Metadata and Tools for Integration and Preservation of Cultural Heritage 3D Information

In this paper we investigate many of the various storage, portability and interoperability issues arising among archaeologists and cultural heritage people when dealing with 3D technologies. On the one side, the available digital repositories look often unable to guarantee affordable features in the management of 3D models and their metadata; on the other side the nature of most of the available data format for 3D encoding seem to be not satisfactory for the necessary portability required nowadays by 3D information across different systems. We propose a set of possible solutions to show how integration can be achieved through the use of well known and wide accepted standards for data encoding and data storage. Using a set of 3D models acquired during various archaeological campaigns and a number of open source tools, we have implemented a straightforward encoding process to generate meaningful semantic data and metadata. We will also present the interoperability process carried out to integrate the encoded 3D models and the geographic features produced by the archaeologists. Finally we will report the preliminary (rather encouraging) development of a semantic enabled and persistent digital repository, where 3D models (but also any kind of digital data and metadata) can easily be stored, retrieved and shared with the content of other digital archives.