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Multimedia Tools and Applications - Call for Papers: Heritage Preservation in the Digital Age: Advances in machine learning, monomodal and multimodal processing, and human-machine interaction [1250]

Aims and Scope

This special issue focuses on analyzing, processing and valorizing all types of data related to cultural heritage, including tangible and intangible heritage. As stated by UNESCO, cultural heritage provides societies with a wealth of resources inherited from the past, created in the present for the benefit of future generations. The massive digitization of historical analogue resources and production of born digital documents provide us with large volumes of varied multimedia heritage data (images, maps, text, video, 3D objects, multi-sensor data, etc.), which represent an extremely rich heritage that can be exploited in a wide variety of fields, from research in social sciences and computational humanities to land use and territorial policies, including urban modeling, digital simulation, archaeology, tourism, education, culture preservation, creative media and entertainment. 

In terms of research in computer science, artificial intelligence, and digital humanities, they address challenging problems related to the diversity, specificity or volume of the media, the veracity of the data, and the different user needs with respect to engaging with this rich material and the extraction of value out of the data. These challenges are reflected in the corresponding sub-fields of machine learning, signal processing, mono/multi-modal techniques and human-machine interaction.

The objective of this special issue is to present and discuss the latest and most significant trends on analysis, understanding and promotion of heritage contents, focusing on advances on machine learning, signal processing, mono/multi-modal techniques, and human-machine interaction. We welcome research contributions for (but not limited to) the following topics: 

  • Monomodal analysis: image, text, video, 3D, music, sensor data and structured referentials
  • Information retrieval for multimedia heritage
  • AI assisted archaeology and heritage data processing
  • Multi-modal deep learning and time series analysis for heritage data
  • Heritage modeling, visualization, and virtualization
  • Smart digitization and reconstruction of heritage data
  • Open heritage data and bench-marking

The scope of targeted applications is extensive and includes: 

  • Analysis, archaeometry of artifacts
  • Diagnosis and monitoring for restoration and preventive conservation
  • Geosciences / Geomatics for cultural heritage
  • Education
  • Smart and sustainable tourism
  • Urban planning
  • Digital Twins


Important Dates

Submission: April 15, 2024
Review period: 1 April - 30 July 2024
Notification: 31 July 2024
Author revision: 30 October 2024
Final notification: 31 October 2024


Guest Editors:

Valerie Gouet-Brunet, University of Gustave Eiffel
Ronak Kosti, Piscsart AI Lab
Li Weng, School of Information Technology, Zhejiang Financial College


Submission Guidelines:

Authors should prepare their manuscript according to the Instructions for Authors available from the Multimedia Tools and Applications website (this opens in a new tab). Authors should submit through the online submission site at https://www.editorialmanager.com/mtap/default.aspx (this opens in a new tab) and select “SI 1250- Heritage Preservation in the Digital Age: Advances in machine learning, monomodal and multimodal processing, and human-machine interaction” when they reach the “Article Type” step in the submission process. Submitted papers should present original, unpublished work, relevant to one of the topics of the special issue. All submitted papers will be evaluated on the basis of relevance, significance of contribution, technical quality, scholarship, and quality of presentation, by at least three independent reviewers. It is the policy of the journal that no submission, or substantially overlapping submission, be published or be under review at another journal or conference at any time during the review process. Please note that the authors of selected papers presented at SUMAC2023 are invited to submit an extended version of their contributions by taking into consideration both the reviewers’ comments on their conference paper, and the feedback received during presentation at the conference. It is worth clarifying that the extended version is expected to contain a substantial scientific contribution, e.g., in the form of new algorithms, experiments or qualitative/quantitative comparisons, and that neither verbatim transfer of large parts of the conference paper nor reproduction of already published figures will be tolerated. The extended versions of SUMAC2023 papers will undergo the standard, rigorous journal review process and be accepted only if well-suited to the topic of this special issue and meeting the scientific level of the journal. Final decisions on all papers are made by the Editor in Chief.

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