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Rebuilding old relics

February 20, 2002

THE years take their toll on forgotten relics. By the time they make it into a museum, bits have flaked off and colours faded. But a newly developed computer system will allow visitors to see exhibits in all their glory, with missing limbs restored or drab clothing spruced up.

The "virtual showcase" devised by Jsrg Voskamp of the Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics in Rostock looks like an upside-down glass pyramid with its tip chopped off, sitting on a glass table. The damaged artefact sits in the middle of the pyramid.

        The missing pieces are provided by a 3D computer model. This can be created either from old photographs of the intact piece or by asking archaeologists or art historians to make an educated guess and recreate the missing bits using 3D graphics software.

        To see the reconstructed artefact, viewers wear glasses containing a tiny radio transmitter. This sends out signals that sensors in the table use to track the position and motion of the viewer`s head.

Based on this information, the showcase works out what the missing parts of the exhibit should look like to the viewer, and projects a suitable image through the table and onto the sides of the pyramid.

        The faces of the pyramids are half-mirrors, so when you look at the exhibit you see the image superimposed on the original damaged piece. The glasses are fitted with liquid-crystal shutters that open and close rapidly, exposing first one eye and then the other, and the computer-generated image switches in synchrony so that each eye sees a slightly different image. "The brain combines this to form a 3D image in the right position on the exhibit," says Voskamp.

Virtual reconstruction has certain advantages, says Angie Geary, a lecturer with the Victoria and Albert Museum and Royal College of Art conservation programmes in London. Conservation experts don`t have to make permanent changes to the object, which may or may not be accurate reconstructions, and people can still see the genuine relic simply by taking off the glasses.

Author: Ian Sample

http://www.newscientist.com">New Scientist issue 23rd February 2002

PLEASE MENTION NEW SCIENTIST AS THE SOURCE OF THIS STORY AND, IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO : http://www.newscientist.com"> http://www.newscientist.com

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