UAV surveying for a complete mapping and documentation of archaeological findings. The early Neolithic site of Portonovo

The huge potential of 3D digital acquisition techniques for the documentation of archaeological sites, as well as the related findings, is almost well established. In spite of the variety of available techniques, a sole documentation pipeline cannot be defined a priori because of the diversity of archaeological settings. Stratigraphic archaeological excavations, for example, require a systematic, quick and low cost 3D single-surface documentation because the nature of stratigraphic archaeology compels providing documentary evidence of any excavation phase. Only within a destructive process each single excavation cannot be identified, documented and interpreted and this implies the necessity of a re- examination of the work on field. In this context, this paper describes the methodology, carried out during the last years, to 3D document the Early Neolithic site of Portonovo (Ancona, Italy) and, in particular, its latest step consisting in a photogrammetric aerial survey by means of UAV platform. It completes the previous research delivered in the same site by means of terrestrial laser scanning and close range techniques and sets out different options for further reflection in terms of site coverage, resolution and campaign cost. With the support of a topographic network and a unique reference system, the full documentation of the site is managed in order to detail each excavation phase; besides, the final output proves how the 3D digital methodology can be completely integrated with reasonable costs during the excavation and used to interpret the archaeological context. Further contribution of this work is the comparison between several acquisition techniques (i.e. terrestrial and aerial), which could be useful as decision support system for different archaeological scenarios. The main objectives of the comparison are: i) the evaluation of 3D mapping accuracy from different data sources, ii) the definition of a standard pipeline for different archaeological needs and iii) the provision of different level of detail according to the user need

3D visualization tools to explore ancient architectures in South America

[EN] Chan Chan is a wide archaeological site located in Peru. Its knowledge is limited to the visit of Palacio Tschudi, the only restored up to now, whilst the majority of the site remains unknown to the visitors. The reasons are manifold. The site is very large and difficult to visit. Some well-conserved architectures, such as Huaca Arco Iris, are very far from the core centre. Furthermore, there are heavy factors of decay, mainly caused by illegal excavations, by marine salt and by the devastating phenomenon of El Niño. For these reasons, the majority of the decorative elements are protected by new mud brick walls. Finally, the vastness of the buildings makes difficult to understand their real value, even through a direct visit of the site. In order to overcome the aforesaid problems, we designed, developed and realized the museum exhibition presented in this paper. We named Esquina Multimedia an installation where every corner is aimed to solve a specific problem, providing the tourists with interactive and enjoyable applications. The virtual tour allows reaching also the unreachable areas. An Augmented Reality (AR) application has been developed in order to show ancient artefacts covered by the earth. A web-browser has been specifically designed to show bas-reliefs, with HD visualization, anaglyph stereoscopic view and a 3D virtual model of both the structures and the bas-reliefs. At the same time, a wall-mounted panel representing a metric 3D reconstruction of the building helps the user to find the artefact position. Descriptions of the hardware components and of the software details are presented, with particular focus regarding the implementation of the application, arguing how the digital approach could represent the only answer towards a full exploitation of archaeological sites. The paper also deals with the implementation of a web tool, specifically designed to display and browse 3D-Models.Pierdicca, R.; Malinverni, ES.; Frontoni, E.; Colosi, F.; Orazi, R. (2016). 3D visualization tools to explore ancient architectures in South America. Virtual Archaeology Review. 7(15):44-53. doi:10.4995/var.2016.5904.SWORD445371

Smart Eye: An Application for 'In Situ' Accessibility to “Invisible” Heritage Sites

The Smart Eye Application is an augmented reality app for mobile devices that enables the in-situ 3D visualization of underground and inaccessible to the public archaeological sites and monuments. Accessibility to excavated archaeological sites and monuments is often hindered for reasons of preservation or urban development. Portable finds are transferred and, in some cases, exhibited in local museums, but the non-portable remains of ancient structures become eventually effaced from the landscape and the collective memory of local communities. The Smart Eye app provides an “x-ray” type view of excavation sites that have been backfilled and are now invisible. While common practice in heritage sites’ digital dissemination to the general public uses 2D or 3D reconstructions in augmented or virtual reality environments, the Smart Eye app presents archaeological remains in the shape and form they were found in by archaeologists supplemented with augmented reality markers that provide simplified textual and visual information aimed toward a non-scholarly public. The aim is to re-instate these heritage sites into the interactive relationship that people have with their landscape and their history. The present paper discusses the chaîne-opératoire of developing the app, from the acquisition of primary documentation data of the excavation sites to the methodology used for the production of the 3D models of the archaeological sites and the development of the app itself and the technical equipment used. Finally, we discuss the results of the preliminary evaluation of the application and future steps to improve it before final testing by the local communities where the archaeological sites are located

ESQUINA MULTIMEDIA – MUSEUM EXHIBITION FOR THE VISUALIZATION OF CHAN CHAN ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE

[EN] Chan Chan, an archaeological site located at Trujillo, Peru, is a huge historical settlement very large and difficult to visit and some well-conserved architecture, like Huaca Arco Iris, is very far from the core centre of the site. Furthermore many other heavy factors, as illegal excavations, marine salt transported by the wind and the sometime devastating phenomenon of the Niño, are the reasons of the lost of many decorative elements, which are covered due to conservation issues. To overcome the aforesaid problems, we designed, developed and realized the museum exhibition called “Esquina Multimedia”, providing the tourists with interactive and enjoyable applications. An Augmented Reality application has been developed in order to discover ancient artefacts that are invisible because covered by the earth (or by protection structures). A web-browser has been specifically designed to show bas-relieves, with HD visualization and with anaglyph stereoscopic view. Herewith, a wall-mounted panel representing a metric 3D reconstruction by an accurate survey of the building helps the user to find the artefact position.Pierdicca, R.; Malinverni, ES.; Frontoni, E.; Colosi, F.; Orazi, R. (2016). ESQUINA MULTIMEDIA – MUSEUM EXHIBITION FOR THE VISUALIZATION OF CHAN CHAN ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE. En 8th International congress on archaeology, computer graphics, cultural heritage and innovation. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 274-276. https://doi.org/10.4995/arqueologica8.2016.3191OCS27427

Chapter Mostrare l’invisibile: il soffitto trecentesco nascosto del convento di Santa Caterina a Palermo

The 43rd UID conference, held in Genova, takes up the theme of ‘Dialogues’ as practice and debate on many fundamental topics in our social life, especially in these complex and not yet resolved times. The city of Genova offers the opportunity to ponder on the value of comparison and on the possibilities for the community, naturally focused on the aspects that concern us, as professors, researchers, disseminators of knowledge, or on all the possibile meanings of the discipline of representation and its dialogue with ‘others’, which we have broadly catalogued in three macro areas: History, Semiotics, Science / Technology. Therefore, “dialogue” as a profitable exchange based on a common language, without which it is impossible to comprehend and understand one another; and the graphic sign that connotes the conference is the precise transcription of this concept: the title ‘translated’ into signs, derived from the visual alphabet designed for the visual identity of the UID since 2017. There are many topics which refer to three macro sessions: - Witnessing (signs and history) - Communicating (signs and semiotics) - Experimenting (signs and sciences) Thanks to the different points of view, an exceptional resource of our disciplinary area, we want to try to outline the prevailing theoretical-operational synergies, the collaborative lines of an instrumental nature, the recent updates of the repertoires of images that attest and nourish the relations among representation, history, semiotics, sciences

Low cost system for visualization and exhibition of pottery finds in archeological museums

The objective of this project is to build a low-cost system for surveying, modeling, prototyping and interactive visualizing aimed at the enhancement of islamic pottery finds of X – XI centuries. The system will allow various applications: the creation of systems for displaying artifacts from the museum alongside the exhibition, the virtual view of restorations from fragments, including AR and VR, the physical reconstruction of the original form using 3D printer to show the pieces in their entirety, as well as the construction of interactive virtual archives to be made available to scholars and visitors

The Educational Experience of Virtual Reality: An Archaeological Case Study of the Maya Site, Vista Alegre

Archaeological visualization has a long history within the discipline, relying on technological advancements to aid in recording, interpreting, and educating about sites and projects. Though computer graphics have been used as archaeological visualizations for decades, hardware advancements have begun to allow for broader consumer use of Virtual and Augmented Reality platforms in homes, schools, and museums. This thesis explores the applications of Virtual and Augmented Reality platforms for archaeological visualization, specifically in the area of public education. To this end, a 3D model and virtual experience of the Maya site of Vista Alegre in Mexico are created, methodologically explained, and examined to relate history, theory, and the goals of utilizing this medium within the archaeological discipline while expanding on the ethical requirements and empirical methods of praxis. In all, this technology both produces tangible, quantifiable, and accurate data and makes these data more accessible to the general public. Image from Proskouriakoff (1970[1946]

Senseable Spaces: from a theoretical perspective to the application in augmented environments

openGrazie all’ enorme diffusione di dispositivi senzienti nella vita di tutti i giorni, nell’ ultimo decennio abbiamo assistito ad un cambio definitivo nel modo in cui gli utenti interagiscono con lo spazio circostante. Viene coniato il termine Spazio Sensibile, per descrivere quegli spazi in grado di fornire servizi contestuali agli utenti, misurando e analizzando le dinamiche che in esso avvengono, e di reagire conseguentemente a questo continuo flusso di dati bidirezionale. La ricerca è stata condotta abbracciando diversi domini di applicazione, le cui singole esigenze hanno reso necessario testare il concetto di Spazi Sensibili in diverse declinazioni, mantenendo al centro della ricerca l’utente, con la duplice accezione di end-user e manager. Molteplici sono i contributi rispetto allo stato dell’ arte. Il concetto di Spazio Sensibile è stato calato nel settore dei Beni Culturali, degli Spazi Pubblici, delle Geosciences e del Retail. I casi studio nei musei e nella archeologia dimostrano come l’ utilizzo della Realtà Aumentata possa essere sfruttata di fronte a un dipinto o in outdoor per la visualizzazione di modelli complessi, In ambito urbano, il monitoraggio di dati generati dagli utenti ha consentito di capire le dinamiche di un evento di massa, durante il quale le stesse persone fruivano di servizi contestuali. Una innovativa applicazione di Realtà Aumentata è stata come servizio per facilitare l’ ispezione di fasce tampone lungo i fiumi, standardizzando flussi di dati e modelli provenienti da un Sistema Informativo Territoriale. Infine, un robusto sistema di indoor localization è stato istallato in ambiente retail, per scopi classificazione dei percorsi e per determinare le potenzialità di un punto vendita. La tesi è inoltre una dimostrazione di come Space Sensing e Geomatica siano discipline complementari: la geomatica consente di acquisire e misurare dati geo spaziali e spazio temporali a diversa scala, lo Space Sensing utilizza questi dati per fornire servizi all’ utente precisi e contestuali.Given the tremendous growth of ubiquitous services in our daily lives, during the last few decades we have witnessed a definitive change in the way users' experience their surroundings. At the current state of art, devices are able to sense the environment and users’ location, enabling them to experience improved digital services, creating synergistic loop between the use of the technology, and the use of the space itself. We coined the term Senseable Space, to define the kinds of spaces able to provide users with contextual services, to measure and analyse their dynamics and to react accordingly, in a seamless exchange of information. Following the paradigm of Senseable Spaces as the main thread, we selected a set of experiences carried out in different fields; central to this investigation there is of course the user, placed in the dual roles of end-user and manager. The main contribution of this thesis lies in the definition of this new paradigm, realized in the following domains: Cultural Heritage, Public Open Spaces, Geosciences and Retail. For the Cultural Heritage panorama, different pilot projects have been constructed from creating museum based installations to developing mobile applications for archaeological settings. Dealing with urban areas, app-based services are designed to facilitate the route finding in a urban park and to provide contextual information in a city festival. We also outlined a novel application to facilitate the on-site inspection by risk managers thanks to the use of Augmented Reality services. Finally, a robust indoor localization system has been developed, designed to ease customer profiling in the retail sector. The thesis also demonstrates how Space Sensing and Geomatics are complementary to one another, given the assumption that the branches of Geomatics cover all the different scales of data collection, whilst Space Sensing gives one the possibility to provide the services at the correct location, at the correct time.INGEGNERIA DELL'INFORMAZIONEembargoed_20181001Pierdicca, RobertoPierdicca, Robert

Senseable Spaces: from a theoretical perspective to the application in augmented environments

Grazie all’ enorme diffusione di dispositivi senzienti nella vita di tutti i giorni, nell’ ultimo decennio abbiamo assistito ad un cambio definitivo nel modo in cui gli utenti interagiscono con lo spazio circostante. Viene coniato il termine Spazio Sensibile, per descrivere quegli spazi in grado di fornire servizi contestuali agli utenti, misurando e analizzando le dinamiche che in esso avvengono, e di reagire conseguentemente a questo continuo flusso di dati bidirezionale. La ricerca è stata condotta abbracciando diversi domini di applicazione, le cui singole esigenze hanno reso necessario testare il concetto di Spazi Sensibili in diverse declinazioni, mantenendo al centro della ricerca l’utente, con la duplice accezione di end-user e manager. Molteplici sono i contributi rispetto allo stato dell’ arte. Il concetto di Spazio Sensibile è stato calato nel settore dei Beni Culturali, degli Spazi Pubblici, delle Geosciences e del Retail. I casi studio nei musei e nella archeologia dimostrano come l’ utilizzo della Realtà Aumentata possa essere sfruttata di fronte a un dipinto o in outdoor per la visualizzazione di modelli complessi, In ambito urbano, il monitoraggio di dati generati dagli utenti ha consentito di capire le dinamiche di un evento di massa, durante il quale le stesse persone fruivano di servizi contestuali. Una innovativa applicazione di Realtà Aumentata è stata come servizio per facilitare l’ ispezione di fasce tampone lungo i fiumi, standardizzando flussi di dati e modelli provenienti da un Sistema Informativo Territoriale. Infine, un robusto sistema di indoor localization è stato istallato in ambiente retail, per scopi classificazione dei percorsi e per determinare le potenzialità di un punto vendita. La tesi è inoltre una dimostrazione di come Space Sensing e Geomatica siano discipline complementari: la geomatica consente di acquisire e misurare dati geo spaziali e spazio temporali a diversa scala, lo Space Sensing utilizza questi dati per fornire servizi all’ utente precisi e contestuali.Given the tremendous growth of ubiquitous services in our daily lives, during the last few decades we have witnessed a definitive change in the way users' experience their surroundings. At the current state of art, devices are able to sense the environment and users’ location, enabling them to experience improved digital services, creating synergistic loop between the use of the technology, and the use of the space itself. We coined the term Senseable Space, to define the kinds of spaces able to provide users with contextual services, to measure and analyse their dynamics and to react accordingly, in a seamless exchange of information. Following the paradigm of Senseable Spaces as the main thread, we selected a set of experiences carried out in different fields; central to this investigation there is of course the user, placed in the dual roles of end-user and manager. The main contribution of this thesis lies in the definition of this new paradigm, realized in the following domains: Cultural Heritage, Public Open Spaces, Geosciences and Retail. For the Cultural Heritage panorama, different pilot projects have been constructed from creating museum based installations to developing mobile applications for archaeological settings. Dealing with urban areas, app-based services are designed to facilitate the route finding in a urban park and to provide contextual information in a city festival. We also outlined a novel application to facilitate the on-site inspection by risk managers thanks to the use of Augmented Reality services. Finally, a robust indoor localization system has been developed, designed to ease customer profiling in the retail sector. The thesis also demonstrates how Space Sensing and Geomatics are complementary to one another, given the assumption that the branches of Geomatics cover all the different scales of data collection, whilst Space Sensing gives one the possibility to provide the services at the correct location, at the correct time