VIRTUAL GEOLOGY FROM THE LAB TO THE FIELD

In this virtual fieldtrip we will review and discuss three case studies carried out at Utrecht University utilizing virtual reality (VR) and virtual field observations (VFO) across a range of scales for the study of geologic features such as fold and fault or shear zone structures. At the laboratory scale, state-of the art Virtual Reality (VR) provides an unprecedented level of detail for the observation of the surface expression of tectonic deformation in analogue models and provides opportunities for bringing the laboratory into real world virtual environments. An outcrop-scale case-study of the sheared Rosas granodiorite in the eastern Pyrenees will be presented to demonstrate how 2D and 3D drone mapping can aid geologists in understanding relations between intermediate scale structures not directly recognizable in the field. Moreover, it will be briefly discussed how 3D drone maps can be used to extract high quality quantitative field measurements. Lastly, an educational virtual field-trip case study will be presented from the ‘Cap de Creus’ area (Pyrenees), which serves as a data science project within the Dutch component of the European Plate Observing system (EPOS-NL) project, to emphasize how a virtual environment can be used to study complex deformation structures that resulted from multiple deformation events.