CALL FOR PROPOSALS and PARTICIPATION

         SHREC'09 - 3D Shape Retrieval Contest 2009
                       at
     EUROGRAPHICS 2009 - Workshop on 3D Object Retrieval            
     
    *October 31 - Submission deadline for track proposals*

*Introduction*

The general objective of the 3D Shape Retrieval Contest (see
http://www.aimatshape.net/event/SHREC) is to evaluate the
effectiveness of 3D-shape retrieval algorithms. After three
years of success, the contest is now organized in conjunction
with the Eurographics Workshop on  3D Object Retrieval, where
the evaluation results will be presented and printed in the
corresponding workshop proceedings published by the Eurographics
Book Series.

Thanks to the effort of previous track organizers, SHREC already
provides many resources to compare and evaluate 3D retrieval methods.
For this year's contest, we aim at new and updated tracks. Therefore,
the participants are requested to have an active role in the
organization of the event. This includes proposing track themes,
building or acquiring a test collection, and deciding upon the
queries, relevance assessment, and performance measures.

The participants of each track will collectively write a paper,
which will be published in the proceedings of the Eurographics
Workshop 3D Object Retrieval. At least one author per track must
register for the workshop, and present the results.

*Tracks*

In the previous 3D Shape Retrieval Contests the task was to retrieve
ranked lists of similar 3D objects, given a query 3D object, based
on the shape characteristics of the 3D objects (no other aspects such
as color). The contest tracks organized in the past years covered
different aspects and tasks of 3D shape retrieval:
- Stability on watertight models
- Classification of watertight models
- CAD models
- Generic 3D models
- 3D face models
- Protein models
- Partial models

Now, we solicit again proposals for tracks. You may opt for one of the
above themes, or propose new ones. Track organizers should organize
the following aspects:
- The task.
  One might ask for a complete or limited ranking, a classification, etc.
- The collection.
  Is the test set collected or generated. Are there copyright issues?
  Will it be made public? Is there a classification of the models?
- The queries.
  How are the queries determined? Are the query models from the
  collection or new models, or is it just a verbal description, etc.
- The ground truth.
  Is there a ground truth, is there a relevance scale (highly relevant,
  marginally relevant, ...), how and when is it determined (based on
  classification, visual inspection, ...), etc.
- The evaluation method.
  Which performance measure will be used for the evaluation (precision,
  recall, nearest neighbor, k-th tier, average dynamic recall, normalized
  cumulated gain, ...).
- The procedural aspects.
  Does every participant perform the queries, or is that done in a
  central place? Who does the performance assessment? When are test set
  and queries made available?

See http://www.aimatshape.net/event/SHREC/ for examples of organizational
aspects of previous tracks.

*Procedure*

The following list is a step-by-step description of the activities:
1) Potential track organizers send their proposal to shrec@cs.uu.nl,
   describing the envisioned task, collection, queries, ground truth,
   evaluation method, and expected number of participants.
2) Promising tracks and their organizers are listed at the SHREC web
   page, the track organizers start working out the details.
3) Participants register to the tracks they want to participate in.
4) Each track is performed according its own schedule.
5) The track organizers collect the results.
6) The track results are combined into a joint paper, to be included
   in the proceedings of the Eurographics Workshop on 3D Object Retrieval.
7) The description of the tracks and their results are presented the
   Eurographics Workshop on 3D Object Retrieval (March 29, 2009).


*Time Schedule*

October 31
   - Submission deadline for track proposals
November 7
   - Notification of acceptence of track proposals
Nov, Dec, Jan
   - Each track has its own timeline
February 1
   - Each track is finished, and results are ready for inclusion in a track report
February 15
   - Camera ready track papers submitted for printing
March 29
   - EUROGRAPHICS Workshop on 3D Object Retrieval including SHREC'09

The individual tracks will have their own time schedule for registration
of participants, release of queries or submission of executables,
submission of results, etc.

*Organization*

The SHREC contest is supported by the FOCUS-K3D project (see
http://www.focusk3d.eu). For information about the contest, the 
results, etc. see http://www.aimatshape.net/event/SHREC/. The 
results of SHREC'09 are presented at the Eurographics Workshop 
on 3D Object Retrieval, March 29, 2009,
http://3dor.ge.imati.cnr.it/ and
http://eurographics2009.com/co_events/index.html


The SHREC organizers are Frank ter Haar and Remco Veltkamp.
To contact the organizers, send a message to shrec@cs.uu.nl.