Winners of the International Spotlight Heritage Student Contest 2023 and Interactive Digital Media Student Contest 2023

The Polytechnic University of Timișoara organized the third edition of International Spotlight Heritage Student Contest (ISHSC) 2023 and Interactive Digital Media Student Contest (IDMSC) 2023, in its 9th edition, on 17 November 2023, in the Multipurpose Hall of the UPT Central Library.

During the contest International Spotlight Heritage Student Contest (ISHSC) 2023, students from 3 renowned partner universities from Romania, Norway and Italy participated, who worked in international teams to develop projects that integrated mixed and virtual reality and created digital artefacts to capitalize on and celebrate the richness of Timisoara's cultural heritage , as part of the Spotlight Heritage Timișoara project. The event is part of the cultural digital initiative Spotlight Heritage Timișoara, part of the Cultural Program Timișoara 2023 European Capital of Culture and is co-financed by the EEA and Norway Grants funds and by the Municipality of Timișoara through the Project Center.

Section winners International Spotlight Heritage Student Contest (eXtended Reality), part of Interactive Digital Media Student Contest, was the team formed by: Marius Tătaru and Emilian Porumb – Universitatea Politehnica Timișoara (Romania), Inge Johan Johannson – University of Agder (Norway), Mara Valente – Università Roma Tre (Italy), Ilaria Filonzi – Università di Genova (Italy), Giulia Vigo – University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (Italy).

They carried out the project Giroc & Timisoara 2023 in VR, as a continuous development of the Virtual Reality (VR) application Spotlight Heritage by including game and gamification elements, by changing the visual interface, adding new graphic elements, by integrating with interactive elements the Jecza Museum, the Triade Sculpture Park and Casa Tineretului, as landmarks of the Giroc neighborhood and also an assistant was added to accompany users through the application. The team created a game on the virtual reality stage of the Palace of Culture in Timișoara that validates the information, in an improvement of the user experience and the participatory elements, internalizing the stories of the city. The second prize went to the mixed reality app Timisoara 2023 Quest in MR made by Marius Tătaru, Emilian Porumb – Universitatea Politehnica Timișoara (Romania) and Minh Tuan Hua – University of Agder (Norway), which included interface changes, new graphic elements and objects specific to contemporary art and the 1989 Revolution, integrated with the aim of stimulating users by personalizing the interaction with artifacts and art objects.

"I am impressed by the work of the students in the international teams, especially by the way they managed to develop by working both online and in Timișoara. We want to further develop a research component in the relationship of Human-Robot Teaming, humanizing robots and technologies, which also contains a culture and heritage component.", said Filippo Sanfilippo, professor at the Faculty of Engineering and Science, University of Agder (UiA), Norway.

Teacher Antonella Poce from Roma Tre University, Italy stated " It is an impressive project that allows co-creation with mixed student teams, highly innovative and unique in the context of museum experiences.”

”The elements of personalization and gamification introduced this year, the way each user's personal perspective changes, I believe bring many benefits to virtual and mixed reality applications. Congratulations to the students from three countries for their teamwork.” said the president of the ISHSC 2023 jury, Dr. Diana Andone, from the Polytechnic University of Timișoara.

Interactive Digital Media Student Contest (IDMSC) 2023

Now in its ninth edition, the IDMSC 2023 student competition aimed to stimulate creativity and the spirit of competition in the multimedia field, with students presenting the most interesting projects, but also to interact directly with representatives of the economic environment, even possible employers of the participants.

The grand prize Interactive Digital Media Student Contest 2023 was won by the project 🐅🐾🐾🐾🐾🐓 of Mechanics), Ioana Antonia Tănase, Daria Catrinoiu (Faculty of Architecture), from the Politehnica University of Timișoara (Romania) offered by Nutechnologies and Cobalt Sign. FITS is a project that involves a model made by 3D printing of the most important historical buildings in the center of the city of Timișoara. The mock-up became a three-dimensional interactive map, using a combination of technology, art and history to highlight important historical buildings and landmarks, brought to life through Internet of Things (IoT) and mobile technology.

To the category Web Development / Web Development, the winning project was Web Application for the Administration of Student Credentials "DIGIADEVERINțA", made by Marius-Florian Ivan-Fernolendt (Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technologies) from the Politehnica University of Timișoara (Romania), and the prize was offered by Haufe Group Romania. The paper presents a web application for credential management for students in a university. This facilitates the process of obtaining a certificate for both students and university staff.

To the category Internet of Things, the winning project was Solar Encrypt, made by Bogdan Preda (Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technologies), Politehnica University Timișoara (Romania), offered by Nokia. Solar Encryp is a device that aims to connect people in rural areas, it uses solar energy to power a microcontroller that has the role of making it possible for users to communicate through a mobile application, it also uses mechanical mechanisms to have a low energy consumption when the panel is in motion.

To the category Graphic Design / Audio-Video Production, the winning projects were House of Brück and The Enchanted Realm, made by Cristina-Tereza Turcu (Master Multimedia Technologies, Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technologies, UPT), the prize being offered by Deltatel Group. Both projects are represented by images edited and artistically processed in a combination of dedicated software applications with the aim of transposing buildings and elements from Timișoara into the world of stories.

To the category Development for mobile devices / Mobile development no prize was offered this year.

Instead, he was awarded a Special Award offered by Haufe Group Romania to the project Education silenced, made by Marielena-Adelina Chersin, (Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technologies, UPT), a video dedicated to the activity of the "Kinderhilfe" charity association, whose main goal is to reduce school dropout among young people from needy families, in the form of a report with an ending that demonstrates how the organization's actions can change lives for the better.

”It was a special competition in which we saw a qualitative increase in applications from the Internet of Things (IoT) area but also from the graphics and video production area. We thank our partners who provided the prizes but especially their time to get involved in the jury and in the evaluation of the projects and for the interaction with the students." said Prof. Radu Vasiu, president of the IDMSC 2023 jury, from the Politehnica University of Timișoara.

This year's IDMSC jury was formed by: Florin Ciocan (Nokia), Arthur Csertus and Marco Blagoiev (Cobalt Sign), Raul Geană (Haufe Group Romania), Victor Rochian (Deltatel Group), Raluca Vasiliu (Nutechnologies), Radu Ticiu ( Growceanu), UPT Multimedia Center: Radu Vasiu, Mugur Mocofan, Silviu Vert.

The Multimedia Center and the Department of ID/IFR and digital education within the Politehnica Timișoara University congratulates all the participants of this year's Interactive Digital Media Student Contest, but especially the winners for their determination to carry out various projects and the innovative way in which they integrated convergent multimedia technologies.