3D interactive journey into the Great Pyramid of Khufu

July 31, 2011 9:17 AM

3D interactive journey into the Great Pyramid of Khufu. More from BBC. Tour in and around the pyramid guided or on your own. Also explains the theory by French architect Jean-Pierre Houdin how the pyramid was built.
posted by stbalbach (5 comments total)

Requires installation of the 3DVia Player browser plugin. Unfortunately, the Mac install seems to leave-out a necessary component (at least judging from 3DVia's FAQ on what their installer is supposed to install)

Additionally, if it DID do a complete install, you would have to run Safari in 32-bit mode, because the player doesn't support 64-bit on the Mac. In any case, it isn't working for me in either Safari or Firefox/Mac. Bummer...a 3d walk through the pyramid sounds awesome.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:59 AM on July 31, 2011

Ditto for me w/Linux.

Here's an interesting article, and follow-up, describing the internal ramp theory.
posted by eye of newt at 12:15 PM on July 31, 2011

I was about to say it worked under Chrome and Windows 7 64-bit, but the plugin crashed as soon as it tried to load the first segment.
posted by lagomorphius at 2:03 PM on July 31, 2011

A long time ago, read about moving huge blocks easily by sliding them in mud... which of course wouldn't work in a desert environment due to rapid evaporation... however, in this scheme of things, the ramp is covered, and it might be possible. It would have a side effect of making for nice cool working conditions for those doing the pulling.

Hmmm
posted by MikeWarot at 8:16 PM on July 31, 2011

This is a pretty high-end site. Worked for me with Win 7 x64 Firefox. It's very cool graphics that show how amazingly complex the pyramid is, it's not just a big solid stone structure but has all sorts of fascinating internal workings. As the narrator says, the Egyptians worked up to it over generations with previous pyramids adding layers of complexity as they learned along the way (sort of like Cathedral builders), but this one was over the top and they never would repeat it, too complex.
posted by stbalbach at 9:41 PM on July 31, 2011