Flights now confirmed: I have been invited to NTNU (Trondheim Norway, in conjunction with the echoing.eu project) 16-17 October and then I hope to visit and talk in the UK at the University of Salford on games (especially Assassin’s Creed and the upcoming book with Dr. Juan Hiriart), and over 23-25 October UWE Bristol (book launch of Screen Tourism and Affective Landscapes), and Cardiff University (dark and difficult digital heritage).
OA paper written with Dr Hafizur Rahaman and Dr David McMeekin on panorama +3D tools! “Outside Inn: Exploring the Heritage of a Historic Hotel through 360-Panoramas” in MDPI Heritage: Special Issue Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and GIS for Built Heritage.
This research project investigates the potential of 360-panorama tours to improve the situated and contextual interpretation, virtual visitation, and spatial understanding of recorded or simulated built heritage sites. Our chosen case study was the Subiaco Hotel, a significant heritage building designed by Summerhayes Architecture, which we documented using 360-degree photographs and linked with other media to create an interactive 360-panorama tour. Today, 360-degree panorama tours such as Google Street View enable the virtual exploration of heritage sites and historic buildings. They demonstrate limited interaction and immersion across a range of platforms and devices, without the requirement of expensive virtual reality headsets, but typically do not integrate other media to leverage spatially richer ways to communicate the historical developments of architectural interiors and exteriors. The primary goals of this study were to establish a comprehensive step-by-step workflow for creating an interactive tour of a significant heritage site, demonstrate how other media such as text, videos, and 3D models can be linked, gather feedback from cultural heritage professionals, and offer future research directions and development guidelines. Apart from detailing an optimized workflow for developing interactive 360-degree virtual tours for heritage buildings, we also offer guidelines for optimal panoramic tour creation and implementation.
Keywords: 360-panoramas; heritage; virtual tour; historic hotel; Summerhayes Architecture; Subiaco Hotel; heritage interpretation; conservation; workflow; linked data
URL: https://mdpi.com/2571-9408/6/5/232 and PDF: https://mdpi.com/2571-9408/6/5/232/pdf
CITE: Rahaman, H.; Champion, E.; McMeekin, D. Outside Inn: Exploring the Heritage of a Historic Hotel through 360-Panoramas. Heritage 2023, 6, 4380-4410. https://doi.org/10.3390/heritage6050232
CFP: Australia/NZ Conferences
With an emphasis on conferences in heritage and IT-related themes in Australia or New Zealand for the rest of 2023 and the start of 2024.
| *START* | DUE | CONF | THEME | LOCATION |
| 9/10/23 | 12/6/2023 | VRST | 29th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology | Christchurch New Zealand |
| 9/10/23 | 15/06/23 | Web3D | 3D for a Connected World | San Sebastian Spain |
| 10/10/23 | 22/06/23 | CHIPLAY2023 | Computer-Human Interaction in Play: work in progress | Stratford Canada |
| 13/10/23 | 23/6/2023 | SUI | ACM Symposium on Spatial User Interaction | Sydney Australia |
| 16/10/23 | 5/6/2023 | ISMAR | 22nd IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality | Sydney Australia |
| 20/11/23 | 2/6/2023 | NDF23 | NDF23 WHANAKE \ EVOLVE | CALL FOR IDEAS | Wellington New Zealand |
| 4/12/23 | 14/6/2023 | OZCHI | Design from a distant world | Wellington New Zealand |
| 18/12/23 | 26/05/23 | TAG | Theoretical Archaeology Group | East Anglia UK |
| 8/04/24 | 1/06/23 | CAA2024 | Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology (call for sessions mid 2023) | Auckland New Zealand |
| START | *DUE* | CONFERENCE | THEME | LOCATION |
| 18/12/23 | 26/05/23 | TAG | Theoretical Archaeology Group | East Anglia UK |
| 8/04/24 | 1/06/23 | CAA2024 | Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology (call for sessions mid-2023) | Auckland New Zealand |
| 20/11/23 | 2/6/2023 | NDF23 | NDF23 WHANAKE \ EVOLVE | CALL FOR IDEAS | Wellington New Zealand |
| 16/10/23 | 5/6/2023 | ISMAR | 22nd IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality | Sydney Australia |
| 9/10/23 | 12/6/2023 | VRST | 29th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology | Christchurch New Zealand |
| 4/12/23 | 14/6/2023 | OZCHI | Design from a distant world | Wellington New Zealand |
| 9/10/23 | 15/06/23 | Web3D | 3D for a Connected World | San Sebastian Spain |
| 10/10/23 | 22/06/23 | CHIPLAY2023 | Computer-Human Interaction in Play: work in progress | Stratford Canada |
| 13/10/23 | 23/6/2023 | ACM SUI 2023 | ACM Symposium on Spatial User Interaction | Sydney Australia |
Norway in October
Have been invited to the Norwegian University of Science and Technology – NTNU in Trondheim to give a talk and possibly a workshop for echoing.eu (“Recovery of cultural heritage through higher education-driven open innovation”).
And it looks like I may have funds for a book launch in Bristol, a talk at Salford University (near Manchester) and a talk at Cardiff University in Wales. Still to fully organize the UK side trip though.
ICOMOS 2023 GA in Sydney
The General Assembly for the International Council on Monuments and Sites is in Sydney 31 August to 9 September: https://icomosga2023.org/ and I am presenting and co-chairing the Digital Heritage session (Tuesday 5th and Thursday 7th September), hope to see you there!
Early bird registration is still available.
Grants, grants, and more grants!
No, I haven’t received any either. However, I have decided to put all my fun and crazy ideas down and craft them into small modular grant ideas. I’ve basically got to the stage where writing (publications) is not really a good thing to do at universities, they want cash, they’re just very indirect in admitting it. If I have to spend all my time doing business things, I might as well venture back to business, but in the meantime, I thought, why not go back into the grant-writing slipstream? But grants for activities that are actually enjoyable to undertake?
First project, escape rooms.
Second project, oh that would be telling.
Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or A Stab in the Dark?
The book contract is signed, the chapter authors are completing their chapters, and we have a book cover image from Ubisoft (not this one, this is a screenshot from AC Origins Discovery Tour), I just need to update my own chapter and references.
Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or A Stab in the Dark?
Editors: Erik Champion, Juan Hiriart
Publisher: De Gruyter, Video Games and the Humanities series
Section 1: History Through Play
- Historical Video Games and Teaching Practices, Marc-André Éthier, David Lefrancois
- Discovery Tour Curriculum Guides To Improve Teachers’ Adoption of Serious Gaming, Chu Xu, Robin Sharma, Adam K. Dubé
- Christian Vikings storming Templar Castles: Anachronism as a Teaching Tool, Ylva Grufstedt, Robert Houghton
- Ludoforming The Past: Mediation Of Play And Mediation Of History Through Videogame Design, Julien Bazil
Section 2: Cultural History, Tours And Tourism
- Studying Greek Culture Through Historical Characters In Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, Nathan Looije
- Empathy and Historical Learning in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla Discovery Tour, Juan Hiriart
- Ubisoft’s Ancient Greece Discovery Tour as a Pedagogical Tool for a School Trip, Kevin Péloquin, Marc-André Éthier
- Discovering The Past As A Virtual Foreign Country: Assassin’s Creed As Historical Tourism, Angela Schwarz
Section 3: Narration, Creation, and Exhibition
- Classical Creations in a Modern Medium: Using Story Creator Mode in a University Assignment, Hamish Cameron
- Assassin’s Creed @ the Carlos: Merging Videogames and Education in the Gallery, Kira Jones
- From the Sketchbook to Assassin’s Creed Valhalla: An Experiment in Architectural Education, Manuel Sanchez Garcia, Rafael de Lacour
- Assassin’s Creed As Immersive and Interactive Architectural History, Erik Champion
2023-4 Pending, TBC, or in-press publications
Pending, To Be Presented or Published
Books and edited books in press, or under review (1)
- Champion, E., & Hiriart, J. (Eds.). (2023: contracted). Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or a Stab in the Dark? De Gruyter: Video games and the Humanities series.
Book Chapters in press (8)
- Champion, E., & Hiriart, J. (2023: invited). Workshopping Board Games for Space Place and Culture. In C. Randl & D. M. Lasansky (Eds.), Playing Place: Board Games, Popular Culture, Space. Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA: MIT Press. 8 August 2023. https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262047838/playing-place/ ISBN 9780262047838.
- Champion, E. M. (2023: invited). Virtual Heritage: How Could It Be Ethical?? In A. Pantazatos, T. Ireland, J. Schofield, & R. Zhang (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Heritage Ethics. Routledge. Chapter sent.
- Champion, E. (2023: invited). Caught between a Rock and a Ludic Place: Geography for Non-Geographers via Games. Invited. Games and Geography. Germany, Springer-Nature. Chapter sent.
- Champion, E. (2023: in press). Assassin’s Creed As Immersive and Interactive Architectural History. In E. Champion, & J. Hiriart, (Eds.). Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or a Stab in the Dark? De Gruyter: Video games and the Humanities series. Chapter sent.
- Champion, E., & Emery, S. (2023: invited). Gamification of Cultural Heritage as a resource for the GLAM sector. In J. Nichols & B. Mehra (Eds.), Data Curation and Information Systems Design from Australasia: Implications for Cataloguing of Indigenous Knowledge in Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums. Emerald Publishing. Sent.
- Champion, E. (2023: invited). DH-XR: Extended Reality’s Relevance to the Digital Humanities. Routledge Encyclopedia of Technology and the Humanities. Routledge (Contracted). Edited by Chan Sin-wai & Wing Lok Yeung. Routledge. Chapter sent.
- Champion, E., & Rahaman, H. (2024: invited). Mobile Realities Beyond Vision and Photorealism. Mobile Heritage: Practices, Interventions, Politics. Edited by Ana-Maria Herman, Key Issues in Cultural Heritage (KICH), Routledge. Abstract sent. Chapter proposal accepted, chapter due 1 May 2023.
- Emery, S. & Champion, E. (2024: Invited). Escape From Gaol: Augmenting Affect Behind Bars. In J. Micieli-Voutsinas & A. M. Person (Eds.), International Handbook of Heritage and Affect: Designing and Experiencing Places of Heritage. Routledge. Pending/TBC.
Pending Journal Articles (1)
- Rahaman, H., Champion, E. M.; McMeekin, D. TBA.
Pending Conference Papers (1)
- Champion, E. & Rahaman, H. (2023). Difficult Decision-making: the Democratic Layer Missing in Virtual Heritage. ICOMOS General Assembly Scientific Symposium, Sydney. Accepted. 6/9/2023. https://icomosga2023.org
Upcoming Invited Talks/Keynotes/Panels (7)
- Invited to Virtual Memoryscapes Workshops, part of Participatory Workshops: Co-Designing Guidelines for Digital Interventions in Holocaust Memory and Education, led by Dr. Victoria Grace Walden (University of Sussex) and SPECS-Lab (The Netherlands). 28 February, 14 March 2023. Virtual. https://reframe.sussex.ac.uk/digitalholocaustmemory/
- Invited adjunct professor, virtual lectures (digital animation), Faculty of Technology and Design, Universitas Bunda Mulia, Jakarta, Indonesia, 24 February, 10 March, 5 and 12 May 2023: VR in Games, VR for history learning, The effectiveness of game technology for academic learning, New Trends and Technologies in VR for human daily life.
- Champion, E. M. Reworking Architecture as Art in the Age of Virtual Replication. In Real Space-Virtual Space. Aesthetics, Architecture, And Immersive Environments, AN-ICON INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP, Milan, Italy; 19-21 June 2023. https://an-icon.unimi.it/
- Champion, E. M. Invited talk, NTNU Trondheim Norway, 16-17 October.
- Champion, E. M. Book launch, Manchester, 18-19-20 October. TBC.
- Champion, E. M. Book launch, UWE Bristol, 23 October. TBC.
- Champion, E. M. Seminar, University of Cardiff, 25 October. TBC.
Collaboration possibility
Non-Australian academic? know my research into collaborative game design for history and heritage? Like me to run a workshop or gamejam then cowrite a publication with you/colleagues/your student? Email me ASAP (in next few hours) and I can apply for funding here to come to you.
Update: offer now complete, and grant applications in, thanks all!
Update: book contract signed!
Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or A Stab in the Dark, an edited book with co-editor Juan Hiriart, is in process, contract sent/signed with De Gruyter…
Image Credit: Midjourney.
More travel
Between 1-9 September I visit ICOMOS General Assembly in Sydney as a co-chair of the Digital Heritage session (the schedule is up on https://icomosga2023.org/).
Somewhere between September and December (or even into 2024), I will be invited to Trondheim in Norway by a dear friend and leader of echoing.eu archaeologist Aleka Angeletaki to give a talk on my latest book (well, 2nd edition, Playing With The Past: Into The Future) and also a workshop on game prototyping. Dates have not been set yet but I believe they will let me take a short side trip.
New book, new cover?
Champion, E., & Hiriart, J. (Eds.). (2023: accepted). Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or a Stab in the Dark? De Gruyter: Video games and the Humanities series.
It looks like the “Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom: History’s Playground or a Stab in the Dark?” edited book is close to the contract stage, and hopefully will be published by the end of the year…what sort of cover image do you suggest? For De Gruyter’s “Video Games and the Humanities” series (must suit their theme colour):
“Real Space-Virtual Space” Workshop MILAN 2023
I am honoured to be invited to the workshop “Real Space-Virtual Space. Aesthetics, Architecture and Immersive Environments”, scheduled on 19 – 21 June 2023 at Università degli Studi di Milano and Triennale Milano.
Website https://an-icon.unimi.it/ (this workshop is not online yet, I believe).
Location: the University of Milan and Triennale Milano
AN-ICON INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP 19th – 21st June 2023: Real Space-Virtual Space: Aesthetics, Architecture, And Immersive Environments. Organized by the project ERC “AN-ICON” University of Milan.
- Mediarcheology of virtual architectural representation.
- Designing in VR.
- Phenomenology and Aesthetics of the Virtual Space.
- Participatory design and virtual technologies.
- Unrealised projects and virtual or augmented reality.
- Cyberspaces and imaginary/utopian architecture.
- Virtual reality and architectural heritage.
- VR as a training tool.
- Cities, media and virtual practices.
New Journal article
Our article “Exploring Historical Australian Expeditions with Time-Layered Cultural Maps” has been published in IJGI and is available online:
Website: https://www.mdpi.com/2220-9964/12/3/104
PDF Version: https://www.mdpi.com/2220-9964/12/3/104/pdf
Exploring Historical Australian Expeditions with Time-Layered Cultural Maps
The Australian Time Layered Cultural Map platform was created to help digital humanities scholars investigate how online geospatial tools could provide exemplars to their humanities colleagues on how historical collections and cultural data could be extended and re-examined with geospatial tools. The project discussed here investigated how Recogito/TMT could effectively extract spatial and temporal data from pure text-based historical information and generate time-layered interactive maps of that spatio-temporal data using accessible and user-friendly software. The target audience was humanities scholars relatively new to geospatial technologies and relevant programming systems. The interactive maps were created with two free, open-source web applications and one commercial GIS (Geographic Information System) mapping application. The relative pros and cons of each application are discussed. This paper also investigates simple workflows for extracting spatiotemporal data into RDF (Resource Description Framework) format to be used as Linked Open Data.
Chapter out
Reimagining the Humanities edited by Mauer and Salter is out! I wrote a chapter in there somewhere. https://lnkd.in/dgfpc_CK ISBN 978-1-64317-346-7
Champion, E. (2023). Not Quite Virtual: Techné between Text and World. In B. Mauer & A. Salter (Eds.), Reimagining the Humanities (pp. 282). Parlor Press. https://parlorpress.com/products/reimagining-the-humanities
PhD Opportunity #2: Escape Room Design
PhD study opportunity* at the University of South Australia (in Adelaide, South Australia) https://unisa.edu.au/research/degrees/participatory-museum-game-design
“ln this project-based research degree, you will investigate and design learning kits for museums and communities and small classes to create escape rooms (physical or hybrid or via a game engine) to help students develop their own learning by designing escape rooms for others. “
*Sorry, there are no degree fees for locals but there is also no scholarship funding attached to this one.
PhD Opportunity: Audio-Augmented Reality
PhD study opportunity* at the University of South Australia (in Adelaide, South Australia) https://unisa.edu.au/research/degrees/leveraging-audio-augmented-reality
“lead tourists around past & present live music hotspots & live music history locations of Adelaide with directed thematic or user-driven audio tours”
*Sorry, there are no degree fees for locals but there is also no scholarship funding attached to this one.
new book: Screen Tourism and Affective Landscapes
Screen Tourism and Affective Landscapes: The Real, the Virtual, and the Cinematic (Routledge, 2022).*
Edited By Erik Champion, Christina Lee, Jane Stadler and Robert Moses Peaslee
This book explores ways in which screen-based storyworlds transfix, transform, and transport us imaginatively, physically, and virtually to the places they depict or film. Topics include fantasy quests in computer games, celebrity walking tours, dark tourism sites, Hobbiton as theme park, surf movies, and social gangs of Disneyland.
How physical, virtual, and imagined locations create a sense of place through their immediate experience or visitation is undergoing a revolution in technology, travel modes, and tourism behaviour. This edited collection explores the rapidly evolving field of screen tourism and the affective impact of landscape, with provocative questions and investigations of social groups, fan culture, new technology, and the wider changing trends in screen tourism. We provide critical examples of affective landscapes across a wide range of mediums (from the big screen to the small screen) and locations.
This book will appeal to students and scholars in film and tourism, as well as geography, design, media and communication studies, game studies, and digital humanities.
*Webpage says 2023 but routledge told me 2022 but routledge said 2022.
Playing with the Past: Into the Future
I believe my latest book (well second edition) is out today, “Playing with the Past: Into the Future” (in the Human–Computer Interaction Series) https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-10932-4 but it just takes to me to my own university library link so I’ll have to take my own word for it!
Since the turn of this century (and even earlier), a plethora of projects have arisen to promise us bold new interactive adventures and immersive travel into the past with digital environments (using mixed, virtual or augmented reality, as well as computer games). In Playing with the Past: Into the Future Erik Champion surveys past attempts to communicate history and heritage through virtual environments and suggests new technology and creative ideas for more engaging and educational games and virtual learning environments.
This second edition builds on and updates the first edition with new game discussions, surveys, design frameworks, and theories on how cultural heritage could be experienced in digital worlds, via museums, mobile phones, or the Metaverse. Recent games and learning environments are reviewed, with provocative discussion of new and emerging promises and challenges.
Playing with the past: INTO The Future (2023)
Milan in June 2023
I have received an invitation from the ERC Advanced Project “An-iconology. Theory, History, and Practices of Environmental Images” (AN-ICON) hosted by the Department of Philosophy “Piero Martinetti” (https://an-icon.unimi.it/) to speak at the “AN-ICON” International Workshop in MILAN June 2023. An honour to be invited.
We are now organising the workshop “Real Space-Virtual Space. Aesthetics, Architecture and Immersive Environments,” scheduled on 19th-21st June 2023, dedicated to the dialogue between virtual spaces, architecture and urban planning. We will investigate this intertwining which is more and more relevant at both practical and academic level by adopting a transdisciplinary and multimethodological approach – including aesthetics, phenomenology, media studies, architectural design, urban planning, cultural heritage studies.
The workshop will be held at the University of Milan and Milano Triennale (https://triennale.org/), the renowned Italian institution dedicated to design and architecture.
Erik Champion 