research-article

Homogenization of 2D & 3D Document Formats for Cuneiform Script Analysis

Authors:

Bartosz Bogacz,

Hubert MaraAuthors Info & Claims

HIP '15: Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Historical Document Imaging and Processing

Pages 115 - 122

https://doi.org/10.1145/2809544.2809549

Published: 22 August 2015 Publication History

Abstract

In the Digital Humanities, text sources can be digitized using various methods resulting in different data representations of related documents. This presents an increased challenge for clay tablets with cuneiform script, which is one of the oldest scripts written by hand, used in the ancient Middle East for more than three millennia. Using a 3D-Scanner to acquire a cuneiform tablet or a manually created line tracing are two completely different representations of the same type of text source. Additionally, a line tracing can be born-digital as a vector graphic or it can be a raster image of a drawing with ink on paper. Each representation is typically processed with its own tool-set and the textual analysis is therefore limited to a certain type of digital representation. In this work we present a work-flow for unification of the three most common graphical representations of cuneiform tablets. The first approach vectorizes the manually created retro-digitized tracings by skeletonization and applies pattern matching to extract the wedges, which are the radical elements of cuneiform script. Secondly, the born-digital drawings also require pattern matching as the curved lines are set differently by each draftsperson. Due to the density of wedges, a subsequent conflict resolution is applied to both types of line drawings. As cuneiform characters are written by hand in 3D, we show the segmentation and extraction of wedges from high-resolution 3D-models. The result is one representation exported as Scalable Vector Graphic (SVG), which is used for character retrieval for a future Optical Character Recognition (OCR) as ultimate goal.

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Cited By

Bogacz BKlingmann MMara H(2017)Automating Transliteration of Cuneiform from Parallel Lines with Sparse Data2017 14th IAPR International Conference on Document Analysis and Recognition (ICDAR)10.1109/ICDAR.2017.106(615-620)Online publication date: Nov-2017
https://doi.org/10.1109/ICDAR.2017.106
Bogacz BHowe NMara H(2016)Segmentation Free Spotting of Cuneiform Using Part Structured Models2016 15th International Conference on Frontiers in Handwriting Recognition (ICFHR)10.1109/ICFHR.2016.0064(301-306)Online publication date: Oct-2016
https://doi.org/10.1109/ICFHR.2016.0064

Homogenization of 2D & 3D Document Formats for Cuneiform Script Analysis
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Computer graphics
2. Theory of computation

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cover image ACM Other conferences

HIP '15: Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Historical Document Imaging and Processing

August 2015

155 pages

ISBN:9781450336024

DOI:10.1145/2809544

Editors:
Bertrand Coüasnon
Irisa / Insa de Rennes, France
,
Volker Märgner
Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany
,
Volkmar Frinken
Electrical and Computer Engineering, UC Davis, USA and ONU Technology, San Jose, USA
,
Bill Barrett
Brigham Young University, USA
,
Program Chairs:
Bertrand Coüasnon
Irisa / Insa de Rennes, France
,
Volkmar Frinken
Electrical and Computer Engineering, UC Davis, USA and ONU Technology, San Jose, USA
,
Hamid Amiri
ENIT, Tunisia
,
Volker Märgner
Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany
,
Bill Barrett
Brigham Young University, USA

Copyright © 2015 ACM.

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Publication History

Published: 22 August 2015

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HIP '15

HIP '15: 3rd International Workshop on Historical Document Imaging and Processing

August 22, 2015

Gammarth, Tunisia

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Cited By

Bogacz BKlingmann MMara H(2017)Automating Transliteration of Cuneiform from Parallel Lines with Sparse Data2017 14th IAPR International Conference on Document Analysis and Recognition (ICDAR)10.1109/ICDAR.2017.106(615-620)Online publication date: Nov-2017
https://doi.org/10.1109/ICDAR.2017.106
Bogacz BHowe NMara H(2016)Segmentation Free Spotting of Cuneiform Using Part Structured Models2016 15th International Conference on Frontiers in Handwriting Recognition (ICFHR)10.1109/ICFHR.2016.0064(301-306)Online publication date: Oct-2016
https://doi.org/10.1109/ICFHR.2016.0064

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