Some Experiences in 3D Laser Scanning for Assisting Restoration and Evaluating Damage in Cultural Heritage

Abstract

The recent incorporation of laser devices provides advanced tools for assisting in the conservation and restoration of cultural heritage. It is necessary to have an understanding of the object state as complete as possible before evaluating or defining the reach of the restoration process. Thus, a special effort is devoted to surveying, measuring, and generating a high-resolution 3-D model prior to restoration planning. This work presents results of several experiments performed on damaged pieces for evaluation purposes in cultural heritage. Some software tools are applied for carving-work analysis, conservation-state monitoring, and simulation of weathering processes for evaluating temporal changes. In all cases considered, a high-resolution information capture has been performed with a laser scanner, the Minolta 910. The approach has been flexible enough to be adapted to other kinds of pieces or cultural heritage artifacts in order to provide an assessment for intervention planning in conservation and restoration tasks.