20th Century Cinemas: A Complex Challenge for the Visualisation of Culture, Structure and History

This paper discusses the manner in which cinema buildings of the 20^th century represent both an important physical record of society, and a challenge in terms of representing a complex range of historical, cultural, economic and physical data sets.The paper provides an overview of visualisation techniques which are appropriate to the subject, and provides a case study taken from the city of Aberdeen. A conclusion is that emerging technologies will facilitate the rapid collection of highly accurate information pertaining to the still intact physical structure, where still in place, but that such data must be related directly to wider contextual data in order that informed plans can be formulated for future developments, including conservation strategies.