Batten Down the Hatches! Digitizing and Displaying Finds from the Spanish Plate Fleet Wrecks

Artefacts from the Spanish Plate Fleet Wrecks of 1715 and 1733 provide an unmatched archaeological window into 18th century life. To publicize these important finds that are often overshadowed by the wrecks’ alluring gold and silver treasures, the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research Collections and Conservation section created an online 3D museum of selected artefacts. This presents our experiences as we plunged headfirst into the world of 3D photogrammetry and online museum development. We highlight our successes and failures with photogrammetry techniques, model creation, general workflow, and 3D web design for education and public outreach

Interacting with virtual reconstructions in museums: The etruscanning project

Starting from our experience in this domain, we discuss some fundamental concepts about the potentialities of the virtual reconstructions of cultural sites inside museums, with a specific focus on the communication needs, the design, the combination of media, the interaction interfaces, and the embodiment. We conceive a virtual reconstruction as a digital ecosystem, whose main peculiarities are (1) 3D reconstruction, (2) inclusivity, and (3) interactivity. A virtual reconstruction, in a wide sense, should integrate different levels of visualization, both realistic and symbolic; 3D models; metadata; storytelling; behaviors; and tools of visualization and interaction, in order to "reconstruct" and communicate a cultural context, an ecosystem where all the information is integrated. Despite the great advancements of the last years in the digitization process, computer graphics techniques, and archiving strategies, a basic limit of most of virtual museums is that they do not fire up the attention and the involvement of the public: they lack stimulating activities for visitors, narratives metaphors, and emotional impact. The interaction interfaces are not always simple to understand and to control in a few minutes, and they can generate a sense of frustration that causes users to abandon the application after a short and superficial approach. No gap should exist between knowledge and communication. But how can we translate the complexity of the knowledge in appealing to users and into simple applications that fit with the public's need? This article focuses on some communication rules and criteria that are often considered of minor importance by the researchers working in the field of digital cultural heritage but that are really essential to cultural transmission, especially inside museums. We believe that a stronger collaboration between research institutions and museums and among different disciplines would be recommended. Given this premise, we present the Etruscanning EU project, developed in 2011- 2013, focused on the virtual reconstruction of two important Etruscan tombs of the Orientalizing period: the Regolini-Galassi tomb in Cerveteri and the tomb n.5 of Monte Michele in Veii. © 2014 ACM

Archeovirtual 2011 : An evaluation approach to virtual museums

November 2011 saw the opening of the exhibition "Archeovirtual" organized by CNR ITABC - Virtual Heritage Lab - and V-MusT Network of Excellence, in Paestum, Italy, under the general direction of BMTA1. The event, that was part of a wider European project focus on virtual museums, turned to be a great opportunity to show many different projects, applications and installations about Virtual Reality and Cultural Heritage. The four-days exhibition was an occasion to get in touch with the newest experiences with virtual reconstructions, 3D models, interactive environments, augmented reality and mobile solutions for cultural contents; at the same time, it was an opportunity for organizers to directly face the audience's impact towards projects. That because of the necessity to investigate more on social and behavioral aspects in order to positively affect the learning benefits of public. So doing, we could build in the future applications much more tailored on the final costumers, closer to their abilities and necessities. During the show four types of investigative tools were employed to evaluate the general visitor's behavior and the effectiveness of interfaces, to understand their expectations and experiences, and to obtain a reference grid of values to test if users' experience fit with organizers' ones. The first outcomes revealed that audience's impact toward interactive applications seems depending on the capability of technology to be "invisible" otherwise technology has to assure a wide range of possibilities in content accesses. In definitive, virtual museums need to have an always more integrated approach between cultural contents, interfaces and social and behavioral studies

Designing Digital Experiences in Archaeology: Integrating Participatory Processes into Archaeological Practice

Archaeology is a graphically rich discipline that has always applied various forms of visualisation to communicate information and interpretation about the archaeological record. In recent decades, the increasing dominance of digital techniques for archaeological visualisation has led to a rapid uptake of digital products, such as 3D models, often without consideration of users’ diverse needs or assessment of their impacts on audiences. This research seeks to address such issues by incorporating User Experience Design (UXD) and Participatory Design (PD) processes into archaeological practice. Through two distinct iterations of design and assessment of digitally mediated experiences, this research explores key themes around UXD in archaeology by investigating the following research questions: ● What is the impact of 3D visual media upon a diverse range of audiences, specifically how different users (specialists and non-specialists alike) engage with this specific form of (re)presentation of the past? ● How can we integrate evaluation frameworks and iterative processes into our methodologies in order to more meaningfully incorporate users’ feedback into the design and improvements of these digital resources? ● How can we incorporate UXD and PD processes into archaeological practice to create digital products tailored to the needs and expectations of our audiences? The first iteration of this research focuses on evaluating the impact that interactive 3D models have upon different audiences, using the case study of the Middle Bronze Age Cypriot settlement at Erimi- Laonin tou Porakou. The second iteration aims at assessing the design process behind the creation of digital resources using PD practices, through a series of workshops on the co-design of digitally mediated experiences in archaeology and heritage. The thesis ultimately articulates practical guidelines for archaeologists and other practitioners on incorporating UXD and PD approaches into archaeology. Such guidelines should then enable end users and stakeholders to be involved in digital resource development from the outset, critically tailoring these digital experiences to the needs and expectations of their audiences