Nicolas SCHIMERL | Pia Patrizia WEBER | Thomas STÖLLNER (Deutsches Bergbau-Museum Bochum, Germany) Keywords: virtual exhibition; Salt Men of Zanjan; Mining Archaeology The web app “Death by Salt. An archaeological investigation in Persia” is a 1:1 copy of the homonymous special exhibition currently on display in the German Mining Museum Bochum. The exhibition’s topic are the so-called ‘Salt Men of Zanjān’. These bodies of eight workers, who died in mining accidents in an Iranian salt mine approximately 1500 and 2500 years ago, were conserved by the salt. They are the only preserved salt mummies worldwide to day. Visitors follow the archaeologists’ research from the initial discovery of the site through excavations and various scientific analysis. This journey ends with the hypothetical reconstruction of one of the workers last day presented in a graphic novel.   The digital version of the exhibition is extended by an additional information layer offering users interesting insights such as 3D models of the finds, interviews with researchers, explanatory texts, an audio play for children and a mystery tour that can be played both online and on site in the museum. By using a 3D scan of the analogue exhibition area, users are enabled to navigate freely in the virtual exhibition.   Vice versa to bringing the analogue into the digital, digital elements were also integrated in the analogue exhibition in a second connected application. This makes the connection between analogue and digital fluid. Visitors can examine ‘Salt Man 4’ and the mine itself in an AR app. This app offers – like the web app – additional levels of information.   The web app additionally features 3D tours through two more exhibitions connected to “Death by Salt”, which are currently on display at the National Museum of Iran and the German Mining Museum. With one application, visitors can visit three exhibitions regardless of time and location. – Statistics about the use of UI elements can be logged for future improvement of the exhibit...

Takehiko NAGAKURA | Wenzhe PENG | Yuxuan LEI | Xiaoyun ZHANG | Nikolaos VLAVIANOS (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA) Keywords: AR, Multi-media, Web-based application, Alvar Aalto, Baker House Baker House AR (2021) is a web-based AR application built for museum visitors to an architectural exhibition. Its multi-media contents, such as 3D models and video recordings, break and expand the boundary of the traditional drawings and photos, physically exhibited on the walls and tables of the exhibition space. While moving around this exhibit and interacting with the application, visitors are presented with information about an important cultural heritage location, which is organized and curated as an integration of the physical artifacts and the virtual contents switchable through simple UI’s. Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) is a Finnish architect considered one of the most important Modernist pioneers. In the spring and summer of 2021, a large exhibition of works by Aalto and his wife, Aino, was organized for the museums in Tokyo and Kobe, Japan. This application was developed as part of the presentation of Baker House, a dormitory Aalto designed on the campus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1949, through collaboration with MIT, Aalto Foundation in Helsinki, and Gallery A4 in Tokyo. The application includes the following design features. – Its distribution through a web-browser using Three.js and AR.js library eliminates the need to download a native application. – Its multi-media contents, including 3D scans, CAD models, video recordings, and scanned 2D archives, are driven by online databases. Different compositions of these virtual contents can be prepared as means to curate the contents, and users can switch between them through simple UI’s. – In AR mode, the multi-media contents are spatially referenced from the drawings exhibited on the museum floor. Touching the smartphone screen allows the user to suspend the AR mode and to magnify, rotate and move the virtual camera...

Ar Madhu VOTTERY (Apiero Technologies USA, India) Keywords: Gateways, canons, palaces, historic temples The application is designed keeping in mind the usage by school children, teachers,parents, other than global visitors. The application opens with location of 275 Heritage components across the length and breath of the city in forty plus categories/typologies. The curator has added her 14 years of reaserch data in the form of Text, Pictures, 200 handmade drawings,50 audio and 50 video files. She has trained 12 children to record audio files that are about poems facts and folklores on Heritage components. Madhu Vottery has taken many lectures for thousands of students (especially during present pandemic) of different age groups(grade 2 to 12) and fields (architecture, tourism, history) of many private and Govt institutions. These were actually the Virtual tours conducted with the help of this application. She has been honourded by various agencies and Govt of India for her work. A heritage component can be searched in this application easily with its name and alternatively by the category/historic typology it belongs too. It has natural Heritage components too. It is very useful tool to create awareness about the rich Cultural Heritage of her city. She has presented this work at ICOMOS too. The details of her talks can be checked on FB page of Madhu...