A Review of Augmented Reality Applications for History Education and Heritage Visualisation

Augmented reality is a field with a versatile range of applications used in many fields including recreation and education. Continually developing technology spanning the last decade has drastically improved the viability for augmented reality projects now that most of the population possesses a mobile device capable of supporting the graphic rendering systems required for them. Education in particular has benefited from these technological advances as there are now many fields of research branching into how augmented reality can be used in schools. For the purposes of Holocaust education however, there has been remarkable little research into how Augmented Reality can be used to enhance its delivery or impact. The purpose of this study is to speculate regarding the following questions: How is augmented reality currently being used to enhance history education? Does the usage of augmented reality assist in developing long-term memories? Is augmented reality capable of conveying the emotional weight of historical events? Will augmented reality be appropriate for teaching a complex field such as the Holocaust? To address these, multiple studies have been analysed for their research methodologies and how their findings may assist with the development of Holocaust education

Dead men's eyes: embodied GIS, mixed reality and landscape archaeology

Archaeology has been at the forefront of attempts to use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to address the challenges of exploring and recreating perception and social behaviour within a computer environment. However, these approaches have traditionally been based on the visual aspect of perception, and analysis has usually been confined to the computer laboratory. In contrast, phenomenological analyses of archaeological landscapes are normally carried out within the landscape itself, computer analysis away from the landscape in question is often seen as anathema to such approaches. This thesis attempts to bridge this gap by using a Mixed Reality (MR) approach. MR provides an opportunity to merge the real world with virtual elements of relevance to the past, including 3D models, soundscapes and immersive data. In this way, the results of sophisticated desk-based GIS analyses can be experienced directly within the field and combined with phenomenological analysis to create an embodied GIS. The thesis explores the potential of this methodology by applying it in the Bronze Age landscape of Leskernick Hill, Bodmin Moor, UK. Since Leskernick Hill has (famously) already been the subject of intensive phenomenological investigation, it is possible to compare the insights gained from 'traditional' landscape phenomenology with those obtained from the use of Mixed Reality, and effectively combine quantitative GIS analysis and phenomenological fieldwork into one embodied experience. This mixing of approaches leads to the production of a new innovative method which not only provides new interpretations of the settlement on Leskernick Hill but also suggests avenues for the future of archaeological landscape research more generally