Sydney Opera House Gets the 3D Scanning Treatment

sydney opera houseAs you likely know by now, 3D scanning has a multitude of uses. In fact, it can be used to capture human faces, recreate auto parts, and replicate architecture. It’s the latter option that we’re going to talk about today. In fact, a project called The Scottish Ten is making it their personal goal to capture and recreate models of famous UNESCO World Heritage sites, including the Sydney Opera House in Australia.

The project began in Scotland in collaboration with Historic Scotland, the heritage agency within the Scottish government; CyArk, a digital heritage organization; and The Glasgow School of Art’s Digital Design Studio and now it’s moving all over the world to capture historic sites for preservation.

Each of the sites will be thoroughly surveyed, during which 3D scanning will take place to capture three-dimensional digital data. The scanning process will capture every single inch of surface area on each of the sites. Both the inside and outside of each building will be captured for thorough conservation. The Sydney Opera House is the only building on the list of sites that was built in the 20th century.

The Sydney Opera House was selected for preservation because it’s an important World Heritage location. In essence, it’s iconic to the whole world, not just Australia, making it important that it be included in this project.

Several other historical sites and buildings are being included in the project as well including the Eastern Qing Tombs in China, The Queen’s Stepwell in India, and Mount Rushmore in the U.S. One more world site will be added to the list, which includes 5 locations within Scotland. Those include New Lanark, Orkney, St. Kilda, Edinburgh, and the Antonine Wall. It should be quite exciting to see the three dimensional renderings of these sites once the project is completed. We’ll be keeping a close eye on this one.

This just goes to show that there are a multitude of uses for 3D scanning in the world beyond the typically perceived fabrication and reverse engineering functions. It can be used to preserve historical monuments. It can be used to store data about people, places, and things. It’s beyond versatile and grows more and more flexible every day as the technology advances and progresses further. This is where innovation exists and it’s exciting to keep track of. Be sure to check in soon for more information on this project and other exciting advances in 3D scanning.

Picture credit: 7-continentstravel.com

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