Barcelona Pavilion
The Barcelona Pavilion, designed by Mies van der Rohe, was a German entry
for the 1929 World Exposition at Barcelona. The pavilion existed for 6
months and disappeared during the shipping back to Germany. Although its
existence is now confined to cyberspace, the Barcelona Pavilion is still
considered to be the most famous masterpiece of modern architecture. (see Note at bottom of page)
An excellent presentation of the Barcelona Pavilion
with exquisite renderings, background information, and a tour via HTML or
QuckTime VR is available on the web from the
School of Architecture
Property and Planning at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
We developed a model of the pavilion (based on data obtained from SGI) for
experiments in immersive virtual reality and for the study of the following
topics:
- geometry simplification via polygon reduction algorithms;
- real-time rendering techniques in immersive VR; frame rate optimization;
- human relation to a full size representation in immersive VR;
- navigation through and around the pavilion; diving through the pool;
- texture mapping on flat and curved surfaces; translucent surfaces;
- animations via Inventor nodes shuttle, pendulum, rotor, and blinker;
- model representation in VRML 1.0 and 2.0 including level of detail nodes
Our test version is different from the original pavilion, and the
animations placed into the model may not be appropriate regarding the
intended spirit of this building. We hope, however, that these sacrileges
do not offend the many admirers of Mies van der Rohe's work.
Views of the Barcelona Pavilion:
Birds-eye view from a close-by earth with orbiting moon:
Still frames of some animations:
|
Load the VRML 2.0 model
(563K + 266K textures) of the Barcelona Pavilion and explore. Click trough the viewpoint list for a guided tour. |
Note: A reader of this page from Spain pointed out to us that the Barcelona Pavilion was rebuild between 1981 and 1986 in the Montjuic mountains, site of the Barcelona 1929 International Exposition, where this jewel of architecture can now be seen again. Thanks to Josep Maria Beroy for this valuable information.
Last Update: December 5, 2002, kpb
