The fortified settlement of Bivignano. Computer graphic tools in analysis and its representation

The fortified settlement of Bivignano (Arezzo, Italy) is a part of a large system of castles developed between the eleventh and twelfth centuries in a minor valley of Cerfone river, branch of Tevere river. Founded by the family of Count Of Bivignano, the castle grows together with the noble residence (a “casa-torre” typology with a plan dimension of 10.25 by 7.50 meters, still intact for 9.30 meter) and with the adjacent church of Santa Maria (rebuilt in the seventeenth century on the original early medieval chapel). The rest of the buildings consists of housing and service areas, which have been in use until the mid-seventies. Today the castle is in a deep abandonment also due to the continuous looting that deprive him of the architectural elements easily re-usable elsewhere, accelerating the degradation processes. The research group DM_SHS (Documentation and Management of Small Historical Settlements) in charge at DiDA (Dipartimento di Architettura dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze) has recently started up a digital survey campaign aimed to the production of 3D models, useful not only to provide documentary evidence of the entire castle and to support stratigraphic, metrologic, and structural/diagnostic analysis, but also to try out advanced texturing procedures, makes available by the computer graphics (like baking and UV parametrization), capable to correlate the results of such analysis to models themselves; this allows a more appropriate reading of the information and facilitates the dissemination of the results through the web. The paper will therefore be able to assess the progress of scientific research in the particular field that gathers together digital survey, 3D modeling and computer graphics for knowledge, enhancement and dissemination of the cultural heritage.