PFARRKIRCHE KEFERMARKT | GOTIKSTRASSE

Project Overview

This beautiful parish church is part of the INTERREG project “Gotikstraße,” one of the largest cultural heritage digitalization projects in Austria.

Being part of this project wasn’t easy at all, but after crossing the finish line and being able to share the work with the world, it makes it all worth it.

Although it took ages to finish the project, preparing the presentation materials took forever and a day, trying to properly prepare something that felt authentic and human-crafted, and up to MADCHAMO‘s quality standards.

History Time

Built around 1470 as a pilgrimage church for St. Wolfgang, commissioned by Freiherr Christoph von Zelking, Kefermarkt’s parish church could’ve stayed a footnote in regional Gothic architecture. Instead, it got an altar, called Flügelaltar.

Pfarrkirche Kefermarkt was carved between 1490 and 1497 by an artist history never bothered to name, known only as the Meister von Kefermarkt, the winged altar is one of the last great works of late-Gothic woodcarving in Europe. Baroque side altars moved in during the 17th century.

Woodworm moved in during the 19th, badly enough that the whole thing was stripped and restored by 1855, under the direction of writer Adalbert Stifter. The bugs finally lost in 1929, to poison gas.

Five hundred-plus years later, it’s still consecrated. Still holding mass. Still standing exactly where the Meister left it.

Supersplat

A picture can hold a thousand words, but an interactive gsplat model was the proper way to display the sum of our collective work.

The supersplat model above was the second scan of the interior, as it was required due to project management decisions. It was captured and processed by Cosmin Cazacu [MADCHAMO] & JeanClaude Grieco [FOTOMENTO].

Supersplat link here.

Proof of concept

It wasn’t all fine and dandy at the beginning of the project, since when using a new technology, you first have to prove it stands its ground, that it’s feasible and reliable for the project.

The first proof of concept was captured and processed by Christopher Schindelar, with whom we developed a very good professional collaboration relationship.

You can explore his supersplat scene here.

It’s still the most liked Supersplat scene to this date.

UE animations

There were over 30 churches involved in this project, all of which needed turntable animations made using Unreal Engine 5. Since Kefermarkt church was one of the first churches and holds a special place within this project, it was inserted into a small environment to help transpose it back in time, to the Middle Ages.

Tip of the iceberg

The scope and dimension of this project, or should I say, the effort put in, couldn’t be expressed or shared with only the showcase present on this page.

It involved a tremendous team effort: capturing, data registration, digital sculpting and texturing work, and a ton more.

The whole project experience can be explored here.

Reality Scan

The backbone of this church was held by Epic Games’ RealityScan, which proved to be a very reliable partner in this digitalization journey. Although not perfect in some situations, it required many further optimization steps and manual work. Actually, almost every church needed manual work in order to meet the quality standards, and Kefermarkt was no exception. This doesn’t mean that all churches are perfect, don’t worry, we have bad candidates too.

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