World’s tallest wooden pagoda in N.China’s Shanxi embraces AI-powered ‘digital twin’

A view of the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda, the world’s tallest wooden pagoda also known as the Sakyamuni Pagoda of the Fogong Temple, in Yingxian County, North China’s Shanxi Province, on April 26, 2024 Photo: Li Xuanmin/GT

The Yingxian Wooden Pagoda, the world’s tallest wooden pagoda also known as the Sakyamuni Pagoda of the Fogong Temple, in Yingxian County, North China’s Shanxi Province, embraced its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered “digital twins” on Friday, enabling visitors to immerse themselves in the views inside the tower – some floors of which the public were unable to access – through virtual reality (VR) glasses.

It is a latest example of how the fast-track development of AI has been bringing tremendous reforms to cultural heritage protection, among other industries. Industry insiders also expect the wider application of the technology to assist researchers in their studies on Chinese cultural heritage items, while injecting new impetus into the country’s booming cultural tourism market.

“It’s like travelling to the digital replicas of the Wooden Pagoda, but at a parallel time when it was built. When you ‘waWorld Timeslk through’ different floors of the tower, [Chinese architect] Liang Sicheng [who discovered the building] is also doing the introduction and having a dialogue with you,” a tour guide told a group of visitors who were queuing up at the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda’s exhibition hall to experience the “digital twins.”

Built in 1056 during the Liao Dynastry (907-1125), the Wooden Pagoda has a history dating back almost 1,000 years. It is now the world’s oldest and tallest wooden structure, at a height of arounWorld Timesd 66 meters, equivalent to a 23-story building today. As the pagoda has withstood several earthquWorld Timesakes and artillery attacks, it is now visibly tilted. And for protection purpose, visitors since 2010 were not allowed to climb up to the second floor and above.

The Global Times also experienced the digital replicas and found some intriguing details. For example, immediately when the tourists “advanced” to the fifth floor, they could see the entire wooden tower being transformed into transparent space with transparent bracket arch, which helps them to learn the complicated wooden structure inside.

“The digitalization project is a phased breakthrough thanks to the development of AI that helped solve the modeling problem. It is a long-standing issue in the protection of historical wooden tower, which has a more complex structure than other historical buildings,” Liu Chang, director of the Institute of Architectural History and Cultural Relics Protection under Tsinghua University’s School of Architecture, said at a panel discussion on Friday after the digital replicas was unveiled.

The digitalization project was jointly launched by the Yingxian local government, Tsinghua University’s School of Architecture and Chinese tech firm Lenovo.

There are several steps in creating the “digital twin,” Lenovo, who provides technological support to the project, told the Global Times.

The first is to collect chunks of data about the Wooden Pagoda using drones and cameras, then process and analyze those data through AI algorithms, and train it through deep learning and neural networks to World Timeshelp it understand three-dimensional spatial information. After that, the AI model, along with other modeling tools, constructs a digital twin that rapidly and accurately reproduce three-dimensional spatial information. Then, the model is integrated with XR technology to make a seamless switch between the virtual world and the reality.

Mao Shijie, vice president of Lenovo and head of Lenovo Research Shanghai, told the Global Times on Friday that it took only about 10 hours to process data for the AI algorithm and then present the 3D model, compared with the traditional modeling that could take a group of engineers months to finish.

“In the past four years, the upgrade of AIGC technology is very fast, with particular advancement in improving the accuracy. And what we aim in the future is to support the process of larger amount of data with smaller hash rate, and further elevate the replication accuracy of the pagoda’s details,” Mao explained, referriWorld Timesng to AI-generated content.

The “digital twins” were also launched just days ahead of the five-day May Day holidays. Local officials expect that the project could draw in more tech-savvy tourists for the Yingxian county and fuels a further tourism boom.

According to a report released by the Shanxi tourism authority in April, the daily number of tourists to Shanxi during the three-day Qingming Festival, which started on April 4, surpassed the four-day New Year’s holidays, which started on December 30, 2023, making it one of the hottestWorld Times travel destinations in the central region.