Preserving Memories with Digital Media: A Methodology for the Reconstruction of Castelnuovo Village

The historical centre of the village of Castelnuovo (located in Abruzzo, a region in central of Italy) was seriously damaged by the earthquake of the 6th of April 2009. Following the survey by the Civil Protection, all dwellings have been classified as unsuitable for habitation. The village should be either abandoned or totally rebuilt. But which is its value? Is there something worth of being preserved? If observed from a biodiversity point of view, or more precisely from a “cultural biodiversity” point of view, the historical centre possess interesting materials and immaterial characteristics. These qualities constitute real guidelines for a possible recovery project. Since there is not any possibility to make a survey of the inner village because of its destruction by the earthquake, in this research we have decided to use information technology, in order to rebuilt it and study it in a three-dimensional environment. In this paper we describe the theoretical basis, the method of elaboration and the instruments we have used to locate and evaluate the memories that should be preserved in a new project. Starting with a traditional documentation, such as photographs and drawings, we have used a variety of software (graphics editing program, CAD, 3D modeler, videogame 3D-engine), because of the several hypothesis considered.