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Computer Science, Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, cs.CV
Abstract:
Sherds, as the most common artifacts uncovered during archaeological
excavations, carry rich information about past human societies so need to be
accurately reconstructed and recorded digitally for analysis and preservation.
Often hundreds of fragments are uncovered in a day at an archaeological
excavation site, far beyond the scanning capacity of existing imaging systems.
Hence, there is high demand for a desirable image acquisition system capable of
imaging hundreds of fragments per day. In response to this demand, we developed
a new system, dubbed FIRES, for Fast Imaging and 3D REconstruction of Sherds.
The FIRES system consists of two main components. The first is an optimally
designed fast image acquisition device capable of capturing over 700 sherds per
day (in 8 working hours) in actual tests at an excavation site, which is one
order-of-magnitude faster than existing systems. The second component is an
automatic pipeline for 3D reconstruction of the sherds from the images captured
by the imaging acquisition system, achieving reconstruction accuracy of 0.16
milimeters. The pipeline includes a novel batch matching algorithm that matches
partial 3D scans of the front and back sides of the sherds and a new ICP-type
method that registers the front and back sides sharing very narrow overlapping
regions. Extensive validation in labs and testing in excavation sites
demonstrated that our FIRES system provides the first fast, accurate, portal,
and cost-effective solution for the task of imaging and 3D reconstruction of
sherds in archaeological excavations.
