An Intelligent Augmented Reality Mobile Application for Heritage Conservation Education

It has become a challenge to protect the built heritage and conserve the local traditional and cultural values of communities for future generations. Heritage conservation education is important as it increases the local communities' awareness and appreciation of the value of the heritage and thus helps to achieve sustainable conservation. This paper presents the design of an intelligent mobile application for heritage conservation education. The mobile application has a collection of historical photos of local heritage in Hong Kong and provides a heritage map with markers for users to tour on heritages. Users can learn histories of heritages in a fun way by using its Augmented Reality function to compare the current and the past and by using its intelligent recognition function to retrieve historic photos relevant to the current camera view. A survey of 45 Hong Kong residents showed that the mobile app can serve as a fun way to learn history in Hong Kong and is a useful tool for heritage conservation education.