forthcoming campaign will focus on the Dogon region in Mali, West Africa. Approximately 200 QTVR panoramas will document important sites and architecture on the sandstone Cliffs of Bandiagara, which were added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1989. In addition to physical sites and their natural setting, James Conlon, Director of the VMC, and Susan Vogel, Professor of African Art and Architecture at the university, will capture the cultural landscape of the region through approximately 1,200 still photographs. Their field photography will include all of the core towns and significant areas on the Bandiagara escarpment, ranging from ritual dances and other ceremonies to the practices connected with the design and use of individual works of art.

QTVR represents a huge advance over the traditional slide. It allows both teacher and student to experience architectural space in ways that were not possible before. Le Corbusier's chapel at Ronchamp, for example, is both difficult to access and defies two-dimensional representation; but with QTVR it can be brought directly into the classroom.

Andrew Tallon, Columbia QTVR Campaign Field Manager

As Field Director for the Columbia QTVR campaigns, Andrew Tallon photographed more than two thousand QTVR panoramas over the past six years — at present, the largest such collection in existence. Tallon, a Medieval art historian now teaching at Vassar College, noted that “QTVR represents a huge advance over the traditional slide. It allows both teacher and student to experience architectural space in ways that were not possible before. Le Corbusier's chapel at Ronchamp, for example, is both difficult to access and defies two-dimensional representation; but with QTVR it can be brought directly into the classroom. Similarly, the entire sculptural program of the central portal of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris can be explored from a single interface, with the user zooming in to see details as desired.”

The Visual Media Center (VMC) at Columbia University explores material culture, vision, media, and pedagogy in the broadest sense to connect faculty research and student learning through the creative application of technology.

Collection information

* Image totals should be regarded as an approximation until a given collection is 100% complete. Users should also bear in mind that the number of images available to them may vary from country to country, reflecting ARTstor’s approach to addressing an international copyright landscape that itself varies from country to country.

Last updated: April 2, 2009

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