To recreate an ancient Mayan city, Nebraska anthropologists turn to tech: LiveBIG 2017-18

University Communication Author

09/18/2017 Added

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Armed with the latest in virtual reality technology, University of Nebraska anthropologists are piecing together the past to build a rich and immersive experience that takes users to the heart of the Mayan Empire.

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[00:00:01.368]I started with paper maps over 10 years ago
[00:00:03.713]and now we're working in virtual reality.
[00:00:05.512](lively music)
[00:00:09.600]My research focuses on a Maya site in Honduras.
[00:00:12.397]I'm interested in the visibility of objects
[00:00:14.592]so if somebody is walking down the main road
[00:00:18.157]what would they see?
[00:00:19.400]It's not necessarily the objects themselves
[00:00:20.908]that we're interested in,
[00:00:21.894]it's about the people of the past,
[00:00:23.512]what did they experience,
[00:00:24.411]what were their daily lives like?
[00:00:26.074]We use the obejcts to understand the human behavior.
[00:00:29.105]Virtual reality provides an experience
[00:00:31.062]so that people can feel how the Maya lived.
[00:00:33.607]It's kind of like the closest to a time machine we have.
[00:00:35.920]It puts us there in that spot in the moment
[00:00:38.232]in a way that is not possible in any other way.
[00:00:41.805]I want people to get an appreciation
[00:00:43.099]for the ancient Maya
[00:00:44.260]but also cultural diversity in general.
[00:00:47.339]We're using tools that are very modern
[00:00:49.744]and futuristic to study a very ancient period in history
[00:00:53.715]and I think it goes against the public perception
[00:00:56.362]of what archeologist do.

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To recreate an ancient Mayan city, Nebraska anthropologists turn to tech: LiveBIG 2017-18

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