A Comparative Study of the High-Fidelity Computer Reconstruction of Byzantine Art in Cyprus in the Past and Present

计算机重建遗址为我们提供了一种可视化过去环境的手段，使我们能够一瞥过去，否则可能很难欣赏。然而，这些重建必须包含一个遗址的所有实物证据，否则就有歪曲过去的真实的危险。重建过去环境的关键特征是真实的照明和环境本身。今天，我们的建筑物内部被明亮而稳定的光线照亮，但过去的社会依赖于日光和火焰照明，因此，由于我们对环境的感知直接受到到达眼睛的光线的数量和性质的影响，任何计算机重建都必须准确地模拟这种照明条件。此外，在许多图形应用中，包括虚拟考古学，假设光穿过非参与介质，通常是干净的空气或真空。对于绝大多数合成图像，这是一个令人满意的假设。然而，在某些情况下，有必要包括参与的介质，如雾、烟或灰尘，以在图像中提供所需的真实感水平。特别是在考古遗址中，用于提供室内照明的材料，包括蜡烛和木柴火，会产生烟雾，此外，来自例如用于礼拜目的的香炉的烟雾可能会严重影响这些环境中的能见度。在这项可行性研究中，我们将对拜占庭艺术进行高保真重建，这是从东罗马帝国发展而来的持久的拜占庭帝国的罕见可见遗迹。拜占庭人非常关注黄金的使用，并在他们的教堂中广泛使用。在圣像、巨大的墙壁和天花板马赛克以及壁画中，黄金的使用是为了从内部照亮画面。这种灯光效果与教堂的某些建筑元素相结合，被用来创造某些幻觉，包括圆顶马赛克上的圣人似乎从金色背景中走出来，接近观众。黄金不仅用于绘画，也用于烛台和悬挂的烛台。事实上，拜占庭建筑师非常注意在教堂建筑的某些部分使用直接和间接照明，这取决于各自空间的宗教价值。这种宗教价值也通过建筑形式和图片的使用来象征。我们选择了塞浦路斯拜占庭艺术，因为它的优秀品质和地理位置的接近。在拜占庭时期，塞浦路斯密切关注首都君士坦丁堡的艺术和文化趋势，特别是高-高质量的艺术。今天，在这个拜占庭帝国的小而富裕的和平省份，可以找到许多拜占庭艺术的最珍贵的幸存文物。这项可行性研究将受益于最近的两个关键发展，现在可以开发这种高度真实的重建，古代拜占庭环境：高保真物理计算机图形学的进步，包括参与媒体的精确建模，以及新型高动态范围显示器和高精度眼睛跟踪系统的可用性。这项可行性研究的目的是确定人们今天看待拜占庭艺术的方式是否确实存在重大差异，因为它可能在过去出现，因为它们在原始环境中展示，并被烛光照亮，从这个项目的结果应该提供新的见解如何拜占庭艺术可能已被视为在过去，并提供未来文化遗产人工制品高保真计算机重建的指导方针。

Computer reconstructions of heritage sites provide us with a means of visualising past environments, allowing us a glimpse of the past that might otherwise be difficult to appreciate. However, it is essential that these reconstructions incorporate all the physical evidence for a site, otherwise there is a very real danger of misrepresenting the past. Key features when reconstructing past environments are authentic illumination and the environment itself. Today the interior of our buildings are lit by bright and steady light, but past societies relied on daylight and flame for illumination, and thus, as our perception of an environment is directly affected by the amount and nature of light reaching the eye, any computer reconstruction must accurately model such lighting conditions. Furthermore, in many graphics applications, including virtual archaeology, it is assumed that light travels through a non participating medium, normally clear air or a vacuum. For a great majority of synthesised images, this is a satisfactory assumption. However, in some situations it is necessary to include the participating media such as fog, smoke, or dust to provide the required level of realism within the images. In archaeological sites in particular, the materials used to provide interior light, including candles and wood fires would have caused smoke, and in addition, smoke from, for example incense burners for liturgical purposes, might have significantly affected visibility in these environments. In this feasibility study we will undertake the high-fidelity reconstruction of Byzantine art, that is the rare visible remains of the long lasting Byzantine Empire, which grew out of the Eastern Roman Empire. The Byzantines were much preoccupied with the use of gold and favoured it extensively in their churches. In the icons, massive wall and ceiling mosaics and frescoes, the use of gold was meant to illuminate the pictures from within . This lighting effect in combination with certain architectural elements of the churches was used to create certain illusions, including the holy people on the cupola mosaics seeming to step out of the golden background, approaching the viewer . Gold was not only used for the pictures, but also for candlesticks and in hanging candelabra. Byzantine architects in fact paid careful attention to the use of direct and indirect lighting in certain parts of the church building, depending on the firmly defined religious value of the respective space. This religious value was also symbolised by the architectural form and the use of pictures. We have chosen Cypriot Byzantine art, because of its outstanding quality and the geographical closeness of the sites. During Byzantine times, Cyprus followed closely the art and cultural trends of the capital, Constantinople, with especially high-quality art. Today it is in this tiny former rich and peaceful province of the Byzantine Empire that many of most precious surviving relics of Byzantine art are to be found.This feasibility study will benefit from two key recent developments which now make it possible to develop such highly authentic reconstructions of ancient Byzantine environments: progress in high fidelity physically based computer graphics including accurately modelling of participating media, and the availability of novel High Dynamic Range displays and high-precision eye-tracking systems. The goal of this feasibility study is to determine whether there is indeed a significant difference in the way in which people view Byzantine art today, and as it may have appeared in the past as they were displayed in their original environments and were illuminated by candle light, oil lamps and day light.The results from this project should provide new insights into how Byzantine art may have been viewed in the past and provide guidelines for future high-fidelity computer reconstructions of cultural heritage artefacts.