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Paper presented at the Innovation Expo Amsterdam April 14th 2016
Henk Scholten, Steven Fruijtier, Steven Bos, Eduardo Dias Mark Opmeer, Heidy van Kaam, Sanne Hettinga, Willemijn Simon van Leeuwen, Marianne Linde, Niels van Manen, Rubio Vaughan and Ceciel Fruijtier
Geodan BV, President Kennedylaan 1 1079 MB Amsterdam, The Netherlands +31 (0)20 - 5711 311, [email protected] www.geodan.com
VU University Amsterdam Faculty of Economics and Business Administration SPINlab, Spatial Information Laboratory De Boelelaan 1105, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands +31 20 59 86099, [email protected] http://spinlab.vu.nl
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ABSTRACT
Various disciplines and all kinds of professionals put forward opinions
how to create smart cities and how to answer future demands. What we
need is a synergetic multidisciplinary approach, exchanging data and
insights across the limits of disciplines. Moreover, we need all
stakeholders to get involved, including the people of the place.
Geocraft provides an excellent interactive virtual 3D environment at a
well chosen level of abstraction to design, visualize and explore future
scenarios, raising spatial insight and mutual understanding. Geocraft is
connected to spatial data infrastructures (SDIs). Smart conversions
enable us to import data from existing databases into the virtual
environment of the popular Minecraft game.
The virtual world of Geocraft is a georeferenced representation of the
real world. It is a smart environment wherein real-time impact models
can be run to virtually simulate ánd visualize future developments and
their implications, providing the user with relevant information during
design processes. Data generated or added in Geocraft can upgrade
existing databases and data infrastructures (SDI’s).
Similar to LEGO bricks, everybody intuitively understands how to use
Geocraft blocks to adequately simulate reality ánd to easily design
future scenarios. Via advanced internet technology, Geocraft enables us
to get all stakeholders on spatial issues involved, including the people of
the place. Worldwide 70 million children, among which 80% of all kids in
The Netherlands build, design and play in Minecraft. We expect adults to
follow their example.
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Content ABSTRACT .................................................................................................. 1
Outline of this paper ............................................................................. 4
Introduction .............................................................................................. 5 Smart governance ............................................................................. 5
Designing the path towards optimal solutions ................................. 6
PART 1: Geocraft, a SDI connected tool for visualization, communication, design, impact analyses and serious gaming ................ 8
1.1 SDI connected.................................................................................. 8
1.2 Visualization .................................................................................. 10
The building blocks of Geocraft ...................................................... 10
A wide range of SDI data can be imported into Geocraft ............... 11
1.3 Communication ............................................................................. 17
1.4 Design ............................................................................................ 18
1.5 Impact analyses ............................................................................. 19
1.6 Serious gaming .............................................................................. 20
Games addressing real-life problems ............................................. 20
Immersive experience with optimized learning transfer ................ 21
PART 2: Use cases showing the added value of Geocraft ...................... 22
2.1 High school research & design project on water management and land use Markermeer .......................................................................... 22
An innovative approach .................................................................. 23
Advanced learning and design processes ....................................... 24
Ameliorated communication and collaboration ............................. 25
2.2 Spatial planning in IJburg .............................................................. 26
2.3 Towards more renewable energy and energy saving in Zaandam 28
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2.4 High school students contribute to the Buiksloterham ................ 29
2.5 The Netherlands in Minecraft ....................................................... 31
The dawning of a virtual society ..................................................... 33
The call for regulations and enforcement....................................... 33
Crowd sourced in-game management ............................................ 34
An ongoing challenge ...................................................................... 35
PART 3: The basic logistics of creating, using and maintaining a Geocraft world ........................................................................................ 36
3.1 The creation of a Geocraft World.................................................. 36
3.2 Hosting .......................................................................................... 38
Smart plug-ins ................................................................................. 38
Geocraft servers .............................................................................. 39
3.3 Maintaining and controlling a Geocraftworld ............................... 39
PART 4: Possible future applications ...................................................... 41
4.1 Trends in spatial planning and citizen science .............................. 41
4.2 Technologic advances ................................................................... 43
4.2.1 Augmented Reality and 3D sensors as a collaborative tool ....... 44
Unfolding spatial plans.................................................................... 45
Dynamic interaction ........................................................................ 45
Enhanced collaboration .................................................................. 46
Gaming gets really serious .............................................................. 47
4.2.2 Virtual Reality as a simulation and education tool ..................... 48
Augmented virtual reality ............................................................... 50
A new Artificial Intelligence framework: Bots and Geocraft........... 51
Bridging the gap between the virtual and the real world ............... 52
Conclusion ............................................................................................... 54
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Outline of this paper
After an introduction reflecting on the reasons that urged us to start this
Geocraft journey, this paper comprises four parts. At first we explain
what Geocraft exactly is and discuss its possibilities. Secondly, we
illustrate its utility by a few use cases. In the third part, we outline the
basic organization needed to use Geocraft. We answer in short the
question how to create and maintain a Geocraft world and consider the
choices that can be made. At last we sketch possible future
developments in using Geocraft to address geospatial issues.
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Introduction
Worldwide we envision the need to develop smart cities to answer
future demands. As explained in the UN publication ‘The City We Need’1,
cities can be considered as spatial entities wherein complex systems
interlock: engineering arrangements, social and cultural organizations,
economic structures and environmental components. In any of these
systems, multiple stakeholders are operating with different interests
from varying points of view.
The city governance tries to facilitate the optimal development of this
complex world. Smart ICT technology offers notable support to achieve
this objective, by getting the people of the place engaged in a most
accessible way. They dispose of highly valuable expertise and unique
insights into local situations and possibilities. Their daily urban activities
contribute to sustainable development and new urban economic
activities.
Amsterdam is a good example of a city which embraces a bottom-up
approach and accomodates local initiatives, startups and digital social
innovation. On April 8th
2016, the European Commission awarded the
title of European Capital of Innovation ("iCapital") 2016 to Amsterdam
for its holistic vision of innovation related to four areas of urban life:
governance, economics, social inclusion, and quality of life.
Smart governance
Recent developments in geospatial data services facilitate smart
governance by creating advanced insight in complex processes and by
supporting complex decision making. Geospatial models enable us to
simulate future developments. Top of the range visualization and
discussion tools support the exchange of insights across the limits of
disciplines and raise mutual understanding between different
stakeholders. Modern ict technology offers local initiatives and urban 1 See http://www.worldurbancampaign.org/city-we-need, published by UN-Habitat, the United Nations programme working towards a better urban future.
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policies many opportunities to cooperate and to take decisions
collaboratively.
Figure 1: A Geodesign process integrates information and incorporates insights
from different sources.
Geodan is specialised in multi-stakeholder multi-criteria decision making
and embraces the Geodesign concept to support decision processes. A
Geodesign process invites all stakeholders involved to provide input and
enables dawning insights to be incorporated during the process. Smart
modelling enables testing whether intended goals will be achieved and
how negative effects can be mitigated.
Designing the path towards optimal solutions
Geodesign is based on and shaped by a set of questions and methods
necessary to solve complicated design problems, which are related to
challenges at different geographic scales.2 Roughly speaking, a
Geodesign process incorporates input from four different fields: design
2 See Steinitz, C. (2012) A Framework for Geodesign, published by Esri Press, Redlands.
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professions, information technologies, geographic sciences en most
important: the people of the place. The same emphasis on the decisive
role of the people of the place is put forward in the UN publication
mentioned above: they know the place the best and their engagement
and participation is crucial for any successful plan. Geodesign offers a
strong framework to cooperatively design the path to an optimal
solution.
During a Geodesign process, we attune the way we offer data to specific
audiences for specific purposes. Geocraft enables us to get the people of
the place involved, including the youth. The full potential of the
collected experience, knowledge, talents and ideas of urban dwellers
can be inventoried and utilized. This opens the way for innovative higher
level solutions, firmly grounded on public support. Policy principles can
be translated in practicable plans tailored to local conditions. A wealth
of talent and ideas can be explored and shared, contributing to the
creation of smart cities.
Figure 2: High school students used Geocraft to design the urban environment of their own school; they discuss realistic options with an urban designer (see use case IJburg Amsterdam, The Netherlands, paragraph 2.2).
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PART 1: Geocraft, a SDI connected tool for
visualization, communication, design, impact
analyses and serious gaming
Geocraft is a 3D interactive virtual world similar to the popular computer
game Minecraft, in which we can visualize any 3D geospatial data you
like. In Geocraft not only concrete structures can be depicted, but also
features like the amount of air pollution, noise disturbance, energy
labels, etc. Visualizing cities in Minecraft results in an innovative
representation of the city, displaying the specific aspects of the city you
want to analyse or display (see figure 2). But Geocraft offers far greater
possibilities.
1.1 SDI connected
Geocraft is connected to spatial data infrastructures (SDIs). Different
geospatial data can be visualized by choice, impact analyses can provide
results and relevant information during the design process. That is the
important difference between Geocraft and a random Minecraft world:
Geocraft is a truly interactive smart world, wherein your own data and
models can be integrated.
Lots of organisations and governments already have spatial data
infrastructures (SDIs). In the Netherlands we have a national spatial data
infrastructure3, which is maintained by the Dutch government. Many
local governments developed their own SDI on top of that. For example
Datalab Amsterdam maintains many open datasets and explore new
applications for data which is collected by different stakeholders in this
city. Geocraft can connect to these existing data and visualize them in
the virtual world of Minecraft. Potentially, all geospatial data of a
specific geographical area can be added, forming a 3D database of that
3 Grus, L.; Bregt, A.K.; Crompvoets, J.W.H.C.; Castelein, W.T.; Rajabifard, A. (2009)
Developing a goal-oriented SDI assessment approach using GIDEON - the Dutch SDI implementation strategy - as a case study, WUR, Wageningen.
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area capable of visualizing data from different sources superimposed on
each other.
Figure 3.1: The Dam Square in Geocraft, including the underlying stratigraphy. Amsterdam is build on Holocene and Pleistocene sediments, basically alternating layers of sand (yellow), clay (green) and peat (brown).
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Page 9, Figure 3.2: Detail of figure 3.1, revealing the piles whereon the buildings are build to be supported by the so-called first sand layer. In addition, the sewerage system, service pipes and the underground tubes van be seen. (Dam Square, Amsterdam, The Netherlands). The ‘grid lines’ in this view of the subsurface reveal the building blocks of Geocraft, who measure 1 to 1 meter.
Because Geocraft is SDI connected, data created in Geocraft are
available in the users own geospatial databases and can be used by any
other SDI connected application. The user can select data revealing to be
of significant relevance to specific processes and export these to other,
more specialized SDI based environments. For example to run
sophisticated models and impact analyses
1.2 Visualization
Specialized virtual environments or visualization tools usually ask for
professional experience to work with. Geocraft is very user friendly
enables ‘non-professionals’, for example citizens or highschool students,
to provide input and add their unique point of view and knowledge of
local data. So we can tap the full potential of the collected experience,
knowledge, preferences, talents and ideas of the people of the place.
The building blocks of Geocraft
Geocraft provides an interactive virtual 3D environment at a well
chosen level of abstraction. The real world is simplified to blocks from 1
to 1 meter: the Minecraft world is a voxel based 3D world made up of
blocks of 1 m3. This simplification turns out to be one of the powers of
this approach: no high level of expertise is needed to design and adjust
scenarios in Geocraft.
Every block represents a certain Minecraft material, e.g. wool,
brickstone and water. Some of these materials can be detailed more e.g.
to define colour or type of bricks. A group of 16x16x16 of these blocks is
called a chunk. The chunks of a 2D area of 512x512 blocks are stored in a
region file. A Minecraft world consists of one or more of these region
files depending on the size of the world. In Geocraft, we can create
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worlds ranging in size from your neighborhood to the complete
Netherlands (comprising over 1000 milliard blocks).
A wide range of SDI data can be imported into Geocraft
Not only data representing real 3D objects like (urban) landscapes can
be visualized, but any geospatial data. For example data on energy use
and supply, traffic capacity, air pollution, flood risk, noise disturbance,
etc. Basically, all geospatial data can be imported in Geocraft, see table
1. The results of impact models can be superimposed on topographical
data, 2D data can be combined with 3D data, etc. What data to visualize
depends on the issue the user wants to address.
Since Geocraft is SDI connected, data added in Geocraft is available for
other SDI based applications and visa versa. The intuitive user interface
of Minecraft enables non-experienced designers to design solutions that
can be exported to more specialized 3D virtual environments. For
example, landscape elements can be easily inserted in Geocraft.
Subsequently in other 3D environments, such as Geodans 3D interactive
viewer Falcon, a more realistic view of the resulting landscape can be
generated.
Different datasets of the same location can in Geocraft be superimposed
on each other, resulting in a more and more enriched view. This is
illustrated by subsequent views on Bourtange, a fortified city at the
north-eastern border of The Netherlands.
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Table 1: examples of geospatial data that can be imported in Geocraft
Ground level data Nation-wide point clouds (like AHN2 in The
Netherlands)
DEM
2D topographic data Distribution of land versus water,
infrastructural elements like roads, rivers,
etc, and buildings like houses, offices, etc.
Landscape elements like trees or houses (like
BAG data for buildings in The Netherlands)
3D data 3D data models like Collada, BIM
Elements built by children, citizens or
professional designers.
3D subsurface
data
A voxel representation of
subsurface data (like
Geotop in The Netherlands)
Underground infrastructure;
e.g. tunnel tubes, piles,
pipelines, wires, etc.
2D or 3D results from
impact models
For example the area suffering noise
disturbance after placing a windmill, or the
amount of energy saved after furnishing
houses with double-glass.
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Figure 4.1: Surface Height transformed to Geocraft (Bourtange, The Netherlands)
Figure 4.2: Topographic data transformed to Geocraft
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Figure 4.3: Surface height and topographical data combined
Figure 4.4: Topographical data and 2D building data combined. The building height is averaged. (Bourtange, The Netherlands)
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Figure 4.5: 2D data (tree location, building footprints, topographical data) combined with 3D data (for surface height and buildings). Bourtange, The Netherlands.
Figure 4.6: Aerial photograph of Bourtange, The Netherlands.
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Figure 5.1: Example of a KMZ/Collada file converted to Geocraft (football stadium Bernabeu of Real Madrid)
Figure 5.2: Example of a KMZ/Collada model (the Plaza Mayor, Madrid) loaded into a Geocraft world.This Geocraft world is generated using Spanish Cadastral data, containing minimal and maximum floor levels. An average of 3 meter is taken as floor height.
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1.3 Communication
Similar to LEGO bricks, everybody intuitively understands how to use the
blocks of the popular Minecraft game, to adequately simulate reality ánd
to easily design future scenarios. Geocraft enables citizens to virtually
concretize their ideas on for example urban planning or future land use.
So Geocraft offers citizens the opportunity to communicate their ideas
on geospatial issues towards authorities in an effective way and visa
versa: governments can offer citizens the opportunity to virtually visit
and examine future scenarios. Geocraft can be used as a strong
communication tool to display and share ideas and plans.
Various disciplines and all kinds of professionals put forward opinions
and advises how to create smart cities. What we need is a synergetic
multidisciplinary approach, exchanging data and insights across the
limits of disciplines. As an easy to use visualization tool, Geocraft helps
creating mutual understanding between different disciplines.
Figure 6.1: The Dutch deep subsurface in Geocraft (vertical scale = 5 km), looking at the northwestern coastline of The Netherland. You can spot the island of Texel in the upper left corner of the above image. The subsurface clearly reveals a major angular unconformity covered by Tertiary sediments.
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1.4 Design
In answer to future developments, we need to address a number of
processes with a geospatial component. Think about mobility, water
governance, landscape development, land use, the supply of energy,
food, materials, etc. We have to deal with the interaction between these
geospatial issues. Visualizing geospatial scenarios proposed by different
disciplines in the same virtual environment, instantly reveals where
different plans and processes affect each other.
All relevant geospatial data can be visualised in Geocraft. In Geocraft we
visualized not only The Netherlands above ground, but also the Dutch
subsurface (see the deep subsurface in figures 5.1 and 5.2). The relation
between the underlying geology and land use is clear at a glance. See for
example figure 2.2 with the top 50 meter of the subsurface: the subway
tubes are put in the stable sand layer. Visualizing the subsurface in
combination with land use can be of great help to establish the so called
“Omgevingsvisies”4 the Dutch government aims for.
Figure 6.2: Detail of the Dutch deep subsurface in Geocraft; a volcano beneath
the Wadden Sea. In the above view, you are at 5 kilometer depth, looking
upwards through the former volcanic vent towards Tertiary sediments covering
the volcano. This volcano was active over 175 My ago (late Jurassic).
4 Spatial development strategies to be defined by each municipality of The Netherlands
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1.5 Impact analyses
Decades ago, we started to accumulate data from different sources and
disciplines and assembled them in digital geographical information
systems, providing data to people who needed them for a variety of
purposes. The mutual significance of the examined data became clear in
a way unimaginable before, generating insights very difficult to glimpse
when dealing with separate datasets. The standardisation of data from
different sources and disciplines made them complementary and
exchangeable.
Nowadays, we are pretty sophisticated in mathematically describe and
model all kinds of geospatial processes and display them in 3D virtual
geographical environments. The power of geospatial analytics has an
impact far beyond the traditional usage of geo-data. We can virtually
simulate and visualize future developments ánd their implications,
enabling us to envision the superimposed effects of different processes.
This smart interactive 3D virtual environment provides a platform to test
various ideas on a wide range of issues. Impact analyses can interactively
provide information during the design process. Adding elements you get
real-time information on its effects.
Think for example about placing a specific windmill. In Geocraft, we can
provide instantly visualized information about the area suffering of noise
disturbance, indicated in different noise levels depending on the
distance to the windmill and the surroundings. You see exactly which
locations in the area are affected in what extend. At the same time, you
can get information on other relevant aspects. For example the costs of
this specific kind of windmill, whether this windmill is suited for this
specific location (e.g. current legislation), how much energy this windmill
is expected to generate, as well as the energy demand of the region.
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Figure 7:The area suffering of noise disturbance after placing a specific kind of windmill. The purple area is most affected. Via pink and yellow zones the nuisance decreases towards the green area.
1.6 Serious gaming
Via the internet, children play all sorts of games in Minecraft. For
example ‘conquer the flag’: two teams of children each build the best
defense structure they can imagine, in only 5 minutes time. Then the
battle begins. The team with the best defense structure, the best battle
strategy and the best cooperation wins.
Games addressing real-life problems
We can apply the gaming environment of Minecraft to address real-life
problems by serious gaming in Geocraft. For example the battle against
sea level rise or noise disturbance. Geocraft is a smart environment.
Teams can get a budget and an aim to strive for, and chose from
different options to achieve that aim. Impact models will instantly supply
information on the results of the used interventions. The team solving
the problem with the best result against the lowest costs wins.
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Why bother to use Geocraft for serious gaming? Firstly, because the
interface is very user friendly and can be intuitively used. Secondly,
because it evokes synergetic cooperation between participants who can
have a totally different background and even do not have to know each
other, as we see with the kids conquering the flag. Thirdly, because
Geocraft is a smart environment in which we can simulate the real world
and raise real strategies and solutions for real problems.
Immersive experience with optimized learning transfer
It is known that workshops in problem solving strategies might exhibit a
poor learning transfer. The reason for this is that these practices often
are carried out in more or less decontextualised training environments,
insufficient related to ‘every-day life at the office’ of the trainee.5 To
improve learning transfer, Herrington and Oliver (2000) have proposed
so-called authentic learning environments (ALEs). ALEs are designed to
enable learning experiences with real-world relevance.
In Geocraft, we can adequately simulate real world problems and real
world strategies. Using Geocraft to address real life problems, showed to
raise insights, and as such Geocraft proved to be a strong educational
tool, as we shall illustrate in part 2 of this paper. Moreover, serious
gaming in Geocraft might turn out to be a very efficient way to raise a
synergetic multidisciplinary approach, exchanging data and insights
across the limits of disciplines. We imagine serious gaming in Geocraft
can facilitate governments to tap and utilize the full potential of the
collected experience, knowledge, talents and ideas of all stakeholders
involved. We envision serious gaming in Geocraft can help to reach
optimal solutions for tomorrows problems.
5 See Rens Kortmann et al, 2016 in press: Veerkracht, A game for servant-leadership development
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PART 2: Use cases showing the added
value of Geocraft
In this paper, we present very recent technologic advances. After
creating Geocraft, the first thing we did was offering it to high schools: it
is an excellent educational tool to enhance spatial insight, to raise
awareness and insights in a number of geospatial issues, and to develop
typical 21th century skills: communicating, finding and evaluating
information, creating and innovating, collaborating, problem solving.6
During these high school projects, we tested how a tool like this can be
deployed for public participation processes. At the moment of writing,
we already started several projects to use Geocraft for civil participation.
We are for example designing a contest between different
neighbourhoods to develop steps towards durable energy. These
projects are in the preliminary stages. Therefore, in the below use cases
we limit ourselves to projects wherein high school students address
adult issues.
2.1 High school research & design project on
water management and land use Markermeer7
The Netherlands have a record of claiming land from water. For this
purpose, between 1963 and 1976 a dike was raised between Enkhuizen
and Lelystad, aimed at the creation of new land: the Markerwaard.
However, over the decades agricultural production methods improved
significantly, and in 2003 the Dutch government decided not to invest in
new farmland anymore. Meanwhile, the waters in the occluded
6 See Mark Opmeer et al, 2016 in progress: The added value of Geocraft for educational
purposes 7 All graphics in this paragraph are designs made in Geocraft by high school
students of the Technasium at Lelystad, displaying a possible future scenario of the Markermeer.
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Markermeer area stagnate, resulting in a severely decreased water
quality and heavily damaged ecosystem.
The government decided to convert the area into an extensive nature
reserve: a ‘future proof ecological system’. In addition, the area should
provide recreation space to accommodate the nearby densely populated
urban areas. Furthermore, the opportunities to gain renewable energy
and to raise freshwater food production should be explored. Potentially,
the area is suitable to cultivate the Chinese mitten or usable algae.
Durable energy might be generated by windmills, solar modules or by
growing biomass.
An innovative approach
Over a 3 month period, the students worked on this project for 5 hours a
week. They have to come up with a design to recover the damaged
ecosystem and to optimize the combination of the four objectives:
recreation, food production, energy and most important: nature. Instead
of ‘an empty bathtub with stagnant water’ the government aims for a
variform area, comprising 500 hectare island surfaces. After studying
literature and gathering information from the internet, the students
designed and eventually presented their solution in Geocraft.
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Hitherto, in similar projects the students used photo collages, hand-
made maps and scale models to present their solutions. The virtual
visualization of the designs improved them significantly: working in
Geocraft effected a much higher level of detail and accuracy. However,
this result was not the biggest gain: Geocraft ameliorated the learning
and design process remarkably.
Advanced learning and design processes
Geocraft provided an immersive experience. Instead of trying to
understand the spatial relationships from descriptions and 2D maps, the
students could walk around in the virtual simulation of the studied area.
Every spot can be approached and examined from every direction.
Geocraft generated direct insight in scale size, dimensions and
proportions. The students got an immediate look on the actual result
while making changes; the impact of the changes revealed themselves at
once. That made it a ‘real experience’ instead of a theoretical exercise.
In addition, Geocraft makes it very easy to modify the designs. This
enables a ‘sketching design process’: students can try, modify, en renew
their ideas without being confronted with considerable efforts coming
along with making changes. As a result, the students obtained a higher
creative freedom compared to ‘the old way’ of designing. Progressive
insights could be accommodated much more easily.
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Ameliorated communication and collaboration
Geocraft showed to advance communication and collaboration
processes within the design teams. Working simultaneously in the same
virtual environment necessitated tuning and adaption. Different subjects
had to be amalgamated into a coherent joint design. Working isolated
from one another was impossible, conflicting approaches revealed
themselves at once. This provoked the substantiation of actions and
decisions and coerced a more or less continuous exchange of
substantive arguments. The students became much more aware of the
impact of what they were planning to do. Problem solving thinking
arised spontaneously; it was simply the only possible way to proceed.
Geocraft turned out to be a great tool to induce typical 21th century
skills: communicating, finding and evaluating information, creating and
innovating, collaborating, problem solving. The learning content was
transmitted much more effectively. Moreover, this approach maximized
the engagement of the students. Not only because they became much
more aware of what they were doing, but also because they had great
fun ‘playing with Minecraft’.
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2.2 Spatial planning in IJburg
To accommodate the increased need for residential areas, adjacent to
the city of Amsterdam a new island is being claimed from the IJselmeer:
IJburg. At the newly build IJburg high school, a project started to engage
high school students in the design and urban planning of the
surroundings of their school.8
Two GIS specialists erected the neighbourhood in Geocraft and prepared
the software, a sociologist facilitated the educational and planning
processes and a urban planner created a final design. The students
already knew Minecraft or learned on the job, the teachers were present
to support the group dynamics. The students were divided into design
teams to redesign the space around their school. They worked 4 sessions
of 2 hours, one session per week. Each team got a simple instruction:
change the current world into one you like! 9
Based on the input from
the design teams, a professional urban planner amalgamated the
8 This project was initiated and
facilitated by consultancy agency ‘BuurtPerspectief’ and the SPINlab of the Free University of Amsterdam. 9 Minecraft as a planning tool - part 1 - The environment we dream of
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1yKWedHS20
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different ideas of the students into one, feasible design.10
Not all objects
created made it to the final design; explicit erotic street art and statues
were not incorporated in the final design, or when several overlapping
ideas were present (each group had a library) only one was picked.
This project collected and inventoried the students' needs and wishes as
users of the space. Using Geocraft, the students participated actively
and were enabled to express definite wishes within the actual available
space (such as the desired size of a football field, the preferred location
of a skate park, etc.). This way, they provided distinct input for the
professional urban planner. The final design met the students wishes,
including a playground for kids, pop-up stores, leisure and places to
meet, in- & outdoor activities. The students still recognized the planner's
design as their own design and would definitely support its realization.
Figuur 8: The final plan for the spatial design of the surroundings of IJburg College (Amsterdam, The Netherlands).
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Minecraft as a planning tool - part 2 - A more realistic design https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIsEfBAXl14
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2.3 Towards more renewable energy and energy
saving in Zaandam
Worldwide we strive for energy saving and a transition towards
renewable energy because the amount of fossil fuels is limited, climate
changes, and we want to be less dependent of foreign countries. In
Geocraft, a serious game is developed to challenge students of the
Zaanlands Lyceum to come up with the best solution for their
neighbourhood: realize the most energy saving and the most renewable
energy for the lowest price. Hereto, they can take three measures. For
each measure, smart models in Geocraft calculate costs and benefits:
1. Raise wind mills. The higher the wind mill, the more energy is
generated. However, higher wind mills are more expensive to
raise.
2. Implement solar panels. If the solar panels on a building
generate more energy than the building consumes,
overproduction is not rewarded (as in The Netherlands, you get
almost no compensation for the energy you pass to the grid).
3. Apply thermal insulation.
In Geocraft, the students own
neighbourhood is created. By removing
and adding specific blocks, each design
team can position solar panels, apply
thermal insulation, or build wind mills in
their own Minecraft environment. In
Excel, they have to administer the costs
and benefits of the different energy
measures. During two lessons, they get
the opportunity to try the game and to
establish a handy Excel spreadsheet for
their administration. Thereafter it’s for serious: they get 4 lessons to
conserve in their virtual neighbourhood as much energy as possible at
the lowest costs. After each lesson, the smart Geocraft programme
presents their inferred results with respect to costs and benefits.
Figure 9: A Geocraft windmill
29
This project will raise the students awareness of the potential energy
measures in their own neighbourhood and the energy consumption of
different buildings, as different types of buildings in Geocraft have
different energy labels, just like reality. Moreover, the students are
divided into design teams, each representing another stakeholder with
a different concern: the government,
the people of the place, the energy
supplier and the operator of the
electricity grid. Presenting their final
results, the students will learn that what
is regarded to be the best solution
totally depends on the chosen point of
view. During this project, the students
have to tend different complex tasks to
achieve a good result. They get a feeling
how to address complex issues as a team
and practise the required skills.
Figure 11: Thermal insulation of a residence; first the outer layer is removed, then
a white layer added.
2.4 High school students contribute to the ‘Living
Lab’ Buiksloterham
In Amsterdam, the local government linked up with local companies,
citizens, entrepreneurs and artists to develop a circular neighbourhood
at a cultural heritage site: the northern IJ-shore, a former industrial area
with remnants of the rich Amsterdam history in producing a.o. ocean
liners, oil tankers and aircrafts. The joint efforts aim for a zero-waste
district that is self-sufficient in energy and re-uses not only rainwater but
Figure 10: Implementation of solar panels
30
all materials to establish a circular economy. Buiksloterham is a so-called
‘Living Lab’: no top-down plan is enforced but local initiatives following
the guidelines are supported and stimulated.
In the middle of an undeveloped part of this district, the Hyperion
Lyceum is situated. Its students are going to use Geocraft to design the
urban environment of their own school. Different issues are being
addressed. 350 residences have to be integrated in a lively, mixed
district with a high diversity wherein people can work, live ánd recreate.
At the moment, Buiksloterham is distinctly separated from the adjacent
neighbourhoods; somehow this should be breached. Several old
industrial buildings have to get a new destination, fitting in the context
of a circular neighbourhood. Moreover, the possibility of bridging The IJ
can be considered, however the students should examine how this
would affect mobility patterns and what possible social implications
might be caused.
In this project the disciplines economy, geography, history and visual
arts meet in an attempt to contribute to an innovative urban design,
fostering the awareness of the cultural heritage. The students get
divided into design teams, each dedicated to a specific challenge. At the
end of a 8 week period, each team will present their ideas and designs to
meet their challenge. We look forward to the results of this
groundbreaking approach.
Figure 12: The Buiksloterham in Geocraft, existing buildings in black,
planned buildings in white.
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2.5 The Netherlands in Minecraft – thousands of
children contribute to enhance the virtual reality
Stichting Geofort11
asked Geodan whether it was possible to create the
whole of the Netherlands on a scale 1:1 in Geocraft, including all the
trees, roads, rivers, buildings, etc. Geodan succeeded in this challenge,
the children of The Netherlands were next: Geofort challenged them to
turn the grey Geocraft towns into a realistic impression mimicking the
real world, appropriate on scale. Every minecraft player can join the
Geocraft.NL server online.12
Figure 13.1: The Eusebius church in Arnhem (The Netherlands), a marvellous
example how children succeeded to change the grey data loaded in Geocraft into
a realistic representation of reality. The grey buildings with orange roofs in the
surroundings are still waiting to be made more realistic.
11 GeoFort is an educational attraction on an
exciting fort in the New Dutch Waterline in the field of cartography and navigation. On GeoFort the visitor will meet old and new geotechniques in the GeoExperience, the ‘intelligent’ maze and Bat Trail Garden. See: www.geofort.nl 12
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU3nZGHmwEw
32
Figure 13.2: The church doors are open, welcoming GeoGuests and GeoCitizens
to visit and have a look inside.
The results were stunning, as illustrated by figures 12.x. Over 3000 kids
have already been building fantastic churches, fortresses, residences,
schools, railway stations, hotels, shopping centers, town squares, etc.
Geocraft players can find their way in the Geocraft.NL world by a smart
plug-in made by Geodan: all the larger cities, towns and villages can be
‘warped’ by entering /WARP followed by the name of the place.
Figure 13.3: A splendid example of an interior, mimicked in Geocraft. Notice the
church organ in the rear.
33
The dawning of a virtual society
On Geocraft.NL, collaboration and joint projects emerge spontaneously.
Children initiate big cooperate building projects, for example to finish
the Dom Tower in Utrecht. In the chat, children make appointments and
set a date and time to put their shoulders to the wheel. The people of
Vreeland joined efforts to mend every detail of their town. The center of
Amsterdam is being collaboratively build by a group Minecraft players.
The Netherlands in Geocraft comprises over 1000 milliard blocks. It took
some doing to oversee and regulate what the kids were doing. Initially,
The Netherlands in Geocraft were more or less immediately destroyed
at the day of release. Volcanic flows emerged everywhere and many
phallus symbols were raised, especially after showing this particular feat
on the national youth news channel that very evening. As in the real
society, this virtual society needs regulations and administrative
leadership.
Figure 13.4: Gothic architecture mimicked in Geocraft: the interior of the
Eusebius church (Arnhem, The Netherlands).
The call for regulations and enforcement
Several measures had to be taken. First of all, The Netherlands had to be
reloaded in Geocraft. Secondly, a GeoCadastre and a hierarchic structure
were established, distributing rights to build. Geofort appointed
34
different government officials. The officials of the Geofort themselves,
maintaining this Geocraft world, have the highest ranks: ‘Son of the
King’. Adults spontaneously offering technical support and assistance are
appointed ‘Representatives’. All other officials are Minecraft playing
children, who can apply for the job. GeoCommissionars of the King are
highest in rank and have special building permits. GeoMayors can build
everywhere and give GeoCitizens rights to build on a limited area.
This hierarchic system worked for some time, but when some children
started to berate one another, and others started to destroy each others
buildings, it became clear that a penalty policy was needed. These rules
are now clearly communicated to every GeoCitizen (children building in
this Geocraft world have to register themselves as a GeoCitizen) .
Transgressing the rules, one might be muted, kicked or even banned.
The Bijlmer Bajes (the jail of Amsterdam) was equipped to house
delinquents spending their ban time.
Crowd sourced in-game management
Since October 2015, over 3000 kids registered as GeoCitizens. Geofort
succeeded in establishing a partly crowded sourced in-game
management: teenagers who successfully applied to the job of
GeoMayor or GeoCommissionar. Now these voluntary officials fulfill
over a 300 positions, familiarizing GeoGuests and newborn GeoCitizens
with the rules and possibilities of Geocraft.NL. They answer questions,
explane how to do things and serve out building plots to newborn
GeoCitizens.
Next to these daily active volunteers contributing to The Netherlands in
Minecraft, a couple of Geofort workers deal with the administration and
server management of Geocraft.NL on a day to day basis. At the
moment, Geofort is upscaling its support and maintenance capacity, to
deal with the growing numbers of visitors and actors in this virtual
society.
35
Figure 14: Minister Melanie Schultz-Van Haegen, Ministry of Infrastructure and
the Environment, looking for her own residence in GeoCraft.NL.
An ongoing challenge
The challenge continues: GeoCitizens are invited to take screenshots of
the buildings they are most proud of and send these to Geofort. Weekly,
GeoFort selects the building of the week. Every day, The Netherlands in
Minecraft resembles reality more and more.
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PART 3: The basic logistics of creating, using
and maintaining a Geocraft world
Smart conversions enable us to import data from existing databases into
the virtual environment of the popular Minecraft game. Basically, in
Geocraft all 2D and 3D geospatial data can be visualized. In principle,
there is no limit to the amount of users you want to give access to a
Geocraft world.
3.1 The creation of a Geocraft World
In table 1, we render an overview of the input data we used so far. From
these geospatial datasets, we create georeferenced raster files on a
scale 1:1. Subsequently, we generate tiles according to the Minecraft
scheme and map the raster files to the Geocraft region tiles. The first
step, creating all needed raster files, only takes a few days on a single
computer, even for a geocraft world comprising the whole of The
Netherlands. For the second step, the generation of the Geocraft region
tiles, much more computer power is needed. For example: on a 4 core
CPU machine, the creation of all region tiles of The Netherlands in
Geocraft would require more than 100 days. However, this part of the
process is suitable for parallel computing.
To create The Netherlands in Geocraft, per region file a distinctive set of
4 input raster files (building height, surface height, trees and land use) is
used. This allows the processes to be executed independently of each
other. In a cloud based parallel computing environment, the conversion
of all raster files into Geocraft region files can be executed in a few days.
We deployed this process in the Microsoft Azure Batch platform. We
describe the procedures in more detail in our paper “The Netherlands in
Minecraft – Methodology and usage” (Fruijtier et al 2016, in progress).
37
Figure 15: From geospatial data to Geocraft world.
38
The Netherlands are approx. 300x200 km in size. On a scale of 1 meter is
1 block this results in a Geocraft world of approx. 300000x200000 blocks
in size or 60 billion square blocks. As every Minecraft world is divided
into region files of 512x512 blocks, the Netherlands in Minecraft will
consist of 586 x 391 region files or 229.126 Geocraft region files. Each
Geocraft region file is approx. 4 MB in size. The Netherlands in Geocraft
will therefore be approx. 900 GB.
3.2 Hosting
The standard Minecraft server software offers little possibilities for
managing the Minecraft worlds. Therefore, almost all Minecraft servers
use modded Minecraft server software called Spigot. Spigot allows
additional functionality and management options through plug-ins.
Smart plug-ins
Geodan develops its own plug-ins to add specific functionalities to
Geocraft. We focus on the connection with existing (spatial) data and
services. An example is the geocoding service used in GeoCraftNL. It
allows people to transport to a given address instead of entering
coordinates. The geocoding plug-in takes the entered address and uses a
web service from the GeodanMaps cloud environment to return the
location of the address. Another plug-in calculates the energy efficiency
of projects built in Minecraft and compare these to the actual local
energy consumption. There is even a plug-in to track and trace people
real-time and show their locations in Minecraft.
Using a local copy of a Geocraft world, no hosting is needed. The single-
player mode of Minecraft is dependent on data stored locally on your
computer. This can be usefull, for example when you add a 3D model
and want to check whether it is loaded correctly before making the
world available to other users. As soon as you want to share a Geocraft
world with others, you use the Minecraft multi-player mode and have to
39
connect to the Minecraft server where this specific Geocraft world is
hosted.
Geocraft servers
An example of a Minecraft server is the GeoCraftNL server, where
people mend the basic contour lines of The Netherlands in Minecraft by
adding more detail and colour to mirror the real world, as described in
paragraph 2.5. This server can be reached through the Minecraft address
geocraft.nl. Another example is Geocraft, a server offered by the SPINlab
of the Free University of Amsterdam to provide secondary schools (VWO
level) with serious Geocraft games, addressing a variety of geospatial
issues (see use cases).
Setting up a server involves installing the Minecraft server software. The
software can either be deployed on own servers or a managed
environment can be used. When using a managed environment, system
administration tasks such as the installation and configuration of
Minecraft services, back-ups, etc. are carried out by the provider.
3.3 Maintaining and controlling a Geocraftworld
When making available a Geocraft service, several organisational aspects
have to be implemented in order to create a maintainable and
controllable service. If you just setup a server and offer free access to
everybody without restrictions, it will be a complete mess in no time. A
notorious example is the Danish server which was partly blown-up
within a month from the release.13
To maintain and control a Geocraft
world several roles must be filled in:
System administrator
13
See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2623697/American-hackers-bomb-Minecraft-version-Denmark-raise-stars-stripes-cyber-attack-education-project.html
40
The system administrator is responsible for supplying and upgrading the
server hardware and backups, server user management, etc. When a
managed environment is used this role will be carried out by the
provider.
Minecraft server manager
The Minecraft server manager makes sure the Minecraft service
software is up and running. He installs, updates and configures the
necessary plug-ins. So basically he is responsible the functionality
needed is available for the Minecraft players. When a managed
environment is used this role will be carried out by the provider.
In-game management
An important aspect is the organisation of the in-game management.
See use case ‘The Netherlands in Minecraft’, paragraph 2.5. In-game
management keeps order and hands out claims (if needed).
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PART 4: Possible future applications
In this last part of the paper, we explore several trends of relevance to
the future development and applications of Geocraft. First, we
elaborate on future policy and several relevant citizen science related
questions. Next, we explore technologic advances which might lead to
innovative future applications of Geocraft.
4.1 Trends in spatial planning and citizen science
To be able to understand the usefulness of Geocraft in the pursuit of
sustainable and healthy cities, first of all we need to understand current
planning systems and current policy themes. From various points of
view, we stand at the threshold of a new era with respect to the
development and governance of cities.
The worldwide growing population lives more and more concentrated in
cities. After decennia of top-down ruling and dominance of big players in
the market, local initiatives blossom shifting governance towards a more
bottom-up approach. The advantages of large business estates and top
down planning systems are no longer valid. At the same time, lots of
cities face the limits of expansion; for example in The Netherlands, we
cherish the limited green areas left. The focus has shifted towards
intensifying, improving and transforming existing urban areas. This
means that values of people of the place become more important.
Citizen initiatives in spatial development are on the rise.14
A distinction is made between citizen involvement through participatory
planning and spontaneous civic initiatives, which are hard to fit in with
formal planning procedures. Both forms of activities of people of the
place are in line with the ideas of active citizenship. Spatial planning
14
Boonstra, B. (2015) Planning Strategies in an Age of Active Citizenship, InPlanning, Groningen.
42
strategies must bridge the gap between these informal processes and
the formal framework of the Dutch planning system. Top down planning
strategies are converted into more bottom up planning strategies.
Amsterdam, like many other cities, has created an informal platform to
facilitate different types of initiatives.15
Civic enterprises are stimulated
in many different ways. Actual themes are circular economy, sustainable
energy, healthy living and cycling, local care systems, urban food, multi
functionality of public space and reliability of sustainable mobility and
transport networks. Citizen initiatives can be undertaken by residents,
entrepreneurs, artists, etc., in loose and informal structures. For both
participatory planning and citizen initiatives, Geocraft can be of added
value at low costs. This requires:
1. Access to open SDIs (e.g. Data lab of Amsterdam)
2. Data collection tools (using social media and sensing
technology)
3. Geocraft tools for describing and analysing the impact of these
initiatives and scenario’s developed by local communities
4. Tools which translate these initiatives into more formal
planning processes (import and export facilities between
Geocraft and SDI’s)
5. Instruments for formal assessment procedures, like scenario
design modelling instruments (e.g. LUMOS, which is developed
by the Dutch Environmental Assessment Agency), strategic
environmental assessments, societal cost-benefit analyses and
tools to calculate business cases for spatial investments.
15
see a.o. https://dezwijger.nl/
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4.2 Technologic advances
The next visual revolution is highly portable and immersive. It captivates
the user in a virtual environment or assist it in the real one, using smart
glasses and 3D sensors such as the Kinect. For the virtual Geocraft world
that means two broad scenarios: either feeling present in the virtual
Geocraft using Virtual Reality (VR) technology, or looking at the real
world with an enriched view, a virtual (but geocoded!) Geocraft world as
an overlay being added on top of the real world using Augmented
Reality (AR).
Figure 16: AR underground view (Geodan Research 2009). Looking through smart
glasses, the user observes reality enriched by visualized georeferenced
underground features such as cables and tubes, using Geodan’s Falcon 3D
viewer. The 2D window in the upper left corner shows a mini map, while the
window in the uppper right corner shows the cable properties currently gazed at.
The same can be done using Geocraft as a datasource for any 3D viewer.
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4.2.1 Augmented Reality and 3D sensors as a
collaborative tool The combination of AR, georeferenced 3D virtual worlds such as
Geocraft and high precision satellite positioning such as Real Time
Kinematic (RTK) or Precise Point Positioning (PPP)16
technology enables a
host of new experiences. Now, the real world can now be blended with
the virtual world. Invisible aspects of the concrete world can be
observed using a dedicated (georeferenced) virtual world as an overlay
on top of the real world. These virtual overlays can contain all kinds of
available geospatial data, visualising not only real time data but also
predicted and modelled data.
Figure 17: AR underground view (Jiazhou et al. 2012). Looking through smart
glasses, the user observes reality enriched by an imaginative trench. Now the
user not only observes the underground tubes and cables in relative position, but
is also able to observe the different earth layers. The same can be done using
Geocraft as a datasource, providing the modelled underground 3D information.
16
See http://www.navipedia.net/index.php/Precise_Point_Positioning for more information
45
Unfolding spatial plans
Visualizations of spatial plans can for the first time be experienced in-
situ - being at the actual location. Future changes can be experienced
while considering the real, physical context. These are not static views,
as AR allows for hiding portions of reality and projects future plans as if
they unfold on the spot at that very moment. For example a 5 year
construction can virtually get constructed in 30 seconds. With
transparent AR glasses such as the Microsoft Hololens, discussing these
plans with other AR glass users becomes natural as normal eye contact is
preserved. Normal navigation such as walking around remains possible
as the user is still grounded in reality, greatly enhancing the experience.
AR can be used for a wide range of applications, it is not limited to
spatial outlooks. It allows for interaction with real time data, such as
physically hidden or obfuscated data. For example the rich underground
world with its cables, metro and sewer systems can be easily modelled
in Geocraft and “pulled” above ground on the spot to inspect.
Obfuscated data, such as the street contours in a busy district can be
easily highlighted while distracting phenomena, such as moving cars or
billboards, can be blurred. This provides a clear survey, without
unnecessary data and hindering details.
Dynamic interaction
Sensors can collect data on current phenomena such as heat
distribution, concentrations of atmospheric particulate matter or
chemical pollution levels. These data can be collected and visualized in
Geocraft, enabling the AR user to observe otherwise invisible
phenomena directly in its context. This raises insights in complex
situations.
We can create an interactive link between the real world and the virtual
world. As Geocraft is a smart world, predictive analytics can be provided
on the spot. While designing future scenarios, these scenarios can be
instantly visualized to analyse the impact of proposed changes. For
example future noise disturbance levels after placing a windmill or a
46
sound barrier. Or the increased energy demand as a result of adding
extra residences to the original plan. Different future scenarios can be
examined and compared while walking around at the building site.
Figure 18: First person AR view of Geodan’s Falcon 3D viewer using marker based
tracking. Each AR glass wearer around the sphere sees other information. Note
that real 3D terrain and building data is shown and is fully queryable.
Enhanced collaboration
The availability of a geocoded 3D virtual world and the concept of
blended (sometimes called mixed or trans) realities enables new forms
of collaboration. Imagine streaming a 360 degree 3D sensor feed to one
or more remote (virtual reality) users. In a constrained mode, the
remote user, for example your colleague at the office, can really see
what the wearer of the AR glasses is seeing (ISWYS - I See What You See
concept). Figure 17 becomes more interesting when there is a mission
involved such as finding pipes containing a special substance in a busy
street. Spoken dialogues such as "See that blue pipe, just below 3
meters? Who's it from and what runs through it?" are natural and let the
user feel empowered by being able to query data on-the-fly.
47
In free mode, the remote user observes the view of the user on the spot,
but is free to look around via the cameras mounted on the AR glasses at
the same time. The remote user can point to information that the AR
wearer has missed, but the remote user deems relevant. It’s like
collaborating, surveying and discussing things teamwise in the field,
whilst your colleague did not leave the office. The AR possibilities for
collaboration are endless; virtual instructors or remote users can walk
alongside the AR user as a hologram, etc.
Gaming gets really serious
With AR and Geocraft, the world becomes a digital playfield. AR
geogamers can query real geo structures such as buildings for all kinds of
available data. For example construction date, owner, energy label,
energy demand, planning permissions, etc. Users might vote for specific
parts of spatial plans or can gain points by providing accurate
alternatives. In paragraph 1.6 we sketched multiple opportunities for
serious gaming in Geocraft. In combination with augmented reality,
these games can be played on the spot in the real physical context. With
multiple AR geogamers, gaming in the real world becomes both fun and
social.
Figure 19: Minecraft in the living room, Microsoft Hololens Press Video
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4.2.2 Virtual Reality as a simulation and
education tool
Where Augmented Reality uses physical reality as the base layer, in
Virtual Reality (VR) the user is completely disconnected from the
physical world in both space and time. Immersive VR immerses the user
in impossible experiences such as prehistoric or futuristic travels, life in
slow motion or a first (or third!) person view of a rock star. The past,
present or future world can be experienced without actually going
outside.
Geocraft is a special case virtual environment as it is fully based on real
geographical 3D data, making simulations as-real-as-it-gets. In the
Adventure Mode, people cannot change the virtual Geocraft world but
visit it and go for an adventure. For example think about raising a 17th
century town in Geocraft. Geocraft players may visit this historical place
and for example go for virtual geocaching17
. Virtual books and displays
can provide historical information. Players might have to collect
information or get tasks to perform.
Recently, several GeoMayors visited Geocraft.NL18
with the Oculus Rift.
Wearing this virtual reality headset, they were completely immersed in
this virtual world made by themselves. It was a great experience to pay
the Eusebius church a virtual visit (see figures 13). While sitting next to
each other at the Geofort19
, the children communicated and interacted
like being and meeting each other in the virtual world. They soon found
out, that taking a ride in the functional virtual rollercoaster of The
Efteling (amusement park in The Netherlands, see www.efteling.com),
resulted in real sickness of the stomach....
17 Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", anywhere in the world. A multi-cache consists of multiple discoveries of one or more intermediate points containing the coordinates for the next stage. See www.geocaching.com. 18 The Netherlands in Minecraft, see paragraph 2.5. 19 GeoFort is an educational attraction on an exciting fort in the New Dutch Waterline in the field of cartography and navigation, see www.geofort.nl.
49
Figure 20: GeoCraft landscape seen through an Oculus Rift virtual reality goggle,
with one image for each eye (view at Museum de Fundatie in Zwolle, Geocraft.NL
- The Netherlands in Minecraft).
As-real-as-it-gets
VR allows the user to interact with a virtual environment, simulating
events and let them unfold differently as many times as the user deems
useful. Ever since VR became convincing, phobia treatments such as
Acrophobia (fear of heights) and Agoraphobia (fear of open spaces,
crowds, leaving a safe place), could be given at the user' comfortable
home while VR content can be matched with the stage of phobia
treatment.
With Geocraft in VR, learning on the job will get a new meaning. New
educational paradigms introduce cutting edge technology for as young
as primary school children. With the inexpensive Google Cardboard and
a basic smartphone, kids in a classroom can experiences subject matter
in VR while being guided by their teacher. With the HTC Vive, VR brings
this educational experience to a new level by scanning the physical
surroundings and allowing the user to navigate in 3D space while seeing
a 3D virtual space. With help from Geocraft, a portion of captured reality
can be brought into the classroom, to play and experiment with. Hurray
for everyday excursions!
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Figure 21: The real world aligned with a georeferenced virtual one using GPS. In
this above example, we used the Unity Game Engine to create a georeferenced
world with Geodan’s Falcon 3D viewer. It is very straightforward to apply the
same techniques for Geocraft.
Augmented virtual reality
Geocraft in VR raises the bar for location intelligence as sensors in the
physical world can interact with the virtual world and vice versa. This
again creates new forms of interaction and collaboration. For example
using Geocraft, a VR goggle and high precision GPS allows a user to walk
around in the real world except what the user sees is completely virtual -
the Geocraft world. Now a user can play a giant zombie shooter or build
that magical beanstalk in his backyard. Augmenting the virtual world
with real sensor data such as the Microsoft Kinect 3D sensor allows
many innovative scenarios such as "Holoportation" (hologram
teleportation) in VR and more. As technology advances with tactile
gloves, 360 degree treadmills, machine olfaction and whole
exoskeletons, VR will enter a new era of immersion. How long will it take
before we reach the culmination of virtual reality, the Star Trek
Holodeck, where your complete body is active in a simulation?
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With just these few examples, it already shows that a georeferenced 3D
virtual world such as Geocraft in combination with VR opens endless
possibilities. Spatial plans can be evaluated by all types of different users
(eg. children, adults, disabled, specialists) before being executed. VR
engages users in new paradigm, try before do without consequences.
Figure 22: A real location (Geofort) viewed in VR and augmented using the
Microsoft Kinect with two players. The players see themselves present in the
virtual world, interacting with each other and with virtual personalities. We can
accomplish the same virtual experience in Geocraft.
A new Artificial Intelligence framework: Bots and Geocraft
The digital information present in Geocraft is not limited to geometry
only, like in AR. In principle, Geocraft can serve as a spatial information
library containing all imaginable georeferenced 2D and 3D data.
Querying using a location results in all kinds of contextual input such as
nearby addresses, population statistics and more. This can lift several
location based services to a higher level. For example, a speech
recognizer can update its probabilities for most likely addresses to
navigate to and improve its recognition rate. Imagine the same but now
for computer vision algorithms as context such as time of day and
52
shadow prediction can really help clean up noisy images to again
improve recognition rate.
With more and more digital data entering our physical world, intelligent
data mining and big data processing seems inevitable. Geocraft helps
tying digital data to its digital context. Using cloud computing, AR or VR
goggles and with location as the common denominator, AI in Geocraft
helps overcoming the information overload problem. Last, but not least,
with millions of Minecraft users, another form of strong intelligence can
be asked to analyse and overcome hard problems: the young crowd.
With the announcement of Microsoft's vision for Bots at Build 2016 and
the introduction of the AIX platform for Minecraft, AI in virtual 3D
worlds gains huge traction. With an entire digital environment and full
digital interaction, Geocraft can serve as excellent input for training AI or
advanced machine learning algorithms like Deep Learning Neural
Networks such that they can operate both in the virtual and physical
world. Also, humans retrying any given scenario could be a great cue for
bots (autonomous, intelligent software agents) or physical robots to
explore if it can assist the human in anyway.
Bridging the gap between the virtual and the real world
Any good VR experience is one that immerses the user, stimulating more
than the visual senses. With the 3D data of Geocraft, objects from the
virtual world can be 3D printed and brought to the physical world. Now
the user can interact with the object it sees in virtual reality and feel it in
physical reality without breaking the immersion. A gamechanger for
physical VR games.
Microsoft positions Minecraft as a first class citizen for VR and mobile VR
experiences, having announced support for both the Oculus Rift as well
as the Samsung Gear VR platform. With these announcements high
quality, immersive VR experiences can come to any boardroom or
classroom as a great discussion and learning tool. With Minecraft as its
engine, Geocraft will co-evolve as Minecraft explores new features and
support new platforms.
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Figure 23: AR or VR? Above is a real world hand visible, tracked with a virtual
hand using the Leap Motion Orion and Oculus Rift. The location is again a real
location (Geofort).The same interaction between the virtual world and the real
world can be accomplished in Geocraft.
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Conclusion
Geocraft provides an excellent interactive virtual 3D environment at a
well chosen level of abstraction to design, visualize and analyse future
scenarios, raising spatial insight and mutual understanding. It is not only
a strong educational tool, but also enables us to engage the people
involved in spatial issues in a most accessible way. For example people
of the place, who dispose of highly valuable expertise and unique
insights into local situations and possibilities.
In the 2012 Manifesto for Cities20
, the UN declared that the battle for a
more sustainable future will be won or lost in cities. In the next few
decades, nearly three-quarters of world’s population will live in cities.
More than 60 percent of the built environment needed to accommodate
these new urban dwellers has yet to be built. How we plan, build, and
manage our cities now will determine the outcome of our efforts to
achieve a sustainable and harmonious development tomorrow.
Past and current trends provide some important lessons for what to
avoid. In the circular ‘The City We Need’21
, eight major lessons are listed.
Geocraft might be helpful to address some of them, as we hope to have
illustrated with the use cases we presented in this paper. Foremost,
Geocraft is an easy accessible tool to facilitate effective participation and
engagement of all citizens, youth in particular (see for example use case
‘IJburg’, ‘Buiksloterham’ and ‘The Netherlands in Minecraft’). In
addition, Geocraft is a very strong educational tool to raise awareness
and insights in complex issues (see for example use cases ‘Zaandam’ and
‘Markermeer’). Last but not least: Geocraft advances learning and design
processes, and ameliorates communication and collaboration (see all
use cases).
20
http://mirror.unhabitat.org/images/WUC_Manifestos/ Manifesto%20For%20Cities_English.pdf 21
http://www.worldurbancampaign.org/city-we-need
55
We think the use of Geocraft can contribute to a better urban future by
facilitating the creation of high level solutions. Via advanced internet
interfaces, all urban actors can get a voice and communicate their
insights and ideas. Geocraft could be the way for citizens’ participation
in spatial development and inspire them to take ownership of the city
they inhabit. A Smart City cherishes, taps and utilizes the full potential of
the collected experience, knowledge, talents and ideas of its citizens.
Our Geocraft journey has just begun. We look forward to future
developments and applications, and invite governments, social
entrepreneurs and geospatial industry to exploit the possibilities of
Geocraft.
Figure 24: Future scenario of the Markermeer designed by high school students,
see use case Markermeer (paragraph 2.1).