In this section of the exhibition, you can discover stereoscopic photography, moving from the use of an analogue camera to a modern virtual reality experience.
The stereoscopic photographs documenting the 1857 earthquake come to life, offering us a three-dimensional account of Mallet’s scientific expedition. Accompanied by a publication from the Royal Society of London, this extraordinary photographic record by Alphonse Bernoud and Claude Grillet represents one of the earliest examples of photography being used to bear witness to a natural disaster.
The images are of immense historical and documentary value: they show collapsed buildings, destroyed streets and landscapes transformed by the force of the earthquake.
They also represent a valuable resource for studying the evolution of photographic techniques and visual perceptionfrom the nineteenth century to the present day.
Stereoscopic photography, in fact, can be regarded as the most important precursor to contemporary three-dimensional (3D) modelling technologies.
With TeLù’s VR experience, you will be able – thanks to a face-tracking system (face tracking) – to view a three-dimensional scene of the nineteenth-century earthquake, gaining a stereoscopic and realistic view of the setting.
It will feel as though you are immersing yourself in the landscape through the eyes of the past!
