Scapa Flow WW2

Scapa Flow WW2

Culture,Intangible Heritage

In 2020, we collaborated with the Scapa Flow Museum in Orkney. The museum was closed for redevelopment, with a new extension being built and a reopening to the public on the 2nd of July 2022. Working from the museum's extensive archive of photos and documents, we created a digital reconstruction of the camp at Lyness to help show the scale of Lyness during wartime. This was installed in the museum for the reopening in 2022 as an interactive VR experience. Scapa Flow Museum’s role is to chart Orkney’s military involvement in the First and Second World Wars, and provide a safe home for a major collection of wartime artefacts, many of national and international importance. Their stories are brought to life through a world class display of over 250 artefacts and interactive exhibits, some never displayed until now, in extensively redeveloped and extended galleries. In 2023, Scapa Flow Museum was a finalist for Art Fund’s prestigious Museum of the Year prize, the largest museum prize in the world. For more information on the Scapa flow Museum visit: https://www.orkneymuseums.co.uk/our-museums/scapa-flow-museum/

reconstructions

2020/21

Reconstruction

1512

In Copyright (InC)

current,58.8337389780696,-3.1971904635429387;

https://openvirtualworlds.viewin360.co/share/collection/7k6Gf?logo=1&info=0&fs=1&vr=1&sd=1&initload=0&thumbs=1

Open Virtual Worlds Team University of St Andrews

TEXT

Firstly, a digital landscape was created using survey data and height maps. Following extensive historical research and collaboration with specialists, 3D models are created and imported into UNREAL Engine (a cross-platform game engine for creating virtual worlds). Models are textured, scaled, oriented and assembled. Scenes are created and populated with appropriate objects, including furniture and artefacts. Landscapes populated with flora and fauna. Weather settings and atmospheric lighting. Where applicable, models of characters, animals or 3D digitised artefacts were imported and animated.

The former Royal Navy base at Lyness, Hoy, lies at the heart of Scapa Flow, which provides an enormous sheltered anchorage, in a commanding position from which to control the North Sea and the North Atlantic. Scapa Flow was the base for the Navy’s Grand Fleet in WW1, and again for the (renamed) Home Fleet in WW2. Funded through CUPIDO, an international project developing new business opportunities in the culture and heritage sector, the VR display will allow visitors to ‘wander’ around the WW2 naval base at Lyness. The project draws on the expertise of the University of St Andrews School of Computer Science. It’s one of several trans-national digital heritage projects supported by CUPIDO which sees Highlands and Islands Enterprise, in partnership with the University of St Andrews, working with communities and social enterprises across the North of Scotland to help economic development within the culture sector. CUPIDO "Culture Power - Inspire Development in Rural Areas" itself is an Interreg North Sea Region cultural heritage project involving 16 partners from 7 regions around the North Sea. (Interreg Europe helps regional and local governments across Europe to share, develop and deliver better policy and is funded by the European Regional Development Fund.) Ann Marie Reid, senior project manager at HIE, said: “We have been working with the University of St Andrews, through ‘CUPIDO’, to help the heritage sector adopt relevant technologies to modernise their cultural offering and enhance commercial growth. “Scapa Flow Museum is a fantastic example of an organisation using innovative digital technology to reach a wider audience. It’s great to be able to offer people the virtual reality experience to retell the important story of Scapa Flow’s history.” Research Fellow at the University of St Andrews' School of Computing Science, Sarah Kennedy, has been working closely on the project’s digital recreations: “We wanted to show visitors the extent and importance of the Naval base that once stood here. Using an immersive 3D exhibit, we can demonstrate to museum visitors the scale and spread of buildings that covered the site.” - https://www.orkney.gov.uk/latest-news/sneak-peek-at-scapa-flow-museums-virtual-reality-installation/

Jude Callister (Scapa Flow Museum)

Sarah Kennedy, Iain Oliver, Alan Miller (University of St andrews)

1943 - WW2