In late December of 2012, MATRIX Director Dean Rehberger and Audio-Visual Lab Consultant Mike Green traveled to Senegal at part of a Smithsonian-funded pilot project that focused on creating 3D, digital representations of cultural heritage artifacts from the Gorée  Island excavations. The team used a process called stereophotogrammetry to create the 3D representations, which will then be shared freely online in the Gorée Island Archeological Digital Repository.

Stereophotogrammetry is the practice of taking high-quality digital still photographs in a circle around an object. These photographs are then fed into a computer program that uses the photographs to define and triangulate specific geometric points on the object. These geographic points are then matched throughout all the photographs taken of the object (which can often range from between 50-100 images) and are used to create 3D representations of the artifact. Stereophotogrammetry is a relatively inexpensive and mobile process, making it ideal for Africa-based cultural institutions who typically have lower budgets and need the capacity to document objects both within the museum and in the field.

MATRIX’s trip to Senegal was intended to serve as a brief training session where Rehberger and Green taught local Senegalese students how to complete the work of stereophotogrammetry. This included instruction on how to use DSLR cameras, how to take high quality photographs, how to set up equipment, and how to manipulate images in the 3D photo creation software. During their one-week stay, Rehberger and Green were able to host three full days of training, which resulted in six Senegalese students now being trained in the art of stereophotogrammetry. These six students are now able to train other students, resulting in a multiplication of equipped personnel who can begin cataloging and preserving the extensive archives of archaeological artifacts that exist at Gorée Island (and in Senegal as a whole). In this way, the Senegalese cultural institutions are self-sustaining and are not dependent on outside help to complete importation documentation and preservation work.

The trip to Senegal was meant to serve as a test bed for future projects that will help create a larger, 3D digital repository of African cultural heritage materials as a way of both preserving the materials themselves and as a method of sharing these materials to scholars in an open-source, open-access digital environment. This project addresses dire needs in the African cultural heritage community, including a lack of best-practice-ready heritage institutions and personnel within Africa; a history of colonial bias in artifact description and preservation; and the rapid degradation of cultural materials in Africa due to politics, wars, environmental concerns, and time.

The Gorée Island Archaeological Digital Repository is made possible through active collaboration between MATRIX, Michigan State University,  AFRICOM, the Smithsonian Institution, the Association of African American Museums, and the American Association of Museums (now the American Alliance of Museums). MATRIX is excited to continue our tradition of international partnerships in order to preserve and disseminate these important cultural heritage materials in digital spaces.

The print version of Archaeology 2.0: New Approaches to Communication and Collaboration was released this week by the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press. Edited by Eric Kansa (Lead Developer of Open Context), and Sarah Witcher-Kansa (Executive Director of Alexandria Archive Institute), and Ethan Watrall (MATRIX Associate Director & Assistant Professor of Anthropology)the volume is the first book in the Cotsen Institute’s new Digital Archaeology Series. The book can be purchased from the David Brown Book Company. An open acces version of the book is also available at the University of California’s eScholarship repository.

The volume’s description reads:

How is the Web transforming the professional practice of archaeology? And as archaeologists accustomed to dealing with “deep time,” how can we best understand the possibilities and limitations of the Web in meeting the specialized needs of professionals in this field? These are among the many questions posed and addressed in Archaeology 2.0: New Approaches to Communication and Collaboration, edited by Eric Kansa, Sarah Whitcher Kansa, and Ethan Watrall. With contributions from a range of experts in archaeology and technology, this volume is organized around four key topics that illuminate how the revolution in communications technology reverberates across the discipline: approaches to information retrieval and information access; practical and theoretical concerns inherent in design choices for archaeology’s computing infrastructure; collaboration through the development of new technologies that connect field-based researchers and specialists within an international archaeological community; and scholarly communications issues, with an emphasis on concerns over sustainability and preservation imperatives. This book not only describes practices that attempt to mitigate some of the problems associated with the Web, such as information overload and disinformation, it also presents compelling case studies of actual digital projects—many of which are rich in structured data and multimedia content or focused on generating content from the field “in real time,” and all of which demonstrate how the Web can and is being used to transform archaeological communications into forms that are more open, inclusive, and participatory. Above all, this volume aims to share these experiences to provide useful guidance for other researchers interested in applying technology to archaeology.