This digital collection was created as part of the Master Media Studies: Digital Cultures. Within the courses Creating Digital Collections I and II, students were taught how to create digital three-dimensional objects by using the Structure from Motion approach and how to incorporate them into a digital collection. If you are interested in the process and want to know more about the practicalities and challenges of creating 3D models, view the whole process on the Creation Process Page.
the project: a virtual time capsule
Throughout the 21st century, human beings have experienced a lot of inventions, trends and movements that directly or indirectly impacted their lives. But how will future generations understand these developments and its repercussions? For this reason, students wanted to capture the essence of these developments in a digital collection as they – who grew up in this time – have experienced it. Each student, therefore, contributed one object to the collection which they saw fit to represent part of this time period. This eventually led to the creation of five different themes which represent major aspects of the 21st century: environmentalism, inclusivity, technology and society, wellness, and entertainment. Next to a dedicated page for each theme (created by the Theme Groups), each and every object is also described and contextualized within one of the themes by an accompanying blogpost (created by individual students).
the creators
We are a group of master students from Maastricht University. Although we are all part of the same Master, we all come from a wide variety of different backgrounds and cultures, which have all influenced the varied perspectives from which we curated this collection. In order to create the digital collection, we took a team-based approach by organizing and dividing several tasks across seven different groups. We would like to thank all of these students who, despite the limitations due to Covid-19, managed to contribute to and create this marvelous digital collection:
Léïa Bonjean, Dora Boskou, Laura van Eden, Gonzalo Fernandez, Viola Gasparini and Ciara Kristensen who provided the guideline of the website by designing it as the webdesign team.
Mariosé Bergsteijn, Stan van Bommel, Nino Luijpen, Lamprini Metaxopoulou, Bastiaan Meyers and Lara Wischert, who brought the overall narrative into life by creating the homepage, the time capsule page, creation process page and about pages as the introduction team.
Paula Dickmann, Tom Gerbert, Aisling Moylan and Aitana Vallés Martí who provided the narrative and contents for the Environmentalism theme.
Ameena Ali, Ella van Geuns, Dounia Katumwa, Xing Yin who wrote and contextualized the Social Justice theme.
Nina Boich, Imke van Gulik, Jiaying Shi and Cristina Turbatu who described and designed the Technology and Society theme.
Yin Nien Chiang, Adrianna Lasinkiewicz, Léa Ritrovato and Jiuzhou Zhao who contributed to the story of the Wellness theme.
Adrián Eduardo Humanes Vegazo, Nantia Kinikli, Anna Lewis and Anna Villarica who portrayed and created the Entertainment theme.
From left to right: Webdesign Team, Introduction Team, Entertainment Team, Environmentalism Team, Inclusivity Team, Technology & Society Team and Wellness Team
acknowledgements
The Virtual Time Capsule Collection was designed and curated as part of the course Creating Digital Collections I & II of the Master Media Studies: Digital Cultures at the University of Maastricht. We would like to take this opportunity to express our gratitude towards Dr. Costas Papadopoulos and Professor Susan Schreibman, who, as coordinators of the course, helped create this collection by guiding us through the difficulties of creating 3D models and a website. From the beginning of the process, they have advised us, supported us and encouraged us in the creation of this collection.
In the creation of this virtual time capsule various software programs have been invaluable. Agisoft Metashape which allowed us to create our 3 dimensional models, Sketchfab which provided a platform to host these models, and WordPress through which this website was created.
