RETOLD

EXARC is looking for a few open-air museums willing to test our new app in the coming weeks. The app is to document buildings: you mostly use photos and a sequence of questions for the initial setting up of a house, which then is followed by for example notes on maintenance. In the end, this app is meant to manage a digital documentation of the stories of both archaeological open-air museums and historical, skansen-type, open-air museums. 

Retold is an EU cooperation project where EXARC and partners develop a method for open-air museums to document, digitise and share their stories. One of the avenues is that we create 3D models of the houses in these museums. These models are then dressed with all kinds of information. Our specialists from XYZ Technical Art Services have developed most of our approach.

On Tuesday, March 28th, during meeting at Sibiu, Cordula Hansen and Shay Gilna (NUWA) led a session “Introduction to Photogrammetry”. The aim of the workshop was to introduce participants to accessible, practical ways of documenting buildings, objects and environments as 3D models using current mobile and desktop applications.

Early Spring 2023, we spent a short week in Sibiu, to discuss going digital with open-air museums. The Complexul National Muzeal ASTRA is one of the largest of this kind of museums in Central and East Europe, counting over 300 houses. The idea of the museum goes back to the end of the 19 th century. Originally they started with installations like for example wind and water mills.

The RETOLD project is in its third year now, so we used the chance to visit Romania and discuss every aspect of documenting, digitising and sharing of the stories of open-air museums. The tools we develop will be available to all open-air museums worldwide.

The RETOLD project is beginning to show its first technological results. Through close collaboration between RETOLD partners UAB and Nuwa Digital Media and under leadership from EXARC, a working prototype of our digital documentation tool for open-air museums is being built.

Early March, we had the chance to visit the Steinzeitpark Dithmarschen in Schleswig, Germany. Occasion was the official opening of their new museum building, a project which was at least ten years in the making, but it was an excellent opportunity for preparations of the RETOLD meeting which will take place here in Autumn-Winter 2023. EXARC is the lead partner in this cooperation project. This meeting in late 2023 in Dithmarschen is foreseen to be a study meeting where we will discuss progress of the EU project, very important because coming winter we will enter the final year of the project.

Over the past three weeks EXARC worked with the three RETOLD museums partners to develop the banners for the second stage of the exhibition, each of the partners is holding at their premises. In 2022 we developed banners which explained the project goals and the partners.

In Berlin, in the Museum Village Düppel, exciting steps are taken. Their village and the surroundings are based on excavation results of a real medieval settlement from around 1200 AD. Can Düppel be digitized? They want to create a digital museum village which can be used in virtual- and augmented reality for education. We can also use digital models to show alternative interpretations of house reconstruction as well as engaging new visitor groups with cultural heritage through virtual and augmented realities.

Results of the Project virt:düppel now on Sketchfab!

In January 2023 our accountant who will do a final audit / reporting of the project (EXARC part) had a look at the first two project years. We wanted to be sure that the system is clear, that all the files can be found and are properly connected to the reporting form. In this way the work of the audit at the end of the project can be done faster, as he will only need to check the last two years and make a final report. We will only have two months to report the whole project back to the EU, and there is also a Christmas break in between.