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Abraham Lincoln’s cottage digitally preserved with 3D laser
Eric Hopton for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
With green laser lights flashing, a team of undergraduate students from Ithaca College traveled to Washington D.C. and captured a digital version of President Abraham Lincoln’s cottage using 3D laser scanning technology. It sounds like something out of Oceans 12, but in actuality it was just an act of preservation.
Lincoln’s historic getaway was where the President liked to pass his summers. It was a welcome escape from the hustle, bustle, and heat of downtown Washington. It was also where he penned the first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Lincoln was far from idle in this calm retreat, though. It was here that the President made crucial decisions about the Civil War. His last visit to the cottage was the day before his assassination.
The Ithaca researchers have captured 3D recordings of both the exterior and most of the interior of the building in amazing detail. The Leica C-10 3D laser scanner takes 50,000 readings every second as the machine rotates. The $95,000 device was first set up in a second-floor room. By timing the length of time each “blip” of the device takes to bounce back, the scanner calculates precise measurements of the size and shape of the reflecting objects, building up a complete 3D picture.
The students hope that the images collected from the scanning “will support preservation research, potentially impacting historical interpretation and public outreach at the site.”
The cottage is open to the public and run by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. As well as preserving the cottage, the Trust operates guided tours, exhibits, and programs in the hope that they will inspire visitors.
“This great opportunity not only records the existing conditions of the cottage, it also provides a platform for us to document, manage and present future preservation projects to the public,” said Jeffrey Larry, preservation manager at President Lincoln’s Cottage.
When the 3D capture is complete, preservationists and researchers will create an ultra-high-resolution image of the whole internal and external structure. The resolution will be down to a few millimetres – around one fifth of an inch. The digital reconstruction should give people all over the world the chance to “fly” through the room where Lincoln freed the slaves.
According to an article in the Washington Post, visitors to the virtual version of the cottage could, “turn the house upside down and make it spin in space with the click of a mouse.”
Michael Rogers, associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Ithaca College, and Scott Stull, lecturer in sociology/anthropology at SUNY Cortland, led the team of researchers. The week-long project was funded by a grant from Ithaca College.
Rogers has previously conducted similar research using 3D laser scanning technology, ground-penetrating radar and/or magnetometry at several other historic sites from the Revolutionary and French and Indian Wars. These include Old Fort Johnson, Fort Klock and Fort Hardy.
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Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/1113316996/lincolns-cottage-digitally-preserved-with-3d-laser-012015/
