Architectural References to Virtual Environments Design
Rodrigo García Álvarado, J.C. Parra, Rodrigo Lagos Vergara, Hernán Alberto Barría Chateau · eCAADe proceedings · 2000
Based on a comparison between the perception of digital and real construction, the development of virtual systems and the review of additional sources, this paper states some differences between the design of virtual environments and architectural spaces. Virtual-reality technologies provide advanced capabilities to simulate real situations, and also to create digital worlds not referred to physical places, such as imaginary landscapes or environments devoted to electronic activities, like entertainment, learning or commerce. Some on-line services already use 3D-stages, resembling building halls and domestic objects, and several authors have mentioned virtual modeling as a job opportunity to architects. But it will argue in this paper that the design of those environments should consider their own digital characteristics. Besides, the use of virtual installations on networks impells a convergence with global media, like Internet or TV. Virtual environments can be a 3Devolution of communicational technologies, which have an increasing participation in culture, reaching a closer relationship to contemporary architecture.