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ncptt

The National Center for Preservation Technology and Training (NCPTT) Grant Project

A Comprehensive Training Program for 3-D Digital Rock Art Documentation and Preservation

This project completed in June 2010

In February, 2009, Cultural Heritage Imaging (CHI), in collaboration with its partner organizations*, was awarded a grant to fund the development of a training program for three-dimensional (3-D) digital rock art documentation and preservation.

Read the NCPTT 2008 Proposal  
Read the NCPTT 2008 Press Release
 
   

50% of the budget for this project is covered by the grant from NCPTT. The rest of the project budget, an additional $29,500, is covered in part by donations from partner organizations and other sources.

We are proud to announce that the Unbroken Chain Foundation has awarded CHI $5000. This money will fund the completion of high quality instructional tools that will enable not just rock art specialists but all types of cultural heritage workers to adopt and use RTI.
  ubc

Project Outcomes

Performing Refection Transformation Imaging DIY Instructional Video

In this video we will cover how to capture reflectance transformation images using the highlight method.


youtube   Check out the video on YouTube.



The 2 day workshop was held at the Presidio in July 2009. Materials from the workshop and other resources developed for the web are available now.

Image from workshop

Available Resources from this project
dot See the Participants, Info & Agenda
dot Read the Blog
dot See Flickr Photo Gallery
dot Listen to a Podcast interview of Carla Schroer on the NCPTT website
dot See the NCPTT website coverage of this project
dot Check out the Do-it-yourself materials on the CHI Learn page
dot Learn the Highlight method of Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) through a capture guide, capt ure checklist and do it yourself video




RTI Highlight Capture Guide

 

RTI Guide to Highlight Image Capture


Describes the camera, lighting, software, object and reflective sphere setup and capture sequence process.

Goto CHI Learn



Photogrammetry

 

Aerial and Close-Range Photogrammetric Technology


Providing Resource Documentation, Interpretation, and Preservervation. By Neffra A. Matthews , Technical Note 428. U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management, National Operations Center, Denver, Colorado.

BLM Heritage Resource Publications



*Project Team
  dot National Museum of the American Indian (Smithsonian)
  dot Presidio Archaeology Program (Presidio Trust)
  dot US Bureau of Land Management National Operations Center
  dot University of California, Berkeley
  dot Hewlett Packard Laboratories
  dot Princeton University
  dot University of California, Santa Cruz

The training will be based on state-of-the-art computational photography techniques that are emerging as the next generation of cultural heritage tools for use both in the field and in museums. Over the past several years, an international consortium of archaeologists, museum conservators, and computer scientists have worked to develop a suite of capture, processing, and semantic provenance tracking technologies. The most mature tool in this suite, Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI), has proven to be of tremendous value for creating digital representations of cultural heritage objects of remarkable quality. Used alone or in combination with stereo photogrammetry, RTI is extremely effective in the documentation and analysis of rock art. This project will bring key experts in these field domains together to produce a self-contained program that puts these techniques in the hands of archaeology and conservation professionals, non-technical Native American audiences, and the interested public. This will be accomplished through video podcasts, do-it-yourself guides, and online dissemination of materials.


Learn more about RTI and how to do-it-yourself back to top


This project is made possible by the generous contributions of these individuals and institutions:

Meg Conkey, international rock art researcher and professor of Anthropology, will donate her time to review classroom and web content, specifically with an eye to the needs of rock art documentation and preservation. She will assist in dissemination of produced materials through the Society for American Archaeology.

Carolyn McClellan, Associate Director of the National Museum of the American Indian (Smithsonian), will donate a professional video team to document the workshop proceedings, and will advise and review classroom and web content, specifically with an eye toward education of non-technical and Native American audiences.

Tom Noble and Neffra Matthews, from the US Bureau of Land Management National Operations Center, bring state-of-the-art photogrammetry expertise to the program. The BLM will donate their time and training materials.

Hewlett Packard Laboratories, Princeton University and the University of California, Santa Cruz are donating expertise to develop and review the soundness of the overall capture and process and analysis methodology.

The Presidio Archaeology Lab of San Francisco will provide the workshop venue and participant lodging.

Cultural Heritage Imaging is donating all indirect costs for the project.

Learn more about RTI and how to do-it-yourself back to top


Reflectance Transformation Imaging Examples

  UNESCO Prehistoric Rock-Art Sites in the Côa Valley, a World Heritage Site in Portugal
  In Summer 2006, CHI visited world-class rock art sites in Portugal to collaborate with staff from the Parque Arqueologico do Vale do Côa (PAVC) site, the Centro Nacional de Arte Rupestre (CNART) group, and scholars at the Universidade do Minho. CHI and their Portuguese collaborators pioneered a new method to document rock art without touching or disturbing the rock art. These new techniques permit relighting from any direction and provide tools that disclose the finest surface details.

 
RTI Gallery : Rock Art Examples from Parque Arqueológico Vale do Côa, Portugal
 
     
  Preserving and Sharing Ancient Treasures with Cultural Heritage Imaging Technology
  cher With support from the Packard Humanities Institute, Cultural Heritage Imaging, the University of Texas at Austin’s Institute of Classical Archaeology, and the National Preserve of Tauric Chersonesos deploy interactive, 3D imaging technology to preserve and share amazing artifacts from a world-class archaeological site in the Ukraine.

 
RTI Gallery : Stelae from Chersonesos
Photo Gallery : On-Site Workshop
     

  Cultural Heritage Imaging Stone Tool Examples
  stone_tool Use the interactive RTI viewer to get up close and examine this gallery of stone tools from the past.

 
RTI Gallery : Stone Tools
 
     

Learn more about RTI and how to do-it-yourself back to top


For More Information Contact Us  

   








Find do-it-yourself materials on the Learn Page
   
   



Quick Links:
dot Available Resources
dot Project Team
dot Examples
   
Related
dot NCPTT Press Release
dot  



 
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