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By Monika Segbert - February 2002
Monika Segbert introduces the TRIAL projects and enlightens us on ACTIVATEd BEASTS that KIST MATAHARI IN VALHALLA. Interested...well read on.
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Under Action Line III.1.5 (Trials
on new access modes to cultural and scientific content) the
Cultural Applications unit of DG Information Society
launched as part of its 4th call in 2000 a programme for
‘Take-Up Actions’. The intention was to launch trial
actions across Europe, which will encourage take-up of results
and stimulate the implementation of innovative products and
services in the cultural heritage sector. The focus of the Action
Line was on exploring and experimenting novel ways of creating,
manipulating, managing and presenting new classes of intelligent,
dynamically adaptive and self-aware digital cultural objects,
either held by memory institutions (archives, libraries, museums,
etc) or directly involving digitally born objects or art forms.
The proposal were to be user-centred and include:
The workplan recommended that focus should be given to the sustainable development of valuable digital repositories in Europe’s libraries, museums and archives, on models for future virtual collections and on guidelines for integrating real and virtual objects and collections. Proposers were asked to provide examples of how dynamic user interaction with the cultural and scientific content can enhance the user experience, addressing the experiences of learning, exploring and entertaining for the user.
As a result of this call 25 new TRIAL projects were chosen. The average duration of the projects is about 12 months. They address a wide-range of user communities (specialist but also general such as children or tourists) and cultural heritage themes. This demonstrates that this is a very worthwhile initiative that has the potential to create a European-wide momentum for innovation not only in the larger cultural institutions, as most of the projects are driven by cultural institutions run by local authorities or by SMEs with local interests. The projects will be interesting to many potential users, as in many cases they will be improving access to cultural assets in museums, archives and libraries, through their use of innovative technologies such as mobiles, digitisation techniques, Internet support.
Playing with the EC acronyms led to the opening line of this article: ACTIVATE will show interesting innovative solutions for accessing cultural resources. It "will also build a virtual reality model of a historic landscape, to provide a new way of accessing existing rich stores of cultural content concerning the landscape". BEASTS will benefit the tourism and leisure industry in Wales: go to the website and read that “eight of the ten SMEs who will be taking part in the trialing have been identified - and represent a wide range of tourism interests. Shops, farms, trekking centres and a riding for those with learning disabilities initiative are included”. KIST will use 3D, audio, animation and video for a digital exploration of the collections of the National Museum of Scotland, whereas MATAHARI will use portable information devices for access to information gleaned from libraries, archives and museums about outdoor objects in order to enhance the visitor’s experience. Finally, VALHALLA is going to provide a resource displaying video & explanation of historic gardens and parks.
The TRIALS meet head on the challenge of cultural institutions taking on ICT, not in an RTD setting, but by experimenting with technology and in partnership between technology providers and (in many cases) smaller cultural institutions – local archives, museums, libraries. These institutions face the challenge of responding to organisational change, of integrating new skills and competences, of meeting the digital challenge. Their motivation is to make cultural content more visible and accessible, to offer their users new ways of interaction and experiences. Those that will benefit from the results of the trials include tourists, teachers and SME’s, historians and scholars, botanists, scientists, the interested citizen, our everyday European life. Particular attention is given to the inclusion and involvement of young people through games and in the creation of content.
Prime examples of involving children are CHOSA, which is developing an interactive web game and a WAP tour, both fun and educational, for access to and awareness of an archaeological site; TREBIS - Trial and Evaluation of a Biodiversity Information System for public use in a natural history museum. This project trials a natural history museum approach to the use of multimedia techniques to enhance awareness of biodiversity, endangered species and ecology. The user community – school children – will be given access to the database and to digital maps. It is a good example of a young Austrian software firm Biogis Consulting partnering with a museum and an educational institution (Institute for Didactis of Biology at the University of Munich and Natural History Museum of Vorarlberg); TPHS is trialling an innovative approach to promoting information on architecture and heritage in that it focuses on information on buildings and related objects which children consider to be of particular interest - it directly deals with Cultura as seen and appreciated by children, in an engaging and playful way.
Another projects aims to bring the sources of history to citizens and tourists - ARCHIVIEW plans to open the resources of historical city archives to broader audiences by integrating easy tools for the management of collections with solutions for creating "narratives" around sources and publishing the results on the Web. This will make a wealth of first-hand information available to those interested in getting to know and feel the past of the towns they live in or are visiting.
A few projects are studying new attractive means to link to town history and historical collections through the resources of virtual reality. VRCHIP, VIRTUAL and HITITE bring slightly different approaches to a common core idea, i.e. showcasing in interactive and fascinating way flagship monuments and resources to make them an access point to the heritage of local identity.
VALHALLA brings an interesting outlook on historical gardens, letting users visit and live them in their rich details of garden architecture in relationship with the buildings that surround them. This is an unusual example of how "minor" but extremely relevant resources of the cultural aspects of towns can be better known and exploited.
And, as a prime example of the rich diversity of the TRIAL projects, the two projects starting with an e- : e-Islam and e-Stage. The one aiming to promote the Islamic collection of the Benaki Museum in Greece by creating digital surrogates of the exhibited items (for example items displayed currently in an exhibition of Glass of the Sultans), the other aimed at setting up a web-based resource on European puppetry.
Time and space are too short to discuss all fascinating aspects of all the other trials not mentioned above in this article (but you will hear more about them elsewhere):
BOOKS2U!: This proposal with an Austrian partnership trials a new approach to inter-library loans which intends to have far reaching impact on necessary improvements across Europe.
CTIC: The partnership, which consists of several UK museums and art galleries, is trialling an online interface enabling users to access cultural content displayed in their collections.
DOMINICO: The project features an Austro-Slovenian partnership to trial innovative technologies for networking smaller museums and exhibition designers as a basis for enhancing a series of exhibitions.
EULER-TAKEUP: Based on the pilot developed through the EULER RTD project, the trial is setting up and evaluating a European digital library for mathematics. The consortium joins partners from Germany, the Netherlands and Italy and addresses the needs of a clearly identified user community.
HYPERGUIDE: The trial builds an XML tool based on a web description methodology, for access to high-value web-based resources in order to enhance selection, filtering and usability of information resources in specific domains.
LAB-VR: The proposal is aiming to improve 3D photographic Internet access to research laboratories and their research activities. Users will be able to view the operational research environment as an interface for gaining further information from the Web..
POUCE: The trial seeks to validate a model for a common access portal to a group of French museums on the Web. The XML-based approach and the exploitation plans are targeted to a sustainable level of service.
SANDALYA: An Italian partnership which will trial the results of previous research dealing with the digitisation of manuscripts. The project has a direct focus on sustainability through both its technical background and active exploitation policies.
SEAX-DAMAS: The project trials a wide range of aspects of archive management in a regional record office relying fully on international standards.
UHI-NMS: The Scottish consortium will trial an approach designed to add value to National Museums of Scotland’s digital content for the National Grid for Learning. Special attention will be given to appropriate pedagogical approaches.
VIRMUS: This project from Latvia proposes to experiment with the use of market-ready 3DML tools in order to enable first-time users to create 3D pages in cultural heritage buildings on the Web. The project aims at a catalytic effect in expanding virtual reality in the museum sector.
More information about each project, and links to individual websites can be found on the TRIS Web site [1].
The TRIS Accompanying Measure will cooperate with all TRIAL projects to strengthen and enhance the effectiveness and the benefits of individual actions and projects beyond their own perimeter. The co-ordination, grouping and dissemination activities of TRIS will help the projects to reach critical mass and substantial cultural, scientific and commercial impact. In particular, TRIS will:
TRIS also plans to actively foster the participation of relevant interest groups that may not otherwise be present in IST. This relates in particular to the participation of non-EU countries, mostly within the PHARE, TACIS and MEDA areas. Despite the availability of significant resources and the active promotion policies undertaken by the Commission, in fact, these areas have experienced difficulties in their involvement in European RTD activities. It is one of the working hypothesis of TRIS that the TRIALS format, because of its lightweight footprint and of its direct concern with results and technology transfer, may represent an optimal vehicle for the involvement of these countries and potentially a bridgehead for a low-risk inclusion of these areas into the 6th FP.
Within the EU, TRIS aims at providing a contribution to the core topic of transferring the results of RTD into the mainstream of territorial activities funded under the Structural Funds in Objective Areas (over EUR 120,000 million targeted at sustainable territory development and at fostering employment). The exploitation of cultural heritage and the interrelationships of culture and tourism are considered to be key to developing a sustainable culture economy that may represent, at least in a large number of areas, one of the most powerful engines for local growth and for the promotion of local identities.
A major role in this process will be played by the capability of European research to shape and to qualify structural activities, by providing models, standards, plans and best practices that can be quickly and effectively deployed throughout the Objective areas. TRIS will provide hints, contacts and active support to promote and to follow-up this process, helping consortia and local policy makers leverage the convergence between the results of the projects and the operational programmes of selected regions.
TRIS is currently planning the first major TRIALs event during the EVA Florence conference (25-29.3.2002). For details about this and more detailed information and news about the TRIALS and TRIS visit the Web site [1].
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Monika Segbert MBE FLA(hon) Dipl.Bibl.
Project Management and Consultancy
Via Fondiglie 5-7
60030 Rosora (An)
Italy
tris@monikasegbert.com
<http://www.monikasegbert.com>
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For citation purposes:
Segbert, M. "The TRIAL projects and their accompanying measure TRIS", Cultivate Interactive, issue
6, 11 February 2002
URL: <http://www.cultivate-int.org/issue6/tris/>
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