Digital Research and Education in Architectural Heritage

This chapter introduces ‘linked cultural events’ as a novel methodological framework that allows for the systematic analysis of cultural expressions in their urban contexts. The events-based approach is inspired by datasets developed in the research program Creative Amsterdam: An E-Humanities Perspective (CREATE). This program investigates how cultural industries have shaped Amsterdam’s cultural position in a European and global context (and vice versa), from the seventeenth century until the present day. By doing so, it aims to contribute to answering several major research questions (cf. [1]): Why do certain places and periods stand out in terms of cultural and creative achievements? Are their accomplishments rooted in specific urban historical contexts? What are the sources of urban creativity and – especially relevant to policy makers – how can they be unlocked?

The aim of this paper is a critical analysis of the process of creating a ‘classic’ monuments catalog, in the context of the implementation of ICT in the history of art. The starting point for this discussion is an analysis of the genesis, structure and function of the catalog in the form in which it was created at the beginning of the 20th century. Texts and illustrations from the beginning of the 17th century on have been taken into consideration. The key problems to be addressed are: the changes that ICT brought to the work of the documenter and its impact on the methodology of cataloging. The conclusion compares the ‘classic’ published monuments catalog with databases of similar character.

This essay deals with the representation of cities focusing on their historical transformations and relying on digital scanning, 3D modeling and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies. The instances shown in it come from a project titled Visualizing Venice, an international multi-institutional cooperation now shifting to Visualizing Cities. The main challenge of Visualizing Cities is to digitally describe how cities – with their architectures – evolve and change over time using an interoperable 4D digital model linked to external sources, such as historic images. Experiencing the workflow of such a digital model a current lack of interoperability between CAD and GIS systems has emerged. This problem is particularly evident in the transition from digital scanning to a Building Information Model (BIM). This gap must be filled because a representational database, such as a 3D BIM model, helps researchers in representing architectural and urban history in all its phases. It makes the users able to control any kind of information: from recording the current state of an urban environment to the interpretation of historical records; from 3D reconstruction of data to their dissemination at different levels of complexity. This paper shows new methodologies in this field and, relating to historical data, attempts to answer also an important question: what kind of information can we get from paintings that show a city view? Representation methods based on perspective rules offer the opportunity to obtain scientific data on how to implement the BIM model correctly.

Digital libraries increasingly provide large amounts of scanned maps. These historical cartographic documents are considered as part of the cultural heritage. In a geographical context, however, old topographic maps are very valuable information sources for tracking land use changes over long periods of time. This chapter presents a methodology for the automated 3D building reconstruction from recent and old topographic maps. The presented methodology was developed focusing primarily on urban research, spatial planning, and a nationwide retrospective land-use monitoring. In the interdisciplinary discourse, perspectives and benefits of the method application in urban history and cultural heritage research and education have been identified and are presented here.

Over the past decades, the increase in the use of digital resources and the growth of research conducted in digital environments has transformed academic scholarship. The goal of this paper is to highlight the importance of understanding user behavior and needs for building digital libraries and resources that have a positive effect on the whole scholarly workflow. For this purpose, the art historical discipline will be used as a case study; by employing an ethnographic approach to the study of scholarly habits, we managed to uncover the requirements that scholars in the field have in terms of accessing and using digital libraries. The complex information behavior of art historians as well as the challenges they often face when interacting with digital resources make them a great example to demonstrate the impact that digital libraries and archives can have on the research process.

The focus of this paper is to highlight what are the major theoretical issues of virtual reconstruction in archeology (black-box effect, palimpsest-effect, role of accuracy) and explain how the Extended Matrix approach was designed to respond to these specific needs. The Extended Matrix (EM) is a tool that extends the stratigraphic approach to the recording and managing of the re-constructive record: one of the goals of this research is to prove that the stratigraphic method, intended as chronological reading of a spatial context, is able to compose a complete and multidimensional re-constructive record through the EM. This approach can improve the quality of virtual reconstructions non only for scientific purposes but also in the industry of Virtual Museums and Digital Libraries.

Due to the ongoing digitization, digital libraries are used more and more by art and architectural historians. Nevertheless, the design of those platforms does not necessarily meet the expectations and user requirements of the scholars. This is especially valid for digital libraries dedicated to historic media such as photography. In this article, we aim to analyze the user community in a first step, in order to see from which fields of interest they come and how far developed their computer affinity is. In a second step, the user requirements of the scholars will be examined, specifically with regard to research questions of architectural history. Based upon those observations, in a third part a possible technical solution will be proposed that could facilitate the work with digital libraries as well as the research process. A case study on the question of the correlation between urban development and the perception of the city will give a further validation of the analytical parts, showing the deficits of yet existing digital libraries and highlighting starting points of further research support.

The paper presents a critical analysis regarding the methodological approach useful to produce 3D digital contents of Cultural Heritage artifacts in context of Digital Archives. The structure of 3D model and the reconstruction process are analyzed in order to elaborate and formalize semantic knowledge concerning the work of art, object of study. Some experiences recently carried-out can show the development of some web-based platform able to allow the use of contents properly related to the characteristics of the case study.

This paper includes a work report of two reconstruction projects realized at the research department “digital reconstruction” at TU Darmstadt. A special focus is on the importance of the urban context and its digital 3D reconstruction for the particular research project and its challenges related to the working process and model structures. Furthermore, current research questions like e.g. documentation, standards, methodology and archiving are interlinked with this.

The text describes specific aspects of the documentation of the research project Grenzgang in the integrated catalogue of the media library of the Academy of Art and Design (FHNW HGK). Grenzgang – Artistic Investigations on Perception and Communication of Space in a Trinational Border Area – is anchored geographically in Basel and the surrounding region, while its method can be located between artistic research and promenadology. References to research results from various project phases are documented with diverse analogue and digital media in the media library’s integrated catalogue. This catalogue attempts to display such artistic works in their heterogeneity and variety and to make them accessible for research alongside other more classic library resources. The contribution submitted here elucidates typical challenges which can occur on the threshold of the catalogue/archive in the aftermath of complex artistic research projects. Specifically, the question arises of what happens when an active investigation like “walking” encounters an apparently static collection facility like the media library.

The availability of digital image repositories of historical photographs offers new possibilities to historians in their research. In addition to representing a large collection of data records themselves, image archives allow for new methods of research, from large-scale statistical analysis, to algorithmic generation of knowledge, such as historical 3D models, directly from these sources. In this paper, we explore methods to work with digital image libraries, from the creation of 3D or in extension time-annotated 4D models, to the eventual dissemination of research findings in teaching/learning scenarios. We review pedagogical approaches to reach different learning objectives, as well as methods that allow for the inclusion of historic city models employing Augmented Reality in mobile learning environments.

Taking care of mankind’s cultural heritage is a well-established obligation to us and to our future generations. To that end numerous experts are contributing. Contemporary technological advances, i.e. digital achievements, have helped a lot to this end. In this paper these technological advances are briefly presented and explained. It is attempted to show how these advances may help Cultural heritage if applied correctly and wisely. The argument is not how they will replace traditional documentation or conservation methods, but how they will support, enhance and supplement them for achieving the desired result with sensitivity and knowledge. The available digital documentation techniques are described along with the contemporary non-destructive techniques for cultural heritage pathology diagnosis and conservation. Their advantages are investigated along with their implementation actions. These techniques include image based methodologies for producing three dimensional models of which traditional two-dimensional products may be extracted, laser scanning techniques to acquire directly three-dimensional information from the object, Nondestructive techniques in order to diagnose pathology problems etc. In order to highlight these techniques, several examples are presented. The alternative uses of the contemporary digital techniques are highlighted through these examples. Among others the following applications will be presented: The virtual restoration of a collapsed stone bridge, the virtual restoration of a monument exposed to the weather conditions and the development of a virtual museum are presented. Finally, a future outlook is attempted, in order to envisage the path that the implementation of these technological advances will lead the worldwide effort to document and preserve our cultural heritage.