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These last months people have been asking me about doing high quality 3D models of fossil specimens with surface digitization techniques. I would like to share with you some of the works that helped me a lot in this digital jouney
First of all, you need to know two of the most amazing researchers working on digitization of fossils: @H_Mallison (aka @Palaeo3D) and @peterfalkingham, both have really impressive blogs on this topic.
@Palaeo3D blog has a lot of entries on how to properly (and efficiently) use Photoscan/Metashape to obtain meshes of impressive quality (besides many other things related with vertebrate palaeontology): https://dinosaurpalaeo.wordpress.com/
In this post you can check his workflow as an informative visual chart: https://dinosaurpalaeo.wordpress.com/2018/11/05/photogrammetry-tutorial-12-my-workflow-for-agisoft-photoscan-as-a-diagram/
@SV_POW saved us a lot of time, making an index of all the entries Heinrich made on photogrammetry (although you need to check the blog from time to time for the updates): https://svpow.com/2017/11/25/photogrammetry-index-to-heinrich-mallisons-tutorials/
@peterfalkingham blog is also a must in digitization of fossils. And he does a great work comparing free and comercial photogrammetry software, besides devices and hardware, and many more interesting topics: https://peterfalkingham.com/blog/
@Palaeo3D, @ichnomatteo and I developed a photogrammetry handbook for @SynthesysEU and the @mfnberlin, with a brief workflow: http://biowikifarm.net/v-mfn/3d-handbook/Photogrammetry_MfN
And now some scientific papers that everybody who works on digitization of vertebrate palaeontology collections should at least now:
Workflows and tips on photogrammetry:
Falkingham (2012): https://palaeo-electronica.org/content/pdfs/264.pdf
Mallison and Wings (2014): https://www.jpaleontologicaltechniques.org/pasta3/JPT%20N12/Pdf/JPT_n012_Jul.pdf
Falkingham (2012): https://palaeo-electronica.org/content/pdfs/264.pdf
Mallison and Wings (2014): https://www.jpaleontologicaltechniques.org/pasta3/JPT%20N12/Pdf/JPT_n012_Jul.pdf
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Virtual Palaeontology* (*But Were Afraid to Ask):
Sutton et al. (2014): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118591192
Sutton et al. (2014): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118591192
Digital preparation of badly preserved fossils:
Lautenschlager (2016): https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.160342
Lautenschlager (2016): https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.160342
I do think that numerous researchers do not give the created 3D model, their associated data and workflow used in the digitization the importance they deserve. That is why I conside this paper of extreme importance. (1/2)
Please, think of including with the 3D model the essential and recommended best practice datasets, besides making them freely accessible (if possible) (2/2).
Davies et al. (2017): https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2017.0194
Davies et al. (2017): https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2017.0194
There are also some guidelines for the publication of digital ichnological data:
Falkingham et al. (2018): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/pala.12373
Falkingham et al. (2018): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/pala.12373
And, I would like to finish the thread with my last paper on the comparison of photogrammetry and structure light 3D scanning and the use of quantitative and visual qualitative comparisons for checking the general quality of the created 3D models (1/2):
Díez Díaz et al. (2021): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/pala.12518
There are many more papers comparing digitization techniques, and I could try to do a new thread on them in the near future, if you want :)
There are many more papers comparing digitization techniques, and I could try to do a new thread on them in the near future, if you want :)
I am probably missing more papers, but these ones are the ones who helped me in my first steps in digitization. Of course, as soon as you dig on them, the references you will find are full of really useful information too.
Do you have a favourite blog or paper on digitization?
Do you have a favourite blog or paper on digitization?
And to finish, @Palaeo3D once told me that digitization is more an art than a science. I like to think that we are bringing part of ourselves and our experience on the creation of the 3D model, but it is important to not influence a lot the result (1/2)
specially if we are going to use the model in a research project or use it as part of a digital collection as cybertype. But we can talk more about cybertypes in other thread :) (2/2)
