Multimedia Database

An international team of multimedia content creators, led by Brunel University and with support from the European Union, is developing and using 3D Multimedia tools to measure, reconstruct and visualise archaeological ruins in virtual reality using as a test case the ancient city of Sagalassos in Turkey.

A three node database with replication between nodes has been designed so that the database can be used in the field, in the archaeologist's laboratory and as a master security copy.
CORBA standard tools are being used to implement the data storage system to make it as generic as possible and allow for a future transition of the database from a centralised design to a distributed architecture.
JDBC and ODBC connectivity and Internet access has been established to database server. CIDOC standards are being referenced to describe completely reconstructed artifacts in order to be compliant to the way museums describe their artifacts.

The Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERD) for external views and conceptual/logical levels has been designed for the major parts of the archaeological process, namely:
· Stratigraphy Visualisation & Reconstruction
· Internet Visualisation & Reconstruction
· Pottery Visualisation & Reconstruction



Open source free software systems have been used wherever possible to reduce the costs to archaeological users:
· Linux, PostgreSQL, Apache HTTP Server, CORBA, Java
· Unicode character
· Multimedia data - VRML 1.0, MPEG-7, MPEG-2, PNM (PBM, PGM, PPM)

The 3DMurale Multimedia Database is the repository of the digital data associated with the excavation site. It stores 2D and 3D image information of archaeological content such as buildings, artefacts and part of artefacts.

· The 3DMurale Database allows for the storage of photographs and 3D models of archaeological content along with the temporal information, which enables the analysis, visualisation, and reconstruction of the site.

· It is a major gateway to the wider public and to the archaeological community in particular as it makes the archaeological information available over the Internet.

· 3DMurale Information System follows a replication model. The data collected during an excavation at an archaeological site is entered into the local database in the personal computer of the archaeologists. The information about campaigns is periodically uploaded to a central database. A user with a valid username and password is able to login to the central database server and can upload and download information about different campaigns. A Replication tool is under development for this purpose, which allows for selective transmission, and is used in conjunction with the STRAT tool.

The Database Servers.


The Replication Tool