Reality Computing

Digitally restoring cultural artifacts

The Mosul Museum in Mosul, Iraq was the country’s second largest museum. Although the museum was looted during the Iraq War, it was scheduled to reopen in 2014 and contained many priceless articfacts from the Assyrian era and from the ancient city of Hatra.

But before it could reopen, ISIS extremists took over the city. This past winter, propaganda videos showed the extremists using sledgehammers and power tools to destroy and deface some of the museum’s artifacts.

In an effort to at least digitally restore these and other lost artifacts, a group of researches created a volunteer initiative called Project Mosul. The researchers are part of the Initial Training Network for Digital Cultural Heritage—a European Union-funded initiative aimed at preserving cultural heritage using digital technology.

Reality Computing is at the heart of this effort. Visitors to the Project Mosul website can upload photographs or videos of the artifacts, and the project volunteers use photogrammetry to create 3D digital models of the artifacts from these images. The digital restoration becomes more complete and of a higher quality as more images are processed. The models will then be displayed in an online museum accessible to the public. The digital restorations are expanding to include other destroyed or damaged artifacts in the Middle East and beyond.

As the Project Mosul website explains, “While these 3D objects can never replace the artefacts that have been destroyed, they can serve as a starting point to keep the memory of these objects and their meaning alive. The 3D objects may initially serve in helping identify stolen items and aid researchers working on the destroyed items. Virtual reconstruction is not an end in itself, however, but the start of a reengagement with the meaning of these objects. It is hoped that the virtual representations will give an additional tool to the communities that wish to think about, learn about, and work on the preservation and dissemination of these important elements of a national, regional and global history, and to return a sense of agency to those left helpless in the face of the destruction of their heritage.”

For more information, check out the Project Mosul website or these articles:

• NPR’s All Tech Considered: Cyber Archaeologists Rebuild Destroyed Artifacts
• BBC: 'Cyber-archaeology' salvages lost Iraqi art

3D printing a steel bridge

Wait … What??

That’s right. Dutch company MX3D plans on 3D printing a steel pedestrian bridge over a canal in Amsterdam.

MX3D is an R&D company working to develop cost-effective robotic 3D printing technology. The company has invented a 3D printing tool in the form of a six-axis industrial robot with an advanced welding machine that can 3D print metals and resin in mid-air, without the need for support structures. The tool adds small amounts of molten metal at a time, enabling it to print extremely intricate metal shapes.

The first production test of the process will be a bridge in the center of Amsterdam. The structure will be printed in the span of two months. The printing will use multiple robots and take place on location—not in a factory setting. The tools will print their own supportive railing as well as the steel the bridge. The project is a collaboration between MX3D, designer Joris Laarman, Autodesk, construction company Heijmans, and others.

 

Computer rendering of the steel pedestrian bridge during printing.
Photo courtesy of Joris Laarman for MX3D.

The ‘compute’ and ‘create’ aspects of Reality Computing are at the core of this endeavor. Laarman is designing the bridge using the Autodesk software. MX3D’s website states, “The design of the bridge is a combination of the vision and craft of the artist, and the iterative power of Generative Design tools like Dreamcatcher. The team is also breaking away from traditional industrial robotic control strategies, using more intuitive systems based on technologies like Dynamo.”

3D printing is a well-established technology used by manufacturers for cost-effective prototyping, mold-making, and small-scale production. But its use for building and infrastructure construction has been limited to experiments with concrete structures. Large-scale 3D printing of metal and mixed material structures could have revolutionary ramifications for the construction industry.  

 

 

Although the exact location hasn’t been announced yet, the bridge is scheduled to be printed in 2017. 'Scheduled to be printed'  ….  a phrase not often used in conjunction with bridge construction!

In addition to the MX3D’s website and YouTube video above, check out these articles about the project:

• Chicago Tribune: 3D printing could be future of infrastructure
• Fast Company: This Robot Can 3-D Print A Steel Bridge In Mid-Air
• ArchDaily: MX3D to 3D Print a Bridge in Mid-Air over Amsterdam Canal

Documenting the world’s oldest known tools

In 2011, a team of archaeologists working in Kenya discovered stone tools that were subsequently dated to be 3.3 million-years-old. In addition to finding the oldest stone tools known to man, the age of the tools has changed our thinking about the world’s first toolmakers. Traditionally, the genus Homo (which includes modern humans) has been credited with the first use of stone tools. But the tools found in Kenya predate the oldest known Homo fossil by half a million years. The findings were reported this spring in Nature Magazine (May 20, 2015).

 

One of the oldest tools known to man.
Click here to view and interact with the stone tool in 3D.

 

Now, Reality Computing is allowing people to digitally view and interact with these stones tools. Dr. Louise Leakey, who was part of the team that discovered the tools, used Autodesk technology to create 3D digital replicas of artifacts for preservation, education, and further research. For several years, Leakey has been using Reality Computing to document fossil collections in a virtual laboratory called African Fossils, where the public and scholars alike can examine the objects via the web or download models of the fossils for 3D printing.

The stone tools were digitized (capture) and Autodesk Memento software was used to convert that captured reality data into high definition 3D meshes (compute). The resulting 3D models can be viewed on the AfricanFossils.org website and downloaded for 3D printing (create).

Check out these articles to read more about the stone tools discovery and the use of Reality Computing to digitally document and preserve these artifacts!

• National Geographic: Wrong Turn Leads to Discovery of Oldest Stone Tools
• BBC: Oldest stone tools pre-date earliest humans
• Autodesk’s In the Fold blog: Out of Africa and Into the Future: Oldest Tools on Earth Captured Using Cutting-edge Technology
• 3DPrint.com: Autodesk & Dr. Louise Leakey Share 3.3-Million-Year-Old Stone Tools with the World via 3D Printing