Digitization of Cultural Heritage using Building Information Modelling: Challenges and Solutions

Abstract

Cultural heritage is of universal value; it connects the people of a country to their roots and has several economic benefits. Since these buildings have been constructed for more than hundred years, they require constant rehabilitation and restoration from time to time. Restoration requires past information which is scarce in such cases hence other methods need to be adopted and the currently available information needs to be stored in some form to help future restoration interventions. For the said purpose this research proposes a digital method for conservation and restoration of cultural heritage. Laser Scanning Technology helps in capturing details of as built building in millimeters. Adding a camera to a laser scanner helps improve the end product even further by adding texture to end product. The end product of the laser scanner is a point cloud model with details in millimeters. In this research a case study (Badshahi Mosque) which happens to be a heritage site was chosen as there were no drawings available of the said building. Laser scanning technology was used to develop a point a cloud model. This digital model served the purpose of conservation-restoration and can form a very helpful tool in case of future restoration intervention. The model can also be used for virtual tourism as it provides as built details not only dimension wise but also provides the texture of the real building present now.As this research involved digital modelling so it updated an existing risk management framework for heritage sites by incorporating BIM in it. A total of ten risks were identified and three were those that were addressed by incorporating digital technology for conservation restoration. The three risks were unclear definition of scope, the choice of appropriate therapy and the case history of building. Revit Families form the building block of a BIM model made by Revit. As this building was a heritage site so existing families that are focused towards the buildings being made now could not be used for this case study, hence making new Revit families a necessity. By using the point cloud data Revit Families were developed. These families can serve as a building block for a future BIM model of this building.