The Huys Hengelo Project
- A 3D model of 'Huys Hengelo' and its surroundings
- An educational web site on the traditional way of building a wooden farm
The two sections will be explained below. To view the results yourself right away, click here.
Introduction
The Huys Hengelo project was started in the 1999 computer graphics course at our department with a small number of students, and two local historian experts. The objective of the project was to create a 3D model of a specific historic building. This old castle ('Huys Hengelo') existed in our region roughly from the 16th to the 19th century and played an important part in the development of the area. In 1821 the castle was demolished and the area was used for industry buildings. During 1993-1995 these building were pulled down and the foundations of the castle were excavated. These excavations (in which our experts have played a key role [4]), resulted in a floor map (see fig. 1) of the foundation and many stone fragments, that were found in the area that had been the castle-moat.
Figure 1: The map of the excavation, created in 1995
The Huys itself
Little is known of what the Huys exactly looked like. The few available historic sources contradict each other: according to Craandijk's drawing (fig. 2), the Huys was rectangular, while Stellingwerf's drawing (fig. 3) suggests it was L-shaped [2]. It is plausible that both variants have existed, at different moments in time. The Huys could have been L-shaped first, and later on be extended to the rectangular version.
Figure 2: The drawing by Craandijk, showing a rectangular Huys Hengelo, a small farm building on the left, and a church on the right.
Figure 3: The drawing by Stellingwerf, showing an L-shaped Huys Hengelo and a protective wall that is not present in Craandijk's drawing.
To deal with such uncertainties, we have created the VR reconstruction of the Huys in such a way that allows the user to change the appearance of the Huys. For example: there has been a stone gate near the Huys, but its exact location is not known. When viewing the 3D scene, a user is able to move the gate between the most plausible locations. This ability to change between different options within the virtual reconstruction provides experts with a tool to communicate their theories, both to other experts and to a wider audience.
The farm
For our virtual reconstruction, our goal was to not only model the Huys itself, but also the surrounding area: the island on which it was built, the water, the protective walls, etcetera. In our research on the area surrounding the Huys, we found that the farm which belonged to the Huys had existed until 1916. Compared to the Huys, a lot is known about this farm:
- The historical archives of the city of Hengelo contain a detailed description of a renovation of the farm, including a floor plan with a description of the different rooms [3].
- In the book "De Bouw van de Twentse Boerderij" by M.L.M Hesselink, an expert explains from recollection how this type of farms used to be built until the beginning of the 20th century [1]. This expert has worked on one of the last farms that were completely built in this traditional way.
Consequently, a side-project was initiated around the farm and it's building process. This has resulted in an educational web site, shows the separate building steps as animated 3D scenes, accompanied by detailed descriptions of specific parts of the wooden structure.
Results
The results of this research can be viewed by clicking on the screenshots below. As all 3D content is made in VRML, a VRML-plugin (such as CosmoPlayer) is needed to view the 3D scenes correctly. Note that the Huys Hengelo uses a Java-console to switch objects on/off, which runs best on Netscape browsers, due to some problems with the Java interface in Internet Explorer.
Visit Huys Hengelo
Visit the Twente Farm
(in Dutch)
Publications
- M. Kragtwijk, A. Nijholt, D. Reidsma, Building Huys Hengelo in VRML, In: Proceedings of the International Cultural Heritage Informatics Meeting 2001 (ICHIM'01), Milan, Italy, September 2001. (View as PDF)
References
[1] Hesselink van der Riet, M.L.M. De Bouw van de Twentse Boerderij, Stichting Matrijs, Utrecht, 1984.[2] Nijhof, H. De tekening van Stellingwerf, Oald Hengel, February 1999, 8-9.
[3] Nijhuis, G.A.B. Reconstructie schoolmeestershuis en schuur bij Huys Hengelo, Jaarboek Twente, 1995.
[4] Reynders, H. Historie en opgraving Huys Hengelo, 1996.
Members
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Last modified on 15 Oct 2001 by Martijn Kragtwijk