IT Innovation Challenges advent calendar 2019
The online platform Cabinet, built by researchers at the Oxford Internet Institute and supported by the IT Innovation Challenges, holds a number of intriguing entries associated with Christmas.
View the 3D model on Cabinet by clicking on the image.
One of them is this 3D model of the Princess Mary Gift Tin box, which was digitised using photogrammetry at one of the University’s Lest We Forget roadshows.
The Princess Mary Gift Fund box is an embossed brass box that originally contained a variety of items such as tobacco and chocolate. It was intended as a Christmas present to those serving at Christmas in 1914 and was paid for by a public fund backed by Princess Mary.
The 3D model reveals the embossing through the play of light on the object’s surface and gives a sense of the object’s age by showing small scratches on its back – a detail usually not visible in photographs.
Other objects on Cabinet that relate to Christmas include
- an offer letter from Queen’s College to Alison Sanders from 1979,
- a British field postcard from 1915 with Christmas greetings in the margins and
- the intricately designed celestial globe clock purchased by Emperor Rudolf II at Christmas in 1584.
Find out more about Cabinet
Cabinet is designed to support the use of objects and images in teaching and its ultimate aim is to make material culture as accessible for learning as traditional text-based sources. If you are interested in using Cabinet in your teaching, take a look at the Centre for Teaching and Learning website.
The Cabinet team is also working on an Augmented Reality extension of the platform to be used in museums. Read more about Open Cabinet on this blog.