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Digital literacy and technology education has gained much relevance in humanities and heritage related disciplines during the recent decades. Against this background, the purpose of this article is to examine the current state of educational programs in digital cultural heritage and related disciplines primarily in Europe with supplemental information from the US. A further aim is to highlight core topics, challenges, and demands, and to show innovative formats and prospects.

Nowadays digital replicas of artefacts belonging to the Cultural Heritage (CH) are one of the most promising innovations for museums exhibitions, since they foster new forms of interaction with collections, at different scales. However, practical digitization is still a complex task dedicated to specialized operators. Due to these premises, this paper introduces a novel approach to support non-experts working in museums with robust, easy-to-use workflows based on low-cost widespread devices, aimed at the study, classification, preservation, communication and restoration of CH artefacts. The proposed methodology introduces an automated combination of acquisition, based on mobile equipment and visualization, based on Real-Time Rendering. After the description of devices used along the workflow, the paper focuses on image pre-processing and geometry processing techniques adopted to generate accurate 3D models from photographs. Assessment criteria for the developed process evaluation are illustrated. Tests of the methodology on some effective museum case studies are presented and discussed.

Digital Cultural Heritage and Digital Humanities are, historically seen, in focus of different communities as well as approaching different research topics and - from an organizational point of view - departments. However, are they that different? The idea of this joint article involving digital humanists and heritage researchers is to examine communities, concepts and research applications as well as shared challenges. Beyond a collection of problem-centred essays this is intended to initiate a fruitful discussion about commonalities and differences between both scholarly fields as well as to assess to which extent they are two sides of the same medal.

In the last years the image-based pipeline for 3D reconstruction purposes has received large interest leading to fully automated methodologies able to process large image datasets and deliver 3D products with a level of detail and precision variable according to the applications. Different open issues still exist, in particular when dealing with the 3D surveying and modeling of large and complex scenarios, like historical porticoes. The paper presents an evaluation of various surveying methods for the geometric documentation of ca 40km of historical porticoes in Bologna (Italy). Finally, terrestrial photogrammetry was chosen as the most flexible and productive technique in order to deliver 3D results in form of colored point clouds or textured 3D meshes accessible on the web. The presented digital products are a complementary material for the final candidature of the porticoes as UNESCO WHS.

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 showt he development of some web-based platform able to allow the use of contents properly related to the characteristics of the case study.

The SACHER project provides a distributed, open source and federated cloud platform able to support the life-cycle management of various kinds of data concerning tangible Cultural Heritage. The paper describes the SACHER platform and, in particular, among the various integrated service prototypes, the most important ones to support restoration processes and cultural asset management: (i) 3D Life Cycle Management for Cultural Heritage (SACHER 3D CH), based on 3D digital models of architecture and dedicated to the management of Cultural Heritage and to the storage of the numerous data generated by the team of professionals involved in the restoration process; (ii) Multidimensional Search Engine for Cultural Heritage (SACHER MuSE CH), an advanced multi-level search system designed to manage Heritage data from heterogeneous sources.

The paper, aiming to retrieve the original meaning of Smart City, attempts to demonstrate its impact in the field of Cultural Heritage (CH). It presents a framework - applied in a project for a prototypical case study of ‘Widespread Built Heritage’ (WBH) - to create a Smart cultural city, transforming Cultural Items into Smart Cultural Objects (SCO), meant as sources and recipients of advanced information. The framework aims to provide an extensive and robust theoretical support to design and to manage the processes of Cultural Objects (CO) and Cultural bins, implementing a methodological system and an advanced environment based on Smart technologies.

The current Cultural Heritage management system lacks of ICT platforms for the management and integration of heterogeneous and fragmented data sources and interconnection between private and public subjects involved in the process. The SACHER project intends to fill this gap, working both on a technological level and on a business model level: firstly providing a platform based on an open-source distributed cloud-computing environment for the management of the complete data lifecycle related to cultural assets; moreover providing new models based on participatory design for Cultural Heritage data directed towards social entrepreneurship. This paper presents the first implementation of a system for managing data based on the 3D model of the cultural object, with a focus on the process for cultural assets management and the interface design for cultural services.

Information and communication technology applications and the preservation, research and popularisation of heritage have attained an important position in the conservation, heritage management and art studies of cultural heritage. As cultural heritage has a lot of different aspects and there is often a need of continuous scientific research and preservation to gather valuable information from our history and provide better understanding for future generations. Although there have been numerous projects around the world, over the past four years become combination of several technical analysis very important cultural heritage documentation solution in Estonia. Supporting that development is the wider knowledge and better accessibility of the instrumental studies, imaging and survey technologies. Combination of non-destructive and destructive surveys provides enriched information about heritage artefacts that may considerably help conservation and heritage specialists especially when it is accessible over the Web. In these following cases study of research connected with art, we tested and used different imaging and information technologies and the possibilities that may in the future be applied in the landscape of museums and cultural heritage protection for improved documentation of Estonia’s heritage.

ICT-based technological innovation has not yet made substantial advantages, although desirable, in the Cultural Heritage field, both as regards the management and as regards the use of assets. It is still weak, e.g., the receipt of the paradigm of the Internet of Things (IoT). Conversely ICT-based technologies could play a main role. I.e. in the following, we discuss how IoT can make a valuable contribution to emphasize the knowledge processes through augmentation of past memories with information interfaces and allows a complete management of the Heritage artefact from conservation to communication.

Nowadays cities, as well as Cultural Heritage, are facing new challenges due to the public financial straits and the increasing need to deliver innovative service to manage a wide heritage. Great expectations are in put the Smart City paradigm relying on the capability of the city to realize and scale up intangible infrastructures based on new typologies of partnerships for the development of services. The paper presents a design framework aimed to transform Cultural Items in Smart Cultural Objects (SCO), meant as sources and recipients of advanced information applied on ‘Widespread Built Cultural Heritage’. The aim has been not just to enhance the artifacts with their own quality, but their unique social, communal, anthropological and urban-infrastructural meaning. The ability to manage efficiently heterogeneous data and the levels of global connectivity, as well as the real-time interaction, perception, localization, communication, and identification, made possible by cloud computing and Internet of Things, to allow the changeover from Cultural Objects to SCO. The framework, here exposed, aims to provide an extensive and robust theoretical support to design and to manage the processes of Cultural Objects and Cultural bins, implementing a methodological system and an advanced environment based on ICT technologies for recording, storage, processing, access and presentation of Cultural Heritage (CH) data in a Smart Management environment. The framework has been applied in two projects for a prototypical case study of widespread urban CH. Keywords: cultural heritage, human smart city, co-design, internet of things, heritage management and communication.

The paper presents a novel digital 3D GIS web-based system entirely founded on Google Earth, built to offer a deep insight into Palladio's opera for restitution of its architectural surveys, reconstruction for historical reasons, analysis for structural and other options, and assembly and presentation of all certified Palladian documentation. The development of the application follows the philosophy of visual computing and it is based on an architectural knowledge representation. The information system is conceived as a typical Rich Internet Application and it is based on the digitalization of the complete Palladian corpus documentation implemented by the Centro Internazionale di Studi di Architettura Andrea Palladio (CISAAP). The 3D geodatabase system is, actually, in use at the Centro as the Palladian information system for researchers and in two expositions at Barbaran da Porto Palace in Vicenza, and at Villa Poiana at Poiana Maggiore, where is widely used by tourists for virtual visits to Palladian buildings.