ITN-DCH Summer School & CGI Conference 27

3

ITN-DCH Summer School & CGI Conference 27

June – 1

July 2016

ESR 5: Gina Stavropoulou Partner: Ku Leuven

The 3rd ITN-DCH summer school took place in Hersonissos in Crete and it was organized by FORTH, one of the full partners of the project. The Summer School was co- located with the 33rd annual conference, Computer Graphics International (CGI) and the fellows had the chance to gain knowledge from both events.

The summer school was on Monday 27th of June, and lasted the whole day. There were 4 main thematic sessions, closely related to the fusion of Digital Cultural Heritage and Computer Graphics; “Digitization and capturing technologies & practices”, “HCI &

semantic data, Digital Humanities” and “Introduction to Geometric Algebra enabling mathematical tools”. I personally enjoyed the “Digital Humanities” session, which consisted of two very interesting presentations. First, Mr. Tsikritsis from the ministry of education talked about the astronomical knowledge in the region of Aegean during the Neolithic era and more specifically about the engraved symbols of the “frying pan”

vessels of the region, which depicted complex astronomical phenomena. Having a personal interest in the engraved symbols of Sumerian art, I found this presentation very interesting and very related to my research. After that, Prof. Martha Vassiliadi continued with another engaging talk on how the European Literature has influenced the way mixed reality simulations are being developed. More specifically she focused on how the destruction of Pompeii, an important historical incident, has been depicted in modern simulations and serious games based not only on historical facts but also on literature, romanticizing the incident but at the same time enriching the simulations with realism.

The subject was exceptionally interesting and I wish there was more time for the second part of the presentation, which was dedicated to fictional heroines, like Salome, and their representation in various forms of literature and simulations.

Regarding the overall conference, I believe it was very successful in terms of

organization and Margarita Papaefthymiou (ESR10) together with the other researchers

from her lad, did an excellent job as hosts, providing general assistance to all the

conference attendees. Moreover, the presentations had been carefully selected and the

keynote speakers were leading figures in the computer graphics field that gave especially

inspiring talks. Something that I really appreciated was the workshop dedicated to

geometric algebra (GACSE), since it was quite intriguing to attend a mathematical

session. However, I believe that the highlight of this ITN-DCH event was again the

interaction with the project’s fellows, both the old and the new! On the day of the

summer school we had the chance to meet again a former fellow of the project, George

Bruseker, who presented his work on the CIDOC CRM standard and the representations

of cultural heritage. Additionally, this was the first summer school for the new fellows,

Eirini, George and Vasiliki. Undoubtedly, this event formed a good opportunity for us to

meet again or to get to know each other and discover common ground for future

collaborations.