Indiana Stones
Project Abstract
For archaeologists, data documentation is one of the hardest aspects due to its meticulous nature and lack of technology causing them to record their findings by hand. Mayan archaeologist have to traverse inhospitable environments such as dark, small tunnels, which further exacerbates this problem. To ease their burden, technology has been used to aid in the documentation process. Although the technologies created has helped archaeologists, there are still issues with them. One such technology uses Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) camera to help map the environment for the archaeologists and create a 3D model using Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM algorithms). However, this method is very expensive. To reduce cost, LIDAR cameras were replaced with Microsoft Kinect cameras which also produced very good 3D models of the environment. However, this setup is too bulky and not feasible to use in small tunnels. Our group has created a camera based system using Intel’s new RealSense cameras to replace the Microsoft Kinect cameras. These cameras are, first, calibrated to enable real-time data collection. The data collected is then fed into SLAM which will create a 3D model of the environment. Our work is a cheaper and portable alternative to the current existing technologies which can be used in the most inhospitable environments such as Mayan tunnels.

Out knowledge guide that we updated throughout the quarter is available here.


All of our code is available here.

Weekly Updates
Week 3 - Camera Setup using ROS
Week 4 - Camera Data Retrieval
Week 5 - Camera Data Retrieval
Week 6 - Camera Calibration
Week 7 - Camera Calibration
Week 8 - SLAM Implementation
Week 9 - SLAM Implementation
Week 10 - SLAM Implementation