The Hunt Museum Hosts Successful 3DBigDataSpace Training Series

Building Skills for Digital Heritage

Aimed at cultural heritage professionals at the beginning of their journey in digitisation and a friendly introduction to the processes that lead to high-quality digital assets.With the advent of the new European Collaborative Cloud for Cultural Heritage (ECCCH), this series of workshops aimed to build participants’ capacity and confidence to create high-quality digital assets to share and reuse as part of the cloud using 3DBigDataSpace tools such as PCSS Viewer: a web-based 3D viewer for exploring digital objects and collections, 4D Viewer: a browser-based tool to visualise models in their spatial and temporal context, and Rooom XR Viewer: a platform for immersive AR presentation and interaction.The training equipped participants with the confidence to adopt 3D technologies in their own institutions by successfully demystifying photogrammetry, scanning workflows, model preparation, and fabrication techniques.

Real-World Application in Education

As a partner in the 3DBigDataSpace project, The Hunt Museum Education team is testing the PCSS Viewer as part of a learning scenario with secondary schools in Limerick. Students participating in the lesson titled: “Pre-Christian Ireland- Stone Age/Bronze Age” are using the PCSS viewer to engage with 3D Bronze Age digital assets, able to view these objects in high quality, and testing their learning using the annotation device.

Training Format and Contributors

The workshop series combined a full-day, in-person workshop at the Hunt Museum with  four online sessions, covering object capture, mesh editing, fabrication, and inclusive design, through to documentation, licensing and long-term storage of 3D collections. The training was led by facilitator Tadhg Charles, a PhD researcher at Northumbria University, specialising in inclusive heritage co-design. Accompanying Tadhg for the final  session was Beth Knazook from the Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI) who led the final training session on Documentation, Licensing & Deposit.

Practical Outcomes and Participant Feedback

Participants praised the balance of theory and hands-on practice:

“The workshop gave me practical skills I can immediately use, especially the step-by-step approach to 3D capture and tactile model preparation.”

Many highlighted the accessibility focus as a standout feature, noting how learning to create tactile and digital replicas will help broaden audience engagement, particularly for visitors with visual impairment.

Another participant commented:

“The encouragement to think about both digital and tactile outcomes has opened new ideas for incorporating 3D into our community programming.”

The inclusion of metadata, licensing, and deposit guidance in later sessions also proved valuable, giving professionals insight into how to preserve and share 3D content responsibly within wider digital repositories.