From a "Mugwumps," i.e., fencesitter or Reform Democrat after Tammany Tweed

"Man who falls into blast furnace is certainly to feel overwrought"  - ?

I think I know what you mean. Years ago I studied the excavations at Nuzi by
Harvard University's Professor Starr. The objects themselves were incomplete
in that the production of 3D information from scant remains are difficult to
create. Certain objects, toy chariots, cylinder seals and projectile points
remain with description but the "gestalt" of the settlement is difficult to
understand. This in a way leads to Charles Redman's insistence in his
doctorate that more regional studies be done, maybe lest we insult ourselves
and others as to the "true nature" of the finds as depicted in reports.
Having thought about it for about twenty years I still have trouble
understanding the major site's orientation and I think one of the reasons is
the implicit problems of "cosmopolitan" nature of Nuzi. Combined of elements
from the Hurrians, the Indus, the Babylonians and with shells from the
Mediterranean, maybe Phoenicians the ability to depict a society in
transition is like trying to depict one East Coast City without looking at
Washington, DC, built in Federal style, as is the case with the Mitanni
capital, still unfound and Indus cuneiform undeciphered.

My own experience is more from the US Federal depiction of information from
photos in the 19th century of structures in a Federal Foundry, site of one of
the earliest labor actions in a Federal facility, the West Point Foundry,
across from the military academy at West Point, NY. A symbiotic relationship
across the Hudson River, in different counties, and using the resources of
the surrounding iron bearing geology along with other sources, it was
conducted through the 19th century until the 1870s, when taconite (iron ore)
deposits were discovered in the US Midwest

An old landscape stereo pair was scanned and blownup into larger sections of
the image to look at a specific area that was to be impacted by new
construction for the HAZMAT remediation of the Constitution Marsh (named
before the American Revolution I read) First mapped by Bernard Romans, the
area around this place was also considered strategic as it was easily
defended, just up the Hudson River from the Academy on the west side, and
theoretically easily destroyed if not defended. From the photos one could see
more but less in explanation. Strange black equipment emerged, houses where
none were thought (from maps) additional features creating an unbelievable
complexity of design. One can with AutoCAD actually recreate the place the
photo was taken, I believe, given a few more parameters and possibly some
modifications to create a "landscape" lens applicable to the time. Study them
enough and one could find more information in the photo, knowing what and
where it obscured or depicted things from. The actual coordinates could
theoretically take one back with a GPS in "time" to the photographer's
tripod. This is claimed adjustable in some of the CAD programs through the
"camera" variable. A reason to leave Flatland, but better bring a way back,
or you'll find yourself back at the beginnings of photogrammetry, on the
ground, where maybe it should still be for humanities sake

Here is one of the stymies I've run into. Do you use software and technology
invented to define the strictest relations of objects since the beginning of
architecture to the past? When we use the same software used to further
"American System of Manufacture," that is interchangeable parts and assembly
line production, on objects created mostly by hand and of other standards of
design than the present, we have the problem of depiction. "Ideal" vs. "As
found" or "As Built" vs. "As Designed"? What is the intent of the depiction?
To confirm the documentary evidence that has the "found object" without
Sartre's "stickiness"? In that case do we spend more time analyzing the
differences between the production and outcome, or the what may have to have
been "Jerry-rigged"? To analyze it with current standards of the computer
arts is difficult and time consuming. New products such as ZBrush (not an
indorsement) bring the 2D depictions into the Video game depictions some
people see the computer artist as having to have, created for the
archaeologist's audience and clients. My problem with this is that the
depictions neither provide any more evidence that what has been described and
to what purpose does it serve to present it?

To depict the chronological sequence of the archaeological excavation is
important, without it the excavation is useless to the next generation. My
feeling is that this is where VR should be used so that another tool to the
reconstruction of events occurring in real time can be ascertained. The
problem of recreating is more up to the artists' imagination unless by larger
study a bigger picture can be found to explain the smaller scale excavated
remains. Everything is a partial recovery then, because one would have to
excavate everything in the world back to its original deposit, each relation
found can obscure another.

The reality that VR brings helps defend different perspectives. If I create
in rough 3D a facility from a VR height of 1100 feet, I can introduce another
horizon where the site may have been involved in resource or target. Recent
programs like GenesisII in Scotland remind me of this capability, one could
theoretically argue about the weather in the depiction then! The ability to
create VR history of industrial sites, where enough evidence and processor
power is possible, can help lend an interpretation to say a "city gas" plant
made from coal as it progressed through time and now should be mitigated
wherever they are, the coal tar resulting pretty dangerous stuff in an
aquifer, and according to recent studies by archaeologists extant ones almost
impossible to find.

Computer graphics - nothing new has been invented -- it's now just cheaper.
In my opinion I saw everything back in the NY Coliseum in the early eighties,
and everything today is there today except the cameras and the ability to
digitally record everything without chemicals (ignoring the disposal of
computers, toxic nightmares) and the ability to document everything
therefore. However, VR and close-range photogrammetry, as applications, are
miles apart, one the application of perspective, the other the elimination of
perspective and "camera affects" to produce "true" (Flatland) depictions. If
you think you can adjust to both at the same time, and their production with
current infrared tachymeters, I wish you as an artist good luck! I was born
terribly cross-eyed. Cured itself.

George Myers, Jr.