Have you ever wondered what the Temple looked like adorned with the famous Boaz and Jachin copper pillars? Or how singing in the Temple made a worshipper feel? Beginning on Monday, using an augmented reality app during a visit to the Western Wall, you can do all of this and even travel between key time periods and landmarks of the site from the time of the Second Temple.
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The application, named Kotel AR, has been launched by the Western Wall Heritage Foundation in collaboration with the Prime Minister's Office, in anticipation of the arrival of millions of tourists to the site during the summer.
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Seeing the Western Wall plaza using augmented reality app
(Photo: Western Wall Heritage Foundation)
The application incorporates an innovative augmented reality technology that recognizes what is being viewed through the camera of the mobile device by scanning the space in the Western Wall plaza, and reading the virtual information on it. In this way, the users of the application actually observe the physical reality of the site together with the virtual reality in one glance.
As part of the new service, which is open to the general public at no cost and is available for download on Android and Apple devices, the visitor will be able to discover the image he would have seen if he had stood at the spot 2,000 years ago.
"The more than 12 million people from throughout the country and the world who each year visit the Western Wall plaza, will now be able to connect even further to the heritage and glorious past of the Temple," according to the Western Wall Heritage Foundation. The new augmented reality application will "provide visitors with a historical, fascinating and enriching experience during their visit, sometimes for the first and only time, at the Western Wall, alongside a variety of tours and educational programs for the whole family."