Trajan's Column

Made in 2001, re-rendered in April 2008, made in about 150 hours total

This is a reconstruction of the Forum Trajani as existed in ancient Rome. Today only the famous Column of Trajan and some rubble remain, but back then it was a huge forum consisting of a basilica, two libraries, the great column itself, a large square, an arc and a couple of collonades (long corridors flanked by columns).

I originally started working on this model in 2001 for an assignment for school, but it soon grew and in the end I rebuilt the entire Forum Trajani. I based my reconstruction on an archeological reconstruction made by scientist Packer, who published a massive book on the subject. A lot of research went into this one and some schools have used my reconstruction as educational material. I also built a website about it back in 2001, containing my reconstruction and a lot of historical information. This website is still up: Trajan's Forum website.

In 2008 I received a request to render the column on a high resolution for an art appreciation book. I had already relit a number of shots of the Forum Trajani in 2005, but had not done this specific shot at the time. I decided I wanted to relit this one for the book and as the required resolution was very high, I also added a lot of detail through VRayDisplacement. The result is highly detailed reliefs, as can be seen below. The displacement map that was used for the relief on the column itself is shown beneath them.