AR Art Experiences
For this project, created for Dr. Mariah Proctor-Tiffany’s AH 497 Digital Art History course, I utilized Augmented Reality (AR) to experiment with new ways for viewers to interact with and experience artworks, particularly sculptures. This project explores the future of museum accessibility for wider audiences, as well as the dangers of perceiving digital representations as ‘the truth.’
When viewing sculptures in a museum, there are fixed viewpoints for the visitor to observe depending on the placement and the protections placed on the art by the museum. The viewer is not able to experience the artwork in-the-round to get a sense of the three-dimensionality of the sculpture and fully appreciate the artistic skill that went into its creation.
Augmented Reality (AR) adds virtual aspects to real life, usually via the camera on a smartphone, and allows users to physically walk around and interact with what they see. This is different from Virtual Reality (VR), where the viewer is completely immersed in the virtual world, and the physical world is shut out. For this project, I utilized AR to experiment with new ways for viewers to interact and experience artworks, particularly sculptures.
Video clip: User’s in-app experience screen recording
Snapchat Lens Studio
To achieve this project, I utilized Snapchat’s Lens Studio, which allows users to create their own custom Snapchat lenses using AR technology. Snapchat filters, which use facial recognition to add effects and accessories to live videos, are one of the most popular and well-known examples of AR. Lens Studio seemed to be the most user-friendly, which was ideal because of the little experience I had working with 3D rendering. Also, the program offered a variety of templates with most of the preprogramming already done, including spatial and ground recognition.
The National Gallery of Denmark #SMKOpen
The National Gallery of Denmark allows free downloads of their now thousands of 3D files without needing permission, effectively democratizing the use of digital art objects. Among the downloads available is a 3D scan of a plaster cast of the sculpture Venus de Milo (Aphrodite of Milos), a Roman copy in marble after Greek original from the 2nd century BCE.
“Triangles” in reference to 3D modelling refers to the “mesh” that makes up the 3D image; more triangles creates a smoother model, while fewer triangles cause the model to appear more geometric. Lens Studio recommends that the triangle count of models not exceed 10,000, but the Venus de Milo model originally contained almost three million triangles. Using the 3D modelling program Blender, I was eventually able to decimate the triangle count to eight thousand; .3% of the original model. As expected, the rendering of the model changed from smooth to geometric, breaking from the model’s original appearance. From Blender, I was able to export the file and import the model into Lens Studio.
Original Venus Scan at 2,742,586 triangles
Venus scan at 8,226 triangles (decimated to .3% of original)