Software Turns that Cheap Camera into a 3d Scanner

Now: can you think of some archaeological applications?

See this post in Wired.

It’s called ProFORMA, or Probabilistic Feature-based On-line Rapid Model Acquisition, but it is way cooler than it sounds. The software, written by a team headed by Qui Pan, a student at the Department of Engineering at Cambridge University in England, turns a regular, cheap webcam into a 3D scanner. Normally, scanning in 3D requires purpose-made gear and time. ProFORMA lets you rotate any object in front of the camera and it scans it in real time, building a fully 3D texture mapped model as fast as you can turn an object. Even more impressive is what happens after the scan: The camera continues to track the objsct in space and matches it’s movement instantly with the on-screen model.

I haven’t found a website for this software yet, and I have no idea when/if it is available, but let’s hope it is soon. Should be a boon to those folks who are creating immersive archaeological simulations of real sites & artefacts (Colleen?)

edit: the website address turns up in the last few seconds of the video at 3.16, http://mi.eng.cam.ac.uk/~qp202

NetherNet Redux? Google Sidewiki

What always excited my about The Nethernet (nee Pmog) was the ability to annotate websites (refugees from the Nethernet keep the flame burning here).

So over at Ubernoggin, I see that the Googlemonster is allowing folks to annotate websites. There’s potential here.

From Ubernoggin:

I can’t help but be excited about Google Sidewiki. It allows users (with google accounts) to leave comments on any website. So now, rather than signing up for forums and chats to comment or searching through dozens of pages to read customer feedback, you can simply click a button in your browser and see what people are saying.

I could be wrong. I could be overly excited. But I can’t help feeling that this is HUGE. The whole of the web now becomes a social network. Every page can have an unbiases forum tacked on that’s viewable by anyone.

It will be interesting to see how this evolves. What was extremely cool about Nethernet, was how those annotations could be made dynamic (puzzles, explosions, you name it). Google as a game playing platform? Stranger things have happened.

Learning with Digital Games – Nicola Whitton

I’ve just gotten my hands on an (e-)inspection version of Nicola Whitton’s Learning with Digital Games: A Practical Guide to Engaging Students in Higher Education.

From the introduction,

Two recent UK studies provide evidence that students may not be as comfortable with technology for learning and new ways of working as is commonly assumed. In a study of student expectations of higher education, IPSOS MORI(2007) found that while the group of potential students who took part in their study had grown up with technology they did not value the use of technology for its own sake, but instead put a high value on face-to-face teaching and traditional teacher-student interaction. A recent study by CIBER (2008) also provides evidence that the assumption that young people who are brought up in the information age are more web-literate than older people is false. Although young people show an apparent ease with computers, they rely heavily on search engines and lack critical and analytic skills. In fact, the study claims, character traits that are often associated with young web users, such as lack of tolerance of delay in search and navigation, are actually true of all age groups of web users.

This followed a section dealing & dismissing with ‘digital natives’, that old saw. I like it already! I would love dearly to give you the page number for that reference, but the e-inspection software does not allow me to copy text, so I typed it all out – then my browser reloaded, and the page was reset to 1.

Would you accept that excuse from a student? Of course not…

(The same digital version, minus bookmarking and annotation tools, can be viewed here). The companion site is here.

Anyway, this looks like a tremendously useful book. Whitton targets her approach explicitly at higher education, from a constructivist point of view. I should’ve ordered a paper copy. You should too!

From the publisher’s blurb:

Written for Higher Education teaching and learning professionals, Learning with Digital Games provides an accessible, straightforward introduction to the field of computer game-based learning. Up to date with current trends and the changing learning needs of today’s students, this text offers friendly guidance, and is unique in its focus on post-school education and its pragmatic view of the use of computer games with adults.

Learning with Digital Games enables readers to quickly grasp practical and technological concepts, using examples that can easily be applied to their own teaching. The book assumes no prior technical knowledge but guides the reader step-by-step through the theoretical, practical and technical considerations of using digital games for learning. Activities throughout guide the reader through the process of designing a game for their own practice, and the book also offers:

A toolkit of guidelines, templates and checklists.

Concrete examples of different types of game-based learning using six case studies.

Examples of games that show active and experiential learning

Practical examples of educational game design and development.

This professional guide upholds the sound reputation of the Open and Flexible Learning series, is grounded in theory and closely links examples from practice. Higher Education academics, e-learning practitioners, developers and training professionals at all technical skill levels and experience will find this text is the perfect resource for explaining “how to” integrate computer games into their teaching practice.

A companion website is available and provides up-to-date technological information, additional resources and further examples.

I have had my own experiences with game-based learning in my classes so I’m looking forward to reading Whitton’s recommendations for design and implementation, to juxtapose with my own experience.

Digital Research Tools Wiki

I came across the DiRT page this morning, run by Lisa Spiro. What an awesome resource! If you know of tools that are useful in your own research, suggest them to Lisa and get them listed on this page. From the front:

This wiki collects information about tools and resources that can help scholars (particularly in the humanities and social sciences) conduct research more efficiently or creatively.  Whether you need software to help you manage citations, author a multimedia work, or analyze texts, Digital Research Tools will help you find what you’re looking for. We provide a directory of tools organized by research activity, as well as reviews of select tools in which we not only describe the tool’s features, but also explore how it might be employed most effectively by researchers.

Please provide feedback on DiRT and recommend tools not included here (yet).

If you’re interested in contributing to this wiki, please email Lisa Spiro at lspiro@rice.edu.  Please see Guidelines for Contributors to learn how to add new information to the wiki.

I love how it is organized by asking what it is you want to do.  While focussed on the humanities and social sciences, there is a distinct lack of Agent Modeling or other simulation tools, which I suppose indicates that simulation hasn’t made great inroads amongst the digital humanities set yet.

Some great dynamic map tools though!

 

• ArcGIS: ”an integrated collection of GIS software products that provides a standards-based platform for spatial analysis, data management, and mapping” (Commercial, Windows)
• GeoNames: “GeoNames geographical database covers all countries and contains over eight million placenames that are available for download free of charge.” (Free, web-based)
• Google Earth: “Google Earth lets you fly anywhere on Earth to view satellite imagery, maps, terrain, 3D buildings, from galaxies in outer space to the canyons of the ocean. You can explore rich geographical content, save your toured places, and share with others.” (Free, with Pro version available; PC/Mac/Linux)
• Google Maps: allows you to view maps and directions, with practical applications for transportation and diverse viewing options to further specify location (Free, web-based)
• Open Street Map: “a free, editable map of the whole world…allows you to view, edit and use geographical data in a collaborative way from anywhere on Earth” (Free, web-based)
• Platial: “the world’s largest social map service…hundreds of thousands of people around the world share and discover all kinds of Places. Anyone can map just about anything including their towns, lives, travels, feeds, files, photos, video and stories in one simple interface…Maps are free and can be embedded on any Web page” (Free, web-based)
• TimeMap: A Java-based client-server/standalone temporal mapping applet for distributed datasets, developed by the Archaeological Computing Laboratory at the University of Sydney (Open Source or support license)
• UUorld: a program that “provides an immersive mapping environment, high-quality data, and critical analysis tools” through the production of four-dimensional, interactive maps (Free, with Pro version available; Windows/Mac/Linux)
• Yahoo! Map Mixer: allows you to create your own basic map, view maps and directions, and search existing maps (Free, web-based)

Resources:

• ECAI – Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative online directory of cultural datasets with search and user contribution functions based on TimeMap.
• Evan Ratliff, “Google Maps Is Changing the Way We See the World,” Wired (June 26, 2007).
• Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a Literary History (Google Books), Franco Moretti. Published 2005.

Examples of Usage:

• PoliMap: Will Riley’s students gathered location data about politicians using a Google spreadsheet and mapped it on a Google Map

 

 

Google WonderWheel and Me

Did you know about the ‘WonderWheel’? It’s a search option on Google – do your search, and then click on ‘more options’. The wheel is a hub-and-spoke visualization of related searches to the one you performed. Below is what you get when you search ’shawn graham archaeology’:

More of a discussion here; is it a gimmick, or a useful way to visualize the links between ideas? It certainly intrigued me to see that ABM, the BSR, and Wilfrid Laurier University are, according to Google, related to me… drilling down the ABM branch I came across some interesting sites, so perhaps it is useful…

SketchLife – Sketchup plugin for exporting to SL

Nearly a year ago, I posted on a possible way to get Sketchup models into Second Life. Today I received a note alerting me to ‘SketchLife’, a plugin you can start using right away for this very thing (thanks for the heads-up, Anthony!).

From the SketchLife website:

What is Sketchlife?

Sketchlife is a system which allows you to model for Second Life using SketchUp.

Most 3D modelling tools use meshes (vertices connected by edges which define faces), whereas Second Life has adopted solids, referred to as primitives, to be their indivisible building blocks. This guarantees that there won’t be any stray polygons flying around, but it also prevents mesh models from being imported automatically.

The in-world modelling tools in Second Life are quite good, but they are stone age compared to the 3D modelling power tool that is SketchUp. SketchUp is free. (Thank you Google.)

Therefore, if we can’t bring SketchUp to Second Life, we’ll bring Second Life to SketchUp.

Colleen, this might be v. useful for all of your projects…!

There’s a video on the site, and a screen shot of a build, made with Sketchlife:

Archaeologically, I can see how this tool will make life a whole lot easier for recreating sites, excavations, reconstructions… if I only had a better net connection, I’d be in there right now…

Alpheios – Firefox tools for Ancient Languages

… and indeed, a host of languages. From the Alpheios website:

The Alpheios Project’s current initiatives include:

- the development of computer tools for reading classical texts
and learning classical languages

- the creation of a million word treebank of classical Greek

- examples of how literary texts can be collaboratively enhanced,
made more accessible to a wider variety of readers, and
rendered more amenable to comparative analysis.

- examples of how computer analysis of texts and corpora can
contribute to literary research and language pedagogy.

We are initially focusing on the six classical languages with the most
extensive literary traditions:

Greek and Latin, Chinese and Sanskrit, and Arabic and Persian.

Several others are under active consideration, including

Akkadian, Hebrew, Pali, Avestan, Old Japanese,
Old English, Old Norse, Old French, Old High German,
Old Castilian and Provencal/Occitan.

These may be developed as the resources for their lexical and
morphological analysis become available, but we wish to point out that
our programs are designed modularly to facilitate the addition of new
languages with minimal effort, and all our code will be open-source
to encourage others to create similar tools for their own languages.

SLOODLE v 0.4 available: educational tools in SL

Get your Moodle and Second Life mashup tools, make your LMS immersive!

From Serious Games Source

Founders of the SLOODLE project have announced the release of SLOODLE version 0.4, a toolset that will assist educational presentations in Linden Lab’s virtual world application Second Life. The project integrates Second Life’s classroom areas with Moodle, an open-source e-learning environment.

Thinking Worlds: Rapid World Authoring

A constant complaint regarding virtual worlds – especially by educators, who are busy enough already! – is the steep learning curve required to get anything worthwhile up and running. Various companies are addressing this (vastpark, justleapin, et al), so it will be interesting to see what emerges. A strong candidate for frontrunner, at least as far as education goes, is ‘Thinking Worlds‘, from Caspian Learning.

Their authoring system [download it here] uses libraries of templates so that 3d worlds can quickly be put together. Then, especially attractive to educators, they have another whole suite of tools to rapidly embed learning objects, formative assessments, scripts (in the sense of things people say, for easy NPC creation), and so on:

Rapidly create challenges and tests using simple templates for MCQ, Options, Checklists, Image drag and many others.

Build non linear scenarios and branching dialogue using wizards and templates.

Develop entirely new learning interactions by selecting controls and customising the GUI.

Build a library of learning interactions to reuse and share.

Setup 3D Scenes

Add different worlds, characters and objects from libraries – templates, wizards and icons using simple drag and drop.

Place new cameras, triggers and paths with the click of a button.

Use animations, particles and sounds for context.

Story Board

Scene Flow canvas uses visual action nodes and wires to intuitively build interactivity.

Vast array of simple action nodes giving designers the power to create complex scenarios and performance measurement.

Easily test, change, amend and extend your design.

Very flexible yet simple to use – drop down lists, check boxes and simple English.

These worlds can be embedded into websites, or they can be stand-alone applications on your computer. Both of these options are attractive – also is the fact that it is a ‘walled-garden’ approach, keeping out the stranger, more dangerous inhabitants of online worlds (a concern for primary and secondary teachers). Indeed, worlds published with Thinking Worlds are also SCORM compliant, and can be embedded in LMS’s. This is, strategically, a master stroke- you’ve got your LMS set up, why not use Thinking Worlds for your immersive component?

One of the demo worlds is called ‘Rome In Danger‘, and seems to be a jump-back-in-time to save the Romans kind of world.

Video:

A tag line on the Thinking Worlds website says ‘build a game in a week’. We shall see…

Tweeting Archaeology

I don’t tweet.

However, like much else on the web, once the idea is out there, people have taken it and run with it. A round-up article from Wired discusses some of the interesting ways people have hacked the service, from a washing machine that tweets when its cycle is over, to house plants that tweet begging to be watered, to a fellow who can turn on his lights from his cell phone by tweeting his house.

An excavation/site/monument that tweeted if visited/disturbed after visiting hours? Hmm.

I also quite liked a related story where Vik Singh of Yahoo! created a mashup that searches tweets for breaking news:

TweetNews takes Yahoo’s news results and compares them to emerging topics on Twitter, in effect using what’s most popular on Twitter as an index for determining the importance of news stories.

In other words, TweetNews uses Twitter to rank stories that are so new they may not have enough inbound links for algorithm-based ranking systems to prioritize them.

The result is a search engine mashup that tracks breaking news stories ranked by Twitter search results, offering faster updates, better relevance and more in-depth coverage than either source by itself.

In a blog post explaining the ideas behind TweetNews, Singh outlines the frustration many felt when searching for news on the Mumbai attacks: “Twitter messages were providing incredible focus on the important subtopics that had yet to become popular in the traditional media… what I found most interesting… was that news articles did exist on these topics, but just weren’t valued highly enough yet.”

So, here’s the TweetNews on Archaeology; and for those who have trouble with dipthongs, the TweetNews on Archeology .  We have archaeological blog aggregators… should we be aggregating tweets too? Do you tweet? Why, and how can you extend it to something bigger/better?

The original post describing how the service works – and the source code!! – is here. Vingh concludes:

There’s something very interesting here … Twitter as a ranking signal for search freshness may prove to be very useful if constructed properly. Definitely deserves more exploration – hence this service, which took < 100 lines of code to represent all the search logic thanks to Yahoo! BOSS, Twitter’s API, and the BOSS Mashup Framework.

Results of my TweetNews search this morning:

Iraq: No haven for ancient world’s landmarks

At Nimrud, decay is accelerating for 3,000 years of history.

2009/02/10 22:01:56

1 Related Tweets

ChristineFarmer

@NevadaSlim thanks No, I have a PhD in Ancient History and Archaeology.

LAist

LAist Goes Shopping: Vintage Jewelry at The House of Love & Luck

LAist couldn’t resist doing a little shopping at The House of Love and Luck on La Cienega just north of Largo at the Coronet. This gorgeous new vintage jewelry store opened six weeks ago. Walk inside to find a treasure trove of beautiful necklaces, rings, bracelets and more. Every item in the store …

2009/02/10 19:15:00

The Wenatchee World

Governor has some budget-cutting changes

OLYMPIA Gov. Chris Gregoire has unveiled her plan to streamline government programs, hoping to cut more expenses as the state faces an estimated $6 billion budget shortfall through 2011.

2009/02/10 18:53:39

New Kerala

Historian claims Stonehenge has Armenian links

London, Feb 10 : A historian has suggested a link between the Stonehenge and an ancient circle of standing stones known as Carahunge in Armenia, which predates the historic site in England.

2009/02/11 04:59:46

The Deming Headlight

Sacred places honored during preservation month

Santa Fe New Mexico communities statewide are being asked to honor sacred places during Heritage Preservation Month, the annual nationwide celebration of historic preservation through community events and other activities held each May, the state Historic Preservation Division announced today.

2009/02/11 07:14:40

New Kerala

Hand-written letter by Rabindranath Tagore found in Bangladesh

Dhaka, Feb 11 : A rare hand written letter by Nobel laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore has been found from a private collector in a Bangladesh village.

2009/02/11 05:24:02

BBC News

Dig unearths 13th century ceramic

A rare ceramic face mask jug dating back to the 13th century has been uncovered at a building site in Rothesay.

2009/02/11 12:27:01

San Francisco Chronicle

‘Why Evolution Is True,’ by Jerry A. Coyne

Why Evolution Is True By Jerry A. Coyne (Viking; 304 pages; $27.95) Praise be the plucky Tiktaalik roseae, the “transitional form” that hauled itself out of the water 375 million years ago to bridge the span between fish and amphibians, whose descendants…

2009/02/11 13:04:08

The Buffalo News

Session to let public air Canal Side views

The public will soon get its first chance to speak out on the proposed $325 million Canal Side project.

2009/02/10 13:24:34

The Pulse-Journal

Local mansion added to National Register of Historic Places

A Deerfield Twp. mansion has been placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

2009/02/10 23:32:35

FOX 10 Phoenix

ASU Closing Dozens of Academic Programs

ASU budget cuts force ASU to cap enrollment – Four Dozen Academic Programs to End

2009/02/10 22:16:40

Straight Furrow

Egypt could jail Australian dealer for 15 years

AN AUSTRALIAN antiques dealer has been arrested in Egypt for allegedly trying to smuggle two 2300-year-old animal mummies and religious figurines out of the country.

2009/02/11 07:57:53

Tiscali

Mexico unearths mass grave from Spanish conquest

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Archaeologists have found a mass grave in Mexico City with four dozen human skeletons laid out in neat lines that could reveal clues about the 16th century Spanish conquest that killed millions.

2009/02/11 01:54:59

Rapid City Journal

Religion briefs 02-07-09

Ladies Salad Luncheon set for Tuesday RAPID CITY The Tuesday Ladies Salad Luncheon will be Feb. 10 at Trinity Lutheran Church, 402 Kansas City St. Special guests are the Rev. Kenneth Sortedahl, his wife and students of Peniel Christian School in Spring Valley, Wis. The event includes music at 11:45 a.m., lunch at noon and the program at 12:30 p.m.

2009/02/11 07:58:13

Deseret Morning News

Museum at BYU seeking docents

Wanted: Volunteer docents for the Museum of Peoples and Cultures at Brigham Young University

2009/02/11 07:31:08

PhotonicsOnline

Laser-Sculpted Optical Devices For Future Giant Telescopes

Future telescopes, with mirrors half the size of a football field, will need special components to deal with the light they collect. Astronomers are turning to photonic devices that guide and manipulate light inside specially-designed materials.

2009/02/11 12:33:22

Otago Daily Times

Slope down applications delayed

Consent applications for a wind farm in the heart of Southland, due to be filed this month, may not be lodged for at least another two months and maybe longer, as the company behind the project gets a swag of assessment reports reviewed.

2009/02/10 16:42:53

Daily Local News

Early chocolate use found in U.S.

Chocolate for your sweetheart this Valentine’s Day?

2009/02/11 11:30:57

KIRO 7 Seattle-Tacoma

Gov. Would Merge Some Washington State Agencies

OLYMPIA, Wash. — In addition to shutting down 150 minor boards and commissions and closing 25 Department of Licensing offices, Gov. Chris Gregoire says the state could save money by merging some agencies.

2009/02/10 19:01:48

MSNBC

2,600-year-old mummy unveiled for first time

Egypt’s chief archaeologist has unveiled a completely preserved mummy inside a limestone sarcophagus sealed 2,600 years ago during pharaonic times.

2009/02/11 15:11:15

Charlevoix Courier

French claim long lost ship Le Griffon

Years after having thought it had taken the steps necessary to lay claim on a ship it lost to rough seas in the 17th century, France formally asserted ownership last week in a Michigan U.S. District Court.

2009/02/11 07:18:10

MSNBC

Human hair found in prehistoric hyena poop

Hairs that likely belonged to humans living 195,000 to 257,000 years ago in Africa have been identified in fossilized brown hyena dung, according to a new study that describes the first non-bony material in the early human fossil record.

2009/02/10 18:41:25

The Daily World

Governer unveils streamlining plan

OLYMPIA The governors plan to streamline government programs would close Department of Licensing offices across the state, including one at South Bend, and eliminate dozens of state boards and commissions.

2009/02/10 19:20:52

Casper Star-Tribune

Natrona County coroner announces retirement

Natrona County Coroner Dr. James Thorpen will retire later this year, he said Tuesday.

2009/02/11 10:51:22

The Bryan-College Station Eagle

Report: Cacao used first in U.S.

WASHINGTON — Chocolate for your sweetheart this Valentine’s Day?Folks may be surprised to know how far back chocolate goes — perhaps 1,000 years in what is now the United States.Evidence of chocolate was been found in Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, …

2009/02/11 02:40:23

Billings Gazette

Butte historical preservation officer quits

BUTTE – Butte-Silver Bow’s new historic preservation officer is leaving the position Friday.

2009/02/11 08:38:51

The Village Voice

Living Ain’t Easy at MOMA’s Documentary Fortnight

Portraits in tenacity make for some of the strongest films in this year’s Documentary Fortnight film fest, again bundled within the supergroup of nonfiction attractions known as MOMA’s Doc Month. You might also group the filmmakers under the banner of the relentless, as they rustle up category-bl…

2009/02/11 00:16:49