Anna Bentkowska-Kafel

Hugh Denard

Computer-Generated Images (CGIs) are widely used and accepted in the world of entertainment but the use of the very same visualization techniques in academic research in the Arts and Humanities remains controversial. The techniques and conceptual perspectives on heritage visualization are a subject of an ongoing interdisciplinary debate. By demonstrating scholarly excellence and best technical practice in this area, this volume is concerned with the challenge of providing intellectual transparency and accountability in visualization-based historical research. Addressing a range of cognitive and technological challenges, the authors make a strong case for a wider recognition of three-dimensional visualization as a constructive, intellectual process and valid methodology for historical research and its communication. Intellectual transparency of visualization-based research, the pervading theme of this volume, is addressed from different perspectives reflecting the theory and practice of respective disciplines. The contributors - archaeologists, cultural historians, computer scientists and ICT practitioners - emphasize the importance of reliable tools, in particular documenting the process of interpretation of historical material and hypotheses that arise in the course of research. The discussion of this issue refers to all aspects of the intellectual content of visualization and is centred around the concept of 'paradata'. Paradata document interpretative processes so that a degree of reliability of visualization outcomes can be understood. The disadvantages of not providing this kind of intellectual transparency in the communication of historical content may result in visual products that only convey a small percentage of the knowledge that they embody, thus making research findings not susceptible to peer review and rendering them closed to further discussion. It is argued, therefore, that paradata should be recorded alongside more tangible outcomes of research, preferably as an integral part of virtual models, and sustained beyond the life-span of the technology that underpins visualization.

Paradata and Transparency in Virtual Heritage

Trish Cashen

Hazel Gardiner

Theory and Practice : Computers and the History of Art Series

Digital Visual Culture

Lindsay MacDonald

This book presents interdisciplinary approaches to the examination and documentation of material cultural heritage, using non-invasive spatial and spectral optical technologies.

Digital Techniques for Documenting and Preserving Cultural Heritage

This book looks at the transformation that Art and Art history is undergoing through engagement with the digital revolution. Since its initiation in 1985, CHArt (Computers and the History of Art) has set out to promote interaction between the rapidly developing new Information Technology and the study and practice of Art. It has become increasingly clear in recent years that this interaction has led, not just to the provision of new tools for the carrying out of existing practices, but to the evolution of unprecedented activities and modes of thought. This collection of papers represents the variety, innovation and richness of significant presentations made at the CHArt Conferences of 2001 and 2002. Some show new methods of teaching being employed, making clear in particular the huge advantages that IT can provide for engaging students in learning and interactive discussion. It also shows how much is to be gained from the flexibility of the digital image ‚Äì or could be gained if the road block of copyright is finally overcome. Others look at the impact on collections and archives, showing exciting ways of using computers to make available information about collections and archives and to provide new accessibility to archives. The way such material can now be accessed via the internet has revolutionized the search methods of scholars, but it has also made information available to all. However the internet is not only about access. Some papers here show how it also offers the opportunity of exploring the structure of images and dealing with the fascinating possibilities offered by digitisation for visual analysis, searching and reconstruction. Another challenging aspect covered here are the possibilities offered by digital media for new art forms. One point that emerges is that digital art is not some discreet practice, separated from other art forms. It is rather an approach that can involve all manner of association with both other art practices and with other forms of presentation and enquiry, demonstrating that we are witnessing a revolution that affects all our activities and not one that simply leads to the establishment of a new discipline to set alongside others.

Anna Bentkowska-Kafel

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