Description New tools for the digitisation of cultural heritage artefacts will result in richer and more realistic representations, better documentation and higher cost effectiveness of digitisationThe project addresses all aspects of 3D-capture, 3D-processing, the semantics of shape, material properties, metadata and provenance, integration with other sources (textual and other media); search, research and dissemination to the public and professional alike. A strong technical research program is complemented by research into practical business aspects: business models for exploitation of 3D assets, workflow planning and execution for mass digitisation, socio-economic impact assessment; and above all the creation of a Virtual Centre of Competence in 3D digitisation.The establishment of the Virtual Competence Centre aims at bringing together the expertise and the technological resources necessary to support:mass digitisation of tangible cultural heritage objects, through benchmarking and validating technologies, defining workflows and procedural standards as well as  plans for quality recognition of 3D digital artefacts and collections;professional development through designing and developing education and training programs that provide cultural institutions with a deeper understanding of the potential of 3D technologies in cultural heritage.The 3D-COFORM consortium brings together 19 partners with sound expertise in 3D-digisation complemented by a representative group of Cultural Heritage organisations, with the Victoria and Albert Museum as a full partner and collaborations from the Louvre, the Florentine Museums authority, the Museum of the Imperial Forums in Rome, World Heritage Sites in Cyprus and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. The consortium also contains organisations tasked at a national level with helping museums move in these directions: CNRS-LC2RMF, the research arm of the French National Museums and CultNat the digitization body for cultural and natural heritage funded by the Egyptian Government.The combination in 3D-COFORM of research and take-up activities will contribute to reinforce 3D-digitisation capability through advancing the state of the art in 3D-digitsation. The project will also contribute to reinforce the competence building in this domain by supporting continuous professional development through a Master program in 3D cultural technologies for cultural heritage.3D-COFORM achievements and the results of the collaboration with the European Digital Library, "Europeana" will provide an important contribution to the European initiative on digital libraries.