Interactive semantic enrichment of 3D cultural heritage collections

Virtual Surrogates of Cultural Heritage (CH) objects are seriously being considered in professional activities such as conservation and preservation, exhibition planning, packing, and scholarly research, among many other activities. Although this is a very positive development, a bare 3D digital representation is insufficient and poor for fulfilling the full range of professional activities. In this paper, we present the first interactive semantic enrichment tool for 3D CH collections that is fully based on the CIDOC-CRM schema and that fully supports its sophisticated annotation model. The tool eases the user interaction, allowing inexperienced users without previous knowledge on semantic models or 3D modeling to employ it and to conceive it for the professional workflow on 3D annotations. We illustrate the capabilities of our tool in the context of the Saalburg fort, during Roman times (2nd century AD), for the protection of the Limes on the Taunus hills in Germany.