Creating hybrid TEI/CIDOC-CRM documents for semantic browsing of information about 3D digital objects
(Øyvind Eide, Achille Felicetti)
As part of the EU funded EPOCH Network of Excellence, several tool chains for cultural heritage have been investigated. EPOCH’s NEWTONs aimed at plugging gaps in the digital processing of Cultural Heritage on the basis of existing tools or tools under development for EPOCH’s Common Infrastructure (WP 3.3). For the final event of EPOCH, a common demonstrator was developed in which 3D modelling is integrated with semantic mark-up.
There are three elements in the integrated system:
- A set of digital 3D reconstructions based on the Arrigo VII funerary complex in Pisa.
- A document describing the digital reconstruction of the elements of the complex as well as theories about the artefacts being reconstructed in 3D. This document is encoded in TEI.
- A semantic model based on information in the text expressed in CIDOC-CRM.
This model is imported into a web-based semantic viewer developed in the AMA NEWTON in order to enable users to browse it. In the system, there are links between the information available in the semantic model and the TEI document. There are also links between the semantic model and the digital reproductions of the different parts of the funerary complex, and links are being created to details of the reproductions, e.g. the head or the hair of a statue.
In the TEI encoding of the document, each "interesting spot" in the text is marked up as a referring string using elements such as rs and name. An xml:id attribute is also included for each element. The CIDOC-CRM model is expressed in RDF and uses the xml:id values to link to the TEI document. Back-links are included for practical reasons. The links between the semantic model and the 3D models are expressed as HTTP references.
This enables the user to explore the system from three different starting points:
- She can read the text, and follow the links through the semantic model to view the reconstructions.
- She can study the reconstructions, and follow the links through the semantic model to the textual description.
- She can explore the semantic model, and use the links to view the reconstructions as well as follow the links to the textual description each fact in the semantic model is based on.
The paper presentation will include details on how the TEI mark-up was created and integrated with the CIDOC-CRM model, and how this is used to move between the different elements of the demo system.
References
- Baracchini, C. et.al. (2004): Digital reconstruction of the Arrigio VII funerary complex in: VAST 2004 - The 5th International Symposium on Virtual Reality, Archaeology and Intelligent Cultural Heritage.
- EPOCH webpage. URL: http://www.epoch-net.org/ (checked 2008-04-30)
- AMA NEWTON webpage. URL: http://www.epoch-net.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=222&Itemid=338 (checked 2008-04- 30)
- TEI (2007): TEI P5. Guidelines for Electronic Text Encoding and Interchange. TEI Consortium. URL: http://www.tei-c.org/Guidelines/P5/ (checked 2008-04-30)