Presentation for the "2ªS JORNADAS DOCUMENTAÇÃO E REPRESENTAÇÃO DIGITAL DE BENS CULTURAIS" at the School of Arts, Porto, 2018

1. ConímbrigAR: A Prototype
Augmented Mobile
Application for Exploration of
Roman Mosaics
2ªs Jornadas de Documentação e Representação Digital de Bens Culturais,
19-20 Oct, School of Arts, Porto, 2018
André Belo, Jorge C. S. Cardoso
CISUC/DEI, Universidade de Coimbra

2. Contents
1. “Mosaico - Conímbriga e Sicó” project
2. Digital Tools for Exploring Roman Mosaic
3. Prototype AR Application
4. AR Framework Testing

3. “Mosaico -
Conímbriga e
Sicó” Project

4. “Mosaico - Conímbriga e Sicó” Project
● Integrated into the CREATOUR
national project as a pilot
initiative - Creative Tourism
Destination Development in
Small Cities and Rural Areas
● “Mosaico – Conímbriga e Sicó”
is a creative tourism project
based on the Roman Mosaic
heritage
○ Develops educational, cultural, and
creative activities around Roman
Mosaic

5. “Mosaico - Conímbriga e Sicó” Project
● Based on the valuable Roman
Mosaic Heritage present in the
geographical axis constituted by
○ the Ruins of the Roman city of
Conímbriga,
○ the Roman Villa of Rabaçal, and
○ the Monumental Complex of
Santiago da Guarda.
● Headquartered in the
“Monographic Museum of
Conímbriga – National Museum”
○ an important center for
archaeological research,
conservation and restoration of
Roman Mosaic in Portugal

6. “Mosaico - Conímbriga e Sicó” Project
● Promotes cultural and creative
activities within the museums,
interpretative centers and
archaeological sites included in
its program of action.
● The visitors are invited to be
involved in alternative
experiences of sharing
knowledge about the Roman
Mosaic Heritage
● Mosaic as an expression of
creativity brought into the
present and reinterpreted now
and in the future.

7. Digital Tools for
Exploring
Roman Mosaic
In the context of the “Mosaico -
Conímbriga e Sicó” project
Various planned digital tools to
support different activities for
exploring roman mosaic

8. Mosaic Editor
● Support for mosaic workshops
for non-professionals

9. Mosaic Programming Environment
● Learning computer
programming by creating
mosaic patterns

10. Innovative Interactive Experiences
● Sandbox early prototype
● Interactive experiences for kids
● Digging mosaics simulations

11. Augmented
Reality Mobile
Application
An AR application that provides
in-place, contextual information
about the roman mosaics

12. Augmented Reality Mobile Application
● Technical information about the
mosaics, for example, when they
were uncovered, what was the
latest conservation or
restoration work, etc.
● Provide additional conservation
and restoration information, for
example, display image overlays
of the conservation or
restoration works on mosaics
over time.

13. Augmented Reality Mobile Application
● Provide a platform for the
visualization of virtual
restoration of the existing
mosaics. The virtual restoration
images could be created by
different audiences with
different purposes. For example,
in the context of a school visit,
students could digitally
manipulate mosaic images and
creatively “restore” missing
parts which could then be
experienced through the AR
application.

14. Augmented Reality Mobile Application
● Provide visual indication
regarding specific aspects of the
various mosaics.
● For example, mosaics could be
highlighted with graphical
information regarding the
various motifs found in the
mosaics
○ geometric patterns, animals, plants,
compositions, mythological figures,
etc.

15. Augmented Reality Mobile Application
● Hybrid application (run on
Android, iOS, etc.)
○ Lower development effort
● What AR development
frameworks are most suitable
for detecting mosaics?

16. Types of Augmented Reality - Location Based
● Based on coordinates (e.g., GPS)
● Imprecise, not enough to overlay mosaic details

17. Types of Augmented Reality - (Structured) Marker Based
● Based on a pre-defined, structured visual marker image
● Very precise, requires placement of artificial markers on site

18. Types of Augmented Reality - (Natural Image Features) Marker
Based
● Based on a pre-defined natural images (targets)
● Very precise, if targets are good enough
● May be used against natural images on site
● Usually used with printed images

19. Types of Augmented Reality - Markerless Based
● Based on detection of planar surfaces
● Not contextual

20. AR Development Frameworks
● We studied multi-platform AR development frameworks and their
features
○ We wanted natural image features
● Narrowed down to 3 frameworks suitable for natural image
detection

21. AR Framework Evaluation
● Real-world evaluation with roman mosaics at Conímbriga
● Targets with different characteristics were captured
● A test application was developed using each of the 3 AR
frameworks

22. AR Test Application
● Test application overlaid graphical shapes over the targets
● We screen-captured in video the execution of the application over
each of the mosaic targets

23. AR Test Application
● We subjectively analysed the various videos on 3 metrics
○ Recognition delay
○ Minimum required target area
○ Visual alignment and stability

24. AR Framework Evaluation Results - Overall Recognition
● Not all targets were
recognized
○ This was expected
○ Targets were captured from a
distance
○ Not much effort in capturing
targets
● Wikitude performed very
poorly
○ Unexpected
○ Requires further study as to
why

25. AR Framework Evaluation Results - Recognition Delay
● CraftAR is faster than PixLive
○ Almost 0.5 seconds faster

26. AR Framework Evaluation Results - Minimum required target
area
PixLive requires less visible target area

27. AR Framework Evaluation Results - Visual alignment and
stability
-1: bad alignment / stability
0: ok alignment / stability
1: good alignment / stability

28. Conclusion
● Study allowed us to understand strong and weak points of these
AR frameworks
● AR frameworks’ performance varies depending on the type of
image they are recognizing
● AR frameworks have different performance compromises
○ No single one is best at every performance attribute
● Virtual Heritage application developers should test different
frameworks before commiting to one
● We still need to study additional aspects such as the best way to
capture targets
○ Explore alternative AR types