CC BY
116ТУРИЗМ_
TOURISM
УДК 796.52 DOI 10.24411/2500-0365-2020-15116
ББК 4581.256
VIRTUAL TOURISM — A NEW EDUCATIONAL DIRECTION
V.D. Ivanov1, A.V. Golubkov2
1 Chelyabinsk State University, Chelyabinsk, Russia 2 Ural state University of physical culture, Chelyabinsk, Russia
The article dwells on the developing sphere of virtual reality, its' impact on the tourism and thereby ongoing development due to increasing interest of people to expanding their horizons, travelling abroad. Furthermore, virtual tourism is not not solely concentrated on travelling but also it touches upon education and sport.
Keywords, tourism, virtual tourism, virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality, sport.
Introduction. What is virtual tourism?
Topicality. Tourism is the largest industry in the world and Virtual Reality has become one of its main attraction points. Virtual reality can provide guided tours to any place of the world. People can now 'try before they buy1 a guided tour what is a remarkable advance for the industry. A new technology will especially help to develop unpopular or unknown tourist destinations, as travellers can take a look at the places each destination has to offer. By giving a full 360-degree view of different locations, travel agents can guarantee the best travel experience for a prospective customer and inspire the confidence in the agency simultaneously. Travel agencies help their clients to choose the best option according to their budget and expectations [1—5].
With the evolution of virtual reality (VR) technology, tourism is to become a composition of physical and virtual worlds. Virtual reality would even probably remove the need for the travelling "offline" entirely.
Excessive tourism, or over-tourism, in popular destinations can cause degradation or damage of heritage sites, harmful impact on the quality of host communities life, and therefore spoil the experience of visitors. Virtual reality offers not only alternative ways of access to threatened locations but also reshapes historical experiences and provides virtual tours to the remote locations a person would not see otherwise [6].
Human brain seems to have an inbuilt VR-like mechanism that enables people to live imagined ex-
periences. Much of the person's waking life is spent thinking about either the past (retrospection) or future (prospection). This is known as mind-wandering. When people are engaged in mind-wandering, the brain processes and assesses mental images via the same neural pathways they use to receive stimuli from the real world. Therefore the imagined past or future can evoke emotions and feelings similar to those people get reacting to everyday life. Virtual reality can elicit these same feelings. Virtual worlds use sensory stimulation and vivid imagery to generate authentic experiences [8]. Immersion in these environments can lead to a deeper understanding of a place or event than simply reading about it or looking at pictures.
Travel and hospitality industry firms are also will be able to showcase destination accommodations. The interactive technology allows a potential hotel or resort guest to explore and experience the accommodation before booking. Some firms have gone so far as to recreate the environment of the accommodation by using real stimulants (wind, aromas, etc.) on the potential client during the virtual experience.
However virtual tourism is not only about recreating a virtual version of reality that renders a travel to the destination unnecessary. It can enhance tourism in other ways — by allowing tourists to handle historical artefacts in virtual form, or by retelling contested moments in history from previously unexplored points of view.
As an example of countries extensively using VR-teclmologies in Tourism we can list Britain, France, Czech, Singapore, Switzerland, the USA. Japan, etc.
History. The origin of the term 'virtual tour' dates back to 1994. The first implication of a virtual tour was a guided tour for museum visitors, consisting of a 'walk-through' a 3D reconstruction of Dudley Castle in Euglaud as it had been in 1550 [3]. This was produced by a computer controlled laserdisc based system designed by British engineer Colin Johnson [3; 6].
One of the first users of a virtual tour was Queen Elizabeth II, when she officially opened the visitor centre in June 1994. Because the Queen's officials had requested titles, descriptions and instructions of all activities, the system was named and described as: "Virtual Torn', being a cross between Virtual Reality and Royal Tour." Details of the original project can be viewed online.
The system was featured in a conference held by the British Museum in November 1994 and in a subsequent technical paper.
Virtual Reality. The term virtual reality is most commonly used to describe what happens when you are completely immersed in a virtual environment you can see through a headset. Enhanced forms of virtual reality allow you to interact with that environment using extra equipment, such as gloves fitted with sensors [10—13].
Let us consider virtual tourism to be the application of virtual reality — including augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) — to tourism.
The Importance of Augmented Reality for the Travel Industry
Augmented reality is the technology that expands our physical world, adding layers of digital information onto it. Unlike Virtual reality (VR), AR does not create the whole artificial environments to replace the real with a virtual one. AR is presented in a direct view of an existing environment with new sounds, videos, graphics added to it [7: 9].
The use of augmented reality technology within the travel industry is still a relatively recent development and, as a result, new uses are emerging all the time [9]. However, some of the most effective and innovative uses of AR so far are explained in greater detail below:
* Interactive Hotel Elements.
Essentially, this gives hotels, resorts and other hospitality businesses the ability to provide customers with more information on demand.
• Augmented Tourist Destinations.
This may allow a user to point their smartphone at a building or landmark and learn more about it, in real-time.
* Beacon Technology and Push Notifications.
This particular technology is useful within
the travel and tourism industry, because it allows businesses and marketers to send push notifications or enable certain functions when people enter a specific location.
* Augmented Reality Gamification.
Tinally, augmented reality has a strong link to the world of gaming and the travel industry is starting to implicate this advantage too. With the use of an augmented reality app, a hotel or hospitality business can improve the customer experience by introducing an element of fun to their physical environment. Gaming apps using augmented reality have been used to introduce treasure hunt-style games to hotel buildings, while Best Western have used AR to allow children to see Disney characters in the hotel or resort area. For adults, apps including AR allow users to redecorate rooms, and place virtual celebrities in the hotel.
Mixed Reality. Either implicated as a standalone concept or used in a broad spectrum. Mixed Reality takes the best from both worlds and attempts to combine the Virtual and the Augmented Reality. When both real and artificial worlds are merged together, an entirely new environment and visualization become possible wherein physical and digital objects co-exist and interact in real time.
Rather than displaying simple images like Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality strives to put fully digital objects that are obseived from any angle and persistent in the user's environment. Users can actually view and manipulate things from different angles which is as complex as an anatomy model.
Virtual Reality as a Part of Travel Industry
As technology impacts and changes the way people travel, many businesses are trying to predict how it will continue to influence the tourism industry in the future.
Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, recently predicted an increase of interest in virtual travel while answering questions on his Facebook page, reports AFR Zuckerberg noted that just as we take photos and videos and post them on our social media platforms, eventually people will be able to capture 3D scenes that others will be able to see. It is perhaps not surprising that the tech giant is predicting more and more of this kind of online content sharing, as last year, Facebook purchased Oculus, a virtual reality (VR) technology company. While Zuckerberg makes predictions more and more users adapt to the new travel technology, many companies
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are already have been experimenting with what it can do for their business.
Marriott Hotels has been trying out virtual reality experiences and has allowed guests at certain hotel locations to trial a virtual reality headset. The company also presented a virtual travel content platform — called VR Postcards — which are immersive travel stories that follow a real traveller to a unique destination, such as the Andes Mountains in Chile, an ice cream shop in Rwanda or the streets of Beijing.
Making Ai t Accessible. Technology has (positively) changed the way how visitors experience a museum. According to Kelly Song from CNBC museums are experiencing the best attendance they've ever had, thanks to the way technology is revolutionizing the access to arts and allowing visitors to experience art in new ways. For example, bringing exhibits all around the world may help to appreciate arts some people who otherwise would never even set a foot in the institution at all.
There are many application possibilities that virtual reality can provide — from Virtual Reality as a part of an exhibition, virtual reality for location accessibility and preservation of heritage reasons or virtual reality used to pursue an educational purposes.
Travelling in Time. Thanks to virtual tourism it is now possible to time travel with the help of the app Timelooper. Its' creators used the VR-technology in combination with a mobile virtual reality headset (not required) to transport a person to past versions of sites like Trafalgar Square or the Tower in London. The list of showcased sites includes the Great Fire of London in the 17th century and a bombing scene in World War II. There are also more scenes planned to go live located for example in New York's Times Square or in the Rockefeller Center. While the display starts out as a 360-degree video showing todays time, it is shorty after overlaid with re-enacted images staging past times (or future scenarios) which are enhanced with visual effects. It is believed that it is a great method for enhancement of the travelling through historical sites experience — a type of travel edutainment. It does not spoil the experience because people have to actually travel to a city to unlock the videos, due to its location-based unlocking mechanism.
A new virtual reality time travel experience, named "VR Time Travel: Step into Old Hong Kong" by the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) allows visitors to step into old Hong Kong and explore the city's old days. Visitors can re-live scenes from the 1960s and 1980s. A battle between two kung-fu fighters at the famous Hollywood Road as well as the dramatic
landing of an aircraft at the Kai Tan International Airport is showcased.
The virtual reality time travel experience is an offer that visitors can pay for while visiting the skylOO observation desk. Additionally, there is the opporhi-riity of buying the virtual reality videos or a VR-cards viewer. This is another point to be added to the ongoing debate if the virtual reality is a substitute for the real travelling or rather its supplement.
Sport Venues Virtual Tours. Among the industries implicating virtual reality technologies it is a VR-boom in sports that looks quite surprising, more specifically, sports tourism. Among the first tests of virtual reality technology was a virtual tour around the field at AT&T Park, the home of the San Francisco Giants. An innovation has made the new trend rocket. Now, with the sudden leap in the development virtual reality has taken recently, the sports tourism experience is being amplified and becoming more immersive in nearly every possible field, ranging from the content consumption to training facilities and recruiting of athletes [11].
The re-enacted sports performance situations can appear tremendously useful to sports teams, who can use it to replay and analyse the game from different perspectives. Since a long time ago professional teams have been using the method of studying the game recordings to examine their own performance or assess opponents. But as the vantage point is being much different from a player's own experience during the game, the results are not always optimal [11]. Now, coaches and players can train better with watching and experiencing plays again and again in virtual reality. STRIVR creates virtual reality training videos shot from the player's-eye view of the action during practices. It then enables players to receive realistic, repetitive training by visualizing through virtual reality headsets situations they will face on the field. For instance, quarterbacks can review the options and opportunities they missed by going through a play several times and reviewing each of their teammates' positions. This helps football teams prepare players for games without requiring their excessive presence on the field, where they risk being injured and exposed to summer heat [11].
Virtual reality has yet to manifest its full potential in sports. For instance, it can make the recruiting process much easier by making college campuses seem much closer to recruits. Athletes can visit stadiums, locker rooms, weight rooms and practically every place and aspect of their future team in the immersive experience of virtual reality — without leaving their homes and stepping on a plane [11].
Sports' interactiveness is daily more feasible and possible through cyberspace theatres amplifying intelligence, perceptions, data and experiences — real or fabricated. Presently there exist a number of engineering mechanisms that are contributing to the virtual reality sports tourism industry.
Tourism can be qualified within a passive framework whereby physical displacement is no longer a criterion. Within the realm of sports tourism this virUial reality displacement is gaining predominance and popularity around the world. This is a boon to all those sports fans who can't afford the luxury of flying half the world in order to see their favourite teams and athletes perform. This is the most realistic experience one can get from seeing a sports event without actually attending in person.
The impact that this has on sports tourism for the future is fairly obvious. If virtual reality technology continues to develop, the desire of people to buy tickets for sports events will probably to go down. Will it be drastic? Who knows. Virtual reality is a great experience, but it can't replicate the experience of being in the crowd at a sporting event [11].
New possibilities for VR applications — both practical and pleasurable — are emerging as the technology evolves. And as people seek new and novel experiences, combining virtual with real world experiences may become a common feature of tourism and sport in the future.
References
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2. Gupta M. Virtual Reality — Emerging Backbone of Tourism Industry. Medium Corporation. Frulix. Available at: https://medium.coni/frulix/vir-Uial-reality-emerging-backbone-of-tourism-industry-7b6000a526c0.
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Для цитирования: Ivanov, V. D. Virtual tourism — a new educational direction / V. D. Ivanov, A. V. Golubkov // Физическая культура. Спорт. Туризм. Двигательная рекреация. — 2020. — Т. 5, № 1. — С. 112—116.
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About the authors
Ivanov Valentin Dmitrievieh — Ph.D. Pedagogy, Associate Professor of Physical Education and Sports, Chelyabinsk State University. Chelyabinsk. Russia, [email protected]
Golubkov Alexey Viktorovich — senior lecturer of the Department of theory and methodology of skiing, Ural state University of physical culture, Chelyabinsk. Russia, [email protected]
PHYSICAL CULTURE. SPORT. TOURISM. MOTOR RECREATION
2020, vol.5, no. 1, pp. 112—116.
Виртуальный туризм — новое образовательное направление Иванов В. Д.1, Голубков А. В.2
1 Челябинский государственный университет, Челябинск, Россия, [email protected]
2 Уральский государственный университет физической культуры, Челябинск, Россия, alexey_golubkov@list. ru
Авторы рассматривают новое направление в туризме — виртуальный туризм, развивающуюся сферу виртуальной реальности. Описывается влияние на туризм, спорт и образование. После виртуального путешествия возрастает интерес к путешествию, потребность увидеть все в реальности. Кроме того, виртуальный туризм не только направлен на сферу путешествии, но также он затрагивает образование и спорт. Позволяет, не выходя на улицу, ознакомиться с достопримечательностями тон или иной страны.
Ключевые слова: туризм, виртуальный туризм, виртуальная реальность, дополненная реальность, смешанная реальность.
Сведения об авторах
Иванов Валентин Дмитриевич — кандидат педагогических наук, доцент, доцент кафедры физического воспитания и спорта Челябинского государственного университета,Челябинск. Россия, [email protected]
Голубков Алексей Викторович — старшин преподаватель кафедры теории и методики лыжного спорта Уральского государственного университета физической культуры. Челябинск. Россия, [email protected]
