Digital Archaeology Blog

FARO Focus 3D scanner captures big 3D models from a tiny Lego trolly

2011-11-01T08:44:00.001+01:00

Virtual POMPEII

2011-10-11T13:26:00.002+02:00

Last week together with Matteo Dellepiane and Marco Callieri from the ISTI, we (me, Stefan Lindgren and Carolina Larsson) started the digital acquisition of two houses in Pompeii: Casa del Torello and Casa di Cecilio Giocondo. These two amazing monuments have been (and are) studied by "The Swedish Pompeii Project", with the goal of [..]"filling the void of documentation lingering with this insula since its excavation"[..].
In this context we decided to use the laser scanner together with computer vision techniques in order to create a very detail 3D model of the entire studied area. The model will be generate in the next months and we hope it will increase the research and the communication of the entire Insula.

Faro scanner, in the republican garden
of Cecilio Giocondo's house

For the field work we employed two FARO scanner and a Canon Camera EOS550 with a wide angle lens. Despite the complexity of the structures and the extension of the area, in two days we were able to complete the planned field work realizing more than 70 scans. The acquisition was incredibly fast and the portability of the new scanner allowed reaching the more tedious areas of the houses.
This instrument is really a new step in the domain of the laser, no cables, no laptop (it works in touch screen) a very long battery, and the combination with computer vision allows an incredible flexibility in fields campaign. It was a very successful acquisition and during the next weeks we will study a useful pipeline to manage and post process such huge quantity of data with a sustainable methodology. The documentation generated during the field work was very accurate and obviously different from the projections (CAD or traditional drawings) realized during the excavation. The main question now is: Does the use of such different data will influence or change the way of building an archaeological interpretation in the future? This is not easy to foresee, because the development and the diffusion of this new methods depend by factors that do not stricktly belong to the archaeology as discipline.
What I think we can hypothize is that using tools which allow describing an archaeological environments with such details, could help archaeologists to build a shared interpretation using an very precise platform, based on the "virtual" archaeoloogical material that define the investigated context.

Map of the Insula, in the picture the scanned area

So far the feedback of my collegues was always very positive, but no enough experimentation and literature has been realized. Now that the tools are ready and easy to use, a work of investigation about the definition of new structured documentation methods in archaeology is required.

IPad&Archaeology

2011-09-19T20:56:00.000+02:00

In terms of devices, it is not easy to understand what will be the next standard in archaeology.

So far the focus of this research field was mostly based on the data capturing and post processing, but very few affords were made to explore the possibility to use these new kinds of data in different scenarios (not just in Lab).

Today new technology allows to generate very precise 3D models of any archaeological context, perfect replicas of how the layer looked like the exact moment before its destruction. If stored properly, these information, can provide a sort of time travel application to keep track of all the actions (physical and mental) that defined the research process during the entire investigation time frame.

The use of these new devices (easy to carry everywhere, quite robust and with no keyboard) allows a direct access to our ongoing work directly into the excavation, bringing more and more the labs activities into the archaeological context. This represents an important step in terms of "information & cognition", because allows to hypothesize scenarios where field activities and post processing work are merge together in the same context.

Recently the National Research Council of Italy, ISTI (Institute of information Science of Pisa) http://www.isti.cnr.it/ , realized a prototype to visualize complex 3D models through IPad, this application is called MeshPad, and it is basically an IPad version of MeshLab. These new tools for Pads (IPad, Galaxy), also if incomplete and not designed primarily for archaeological research (as usual...), represent an incredible opportunity for new experiments based on data management, and opens to new interesting research questions about how our perception of the data affect (increase or decrease) our capacity to interpret.

After Catal

2011-09-11T09:29:00.000+02:00

During the summer I have bee in Catal Huyuk excavating for a couple of weeks and doing some new test, in this occasion I combined computer vision techniques (photoscan) and Total Station. The experiment was very successful because for the first time in my "field experience" I had the chance to generate a scaled and High Resolute 3D model of the excavation every day !!! every evening I had the full documentation ready in HQ and (more important) a 3D model to brainstorm the situation etc.It was very exiting, but more important this experiment open to new questions about archaeological methods and excavation strategy...I think this technique is going to have an important role in the future excavations, but the only technique is absolutely not enough, now we need to figure it out how to use this new kind of data in a large scale and more important what are the possibilities for a better comprehension of the stratigrapy.Before Catal I did some experiment in Uppakra, together with Matteo Dellepiane (ISTI) and Marco Callieri (ISTI) we will present these preliminary results to the International Symposium on Virtual Reality, Archaeology and Cultural Heritage, VAST 2011, www.vast-conference.eu/soon the article will be available on my academia.edu profile : Documentation and Interpretation of an Archeological Excavation: an experience with Dense Stereo Reconstruction tools

let's the esperiment begin ...

2011-05-09T13:34:00.002+02:00

During this week we are starting a new cycle of experiments in Uppåkra to test the efficiency of the image based modelling technique (SFM+DSM) on a long range term excavation. The results from the last year were very exiting but there are still few things to check...

The collaboration with the ISTI (creators of MeshLab) is going on great! They are part of the experiment and one of the goals of this new test section will be to feed the ISTI people with new archaeological inputs for MeshLab ;-)

The connection between MeshLab and Image-based-modelling technique is very good and represent an interesting path to explore in archaeology.

Thanks to MrP you will find online video tutorials about MeshLab..

http://www.youtube.com/user/MrPMeshLabTutorials

helicopter on the excavation

2011-01-04T13:47:00.001+01:00

Short report from ArcheoVirtual 2010

2010-12-01T15:24:00.031+01:00

I HAD THE GREAT PLEASURE to participate in ArcheoVirtual 2010, an exhibition and a work shop at "Borsa Mediterranea del Turismo Archeologico", a sort of fair for tourist organizations, museums, technology providers etc.

At the exhibition I demonstrated an Augmented reality prototype made by master thesis workers Tariq Asghar and Abul Ala Nauman.

Showing the prototype was indeed an interesting experience. Light conditions were very tough and I never got the spotlight I asked for despite an extensive nagging campaign. Never the less, I managed to demonstrate the prototype for many interested visitors. Many of them, however, did not understand English so well and hence I had to improvise with my poor Italian skills. Luckily Italian people are very understanding and tolerant with Italian speaking foreigners so it turned out to be a very successful language lesson for me. :-)

I also showed a short film clip that communicated the ideas behind the project:

There were many interesting and innovative projects in the exhibition. The following film clip shows a product by the Italian company STARK. The concept is promising but unfortunately the user interface is not so easy to use for first time users (the person in the film clip is a sales person and hence expert user).

The workshop contained a row of interesting and thought provoking presentations of development and use of virtual museums in Europe. One presentation that made an impression on me was made by Victor Menchero from Spain. He described the development of virtual museums from a Spanish perspective in a very vivid manner. Also, the Spanish company Virtualware showed several successful examples of VR based exhibitions, such as a virtual walk in a very inaccessible Unesco protected cave system. The demo film used very suggestive, atmospheric soundtrack which triggered me to ask the speaker if he believed the music to be an important part of the installation. The answer was of course yes, and I thanked him for providing me with an good example to point at for the Lejre case study. My question led to an interesting discussion on the role of music in virtual museums.

According to one point of view, one has to be extremely careful when introducing music in a virtual museum application since one has no control over the interpretations and meanings it brings about. This to me is a very mechanistic view of communication theory that I don't agree with. I don't believe communication to be a perfect transaction of a message from sender to receiver. If you want to control all the meanings and interpretations that the mediated content is able to provoke, should you then also try to control the pre-knowledge, experiences and mental models of the visitor? I'm now even more convinced that the matter of sound and music needs to be carefully investigated within the Timetravel group.

There was also a pre-kick-off meeting for the upcoming EU project V-MUST targeting Virtual museums. The network seems to be a group of very nice and enthusiastic people so I'm very much looking forward to the project to start in late February 2011.

again!

2010-10-15T12:56:00.000+02:00

PhotoSynth Toolkit walkthrough from Josh Harle on Vimeo.

new techniques ;-)

2010-10-15T12:54:00.000+02:00

Photogrammetry Guide from Josh Harle on Vimeo.

Reconstructing China: the Virtual Western Han Dynasty

2010-09-24T18:06:00.000+02:00

Western Han Mural Tomb, Xi'an, China

2010-09-24T18:05:00.000+02:00

Archaeological video-prospection

2010-06-21T10:57:00.000+02:00

Archaological video-prospection with a "home-made" endoscope.
Components: a stick, a lot of adhesive tape, some LEDs (from a pocket light), a wireless camera and a monitor (from remote-sensing UAVP device).
Ah, and a little bit of imagination (we just used what we had on the working place).

Experiments of Digital Archaeology in Uppåkra... preliminary results ;-)

2010-06-10T16:47:00.001+02:00

Western Han Dinasty Virtual Museum

2010-05-08T20:12:00.001+02:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPnxBJTAVw8

The Time Travel Project -previously results-

2010-04-04T11:36:00.002+02:00

Rumours in the blogosphere

2010-03-29T08:55:00.003+02:00

Åsa Larsson, archaeologist from Uppsala, has written a very kind blog post about our research on Digital archaeology and Virtual heritage. :-)

Unity 3D 3.0.....

2010-03-24T15:32:00.001+01:00

http://learnunity3d.com/articles/unity-3-0-preview

Paul Debevec.....

2010-03-15T09:38:00.000+01:00

Stone Age Funeral Chamber in Danmark

2010-03-01T15:33:00.001+01:00

Ladies and Gentleman... photosynth

2010-02-24T10:19:00.000+01:00

Lund cathedral in Computer Vision

2010-02-19T16:43:00.001+01:00

ARC 3D

2010-02-18T12:16:00.001+01:00

Life and Power in Imperial Rome

2010-02-17T12:57:00.000+01:00

Marco di Ioia Roman Bath Simulation

2010-02-16T11:48:00.000+01:00

particle animation

2010-02-12T11:27:00.000+01:00

3d modeling, animation, rendering: Marco di ioia. Simulazione in particle animation allagamento deposito pleistocenico Casal de' pazzi

Mesh Lab

2010-02-05T12:02:00.000+01:00

Here is a brief step by step overview about the use of ARC3D and MeshLab:
once imported the model from arc3D, the passages to get a complete model are very simple..:

1 import the model
2 clean
3 Poisson filter
4 clean again
5 apply the texture

"go in" = #

1:V3D import settings
2: #filters - #cleaning and repair- #remove unreferenced points-#
3:#filters-#remeshing#-#poisson recostruction
4:#filter-#cleaning and repair-#remove faces with edges...
5:#filters-#sampling#-vertex attribute trans-#parameters

Ready to start?

2010-02-04T15:29:00.001+01:00

Hi Guys!
This blog is for sharing our experiences in Digital Archaeology
here we can discuss about techniques, technologies projects papers etc.
I think it could be interesting to keep a Digital Diary of our activities!!

Best

nicolo'

2010-02-04T15:27:00.000+01:00

computer vision-meshLab movie

2010-02-04T13:36:00.000+01:00

ready to start?

2010-02-04T09:38:00.000+01:00