Preserving Bangladesh’s heritage sites in virtual reality

Ahamed Jaman Sonjib is the Founder and Project Head of Virtual Museum Bangladesh, and Ashek E Elahi Auni is its Co-founder. They started working towards the initiative in 2017.

The museum lets visitors experience the essence and history of different heritage sites of Bangladesh with virtual reality headsets and computers.

Sonjib got the idea for it after a visit to Panam Nagar in Sonargaon with his family. "The city has already lost a lot of its originality. If this goes on, our future generations will lose the chance to see these masterpieces of history. The unique structures of several of our heritage sites are giving in to the tides of time," he adds.

As of now, the museum offers virtual tours of six famous heritage sites of Bangladesh, including Panam Nagar, Shat Gombuj Mosque, Eleven Shiva Temple Complex, and Choto Sona Mosque, among others, free of charge.

Sonjib and Auni presented a virtual tour of the Shat Gombuj Masjid as a pilot project in the Digital World 2018 contest, where they received the second prize.

"Lack of data is one of our major challenges. Our team visits the sites and manually gathers information about them," adds Sonjib.

Key team members of Virtual Museum Bangladesh. Photo: Nayem Shaan

They also have to compare the data with experts, historical records, pictures, and simulate data into the game engine to present authentic versions of each site.

"So far, Sonjib and I have been funding the project from our own pockets, but I do not know how much longer just the two of us can continue doing so," explains Auni.

Virtual Museum Bangladesh is created to allow students to closely observe the history of the nation. It holds great educational value.

"Each historical site has its own story," says Iftekhar Alam Khan, a young 3D artist of the project. "This work brings me immense joy, and closer to my heritage every day."

The founders intend to welcome every school in Bangladesh to this experience. They are hopeful that the government and financial institutions will come forward to help them with the project.

The beta version of Virtual Museum Bangladesh will be released on March 1. The team is collecting new data on a daily basis, and soon, they will have characters in the virtual tours as well.