Simulating prehistoric humans behaviors in their palaeoevironnements for investigation – SCHOPPER

The SCHOPPER project includes 4 French partners and 2 foreign around a common challenge: creating innovative technology solutions for developing behavioral research through the pooling of existing tools, data and know-how:
· the CERP database that stores 51 years of excavations on a Paleolithic site of world interest : La Caune de l’Arago in Tautavel, with a structured methodology and the result of many multidisciplinary studies,
· the Artificial Intelligence Engine of Craft ai., based on machine learning approaches for the treatment of the data applied in real time and continuously,
· technological immersive tools of Immersion-Tools working since 2007 in the field of physics simulation and interaction between tangible and virtual worlds. The company's work axis is to develop tools able to offer anyone the opportunity to simply associate a presentation of any kind the experiential value offered by augmented reality or virtual reality
· the method of analysis of interactions actors / technical tools of CEROS developed in 2013 and has resulted in several experiments.

On this basis, the project objective is to achieve a "SCHOPPER simulator" that will validate the hypothesis testings of Paleolithic behaviors in a restored immersive environment.
This simulator will be the end result of two digital platforms in interaction:
• the first based on the database of the archaeologists and the IA engine Craft al., will allow to validate the rules of behavior,
• the second produced from the database of archaeologists and immersion tools of Immersion-Tools will simulate the prehistoric environment and receive the rules of behavior to make simulations.

After 51 years of excavations, a large amount of raw data has been acquired and many archaeometric databases have been developed through the study of the site as a whole. This project takes shape when a monographic work of synthesis is completed (Lumley et al, 2015.) and where archaeologists have enough perspective on their data to consider the next step: digital full use of databases through an innovative and unique system that will test research hypotheses about human behavior in the Paleolithic through simulations in virtual environments.

Today, the research hypotheses in this area are often tested through testing performed by reproducing gestures of prehistoric man, whose limits are quickly reached. To overcome these limitations, innovative solutions for Machine Learning (Craft have.) and virtual reality immersion (Immersion-Tools) will be developed as part of this project, to offer new visualization means of scientific results and interaction with the environment, as a research tool. Designed to be used in complete autonomy by archaeologists, the simulator will offer interactivity, speed of execution, multi-agent management capabilities, multi-parameters and exchange of results between users. The test of interdisciplinary research hypotheses with foreign teams on the platforms should provide leading results on knowledge of Paleolithic behavior.

The methodological approach of using SCHOPPER simulator will be provided by CEROS and will enable to replicate this approach in other contexts. Thanks to its demonstrative, immersive and experiential qualities, this tool will be able to have a second application in education, university training and can become a true teaching tool and a quality medium in a museum context, particularly when in the context of unoriented assumptions tests, researchers will exploit it as a crowdsourcing tool with a new public.