Cultural heritage in the mature era of computer graphics

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With the increasing importance of preserving historical remains, the phrase "cultural heritage" is used in different contexts and for completely different purposes. For us, cultural heritage means everything specific to a region/country/continent, in the context of a social development phase. It belongs to the whole world and should be preserved and used for the benefit of humanity. Cultural heritage includes archaeological remains, buildings, cities, music, theater, fine arts, libraries, crafts, customs, fashion, and so on. Technological developments, especially the Internet boom, are making cultural heritage one of the most important IT application areas. Convincing results can be achieved, particularly in interdisciplinary cooperation with computer graphics specialists. Despite the diversity of cultural heritage application scenarios and the technologies needed, we just mention a few key technological issues in this article, and point to some visions about the future role-and the specific needs-of computer graphics in this vitally important application area. We can characterize two main target groups in the context of cultural heritage. First, a broad target group primarily consists of the general public, educational professionals, administrators and investors. The main focus for this group is on presentation. A second target group consists of the experts themselves (art historians, historians, archaeologists, restorers, etc.), who are concerned with the collection, preservation, exploration and mediation of our cultural heritage.