Virtual recreation of urban heritage of Jingdezhen for immersive VR display

To unify the decoupled dimensions of scientific rigor and contextual narrative in virtual heritage display, this paper uses the VR project developed for Jingdezhen’s bid for World Cultural Heritage as a case study, and establishes a workflow for the virtual recreation of urban heritage that includes data collection and processing, spatial script, virtual reconstruction, and asset production. It answers to the core questions in this process including the integration of interdisciplinary historical materials and the determination of the priorities of 3D virtual recreation in order to balance the requirements of scientific validity and contextual completeness. Focusing on the virtual recreation of the core heritage area of the porcelain industry of Jingdezhen, the paper highlights the potentials and reflects on the challenges in the approach which has involved an interdisciplinary team of over 20 experts and has spanned over one year.