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3rd November 2008, 07:00 PM
"While you can get total stations which can do 'point cloud' building recording"
No not these I am talking about total stations that automatically detect features and survey them. Not launched yet but coming soon price unknown.
Peter Wardle.
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3rd November 2008, 07:13 PM
Greetings Peter....
Surely what you are describing is a field archaeologist and the price is infamously cheap........ 
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)
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3rd November 2008, 08:50 PM
You are right Troll the archaeologist is cheap but the total station does not need things like accommodation (tax or untaxed), pensions or training. You dont have to bother about the weather or how deep the trench is and they always come in high vis colours.
So in the long term they will be better value.
I have to say Troll has hit on a point here - how far does cheap labour inhibit the intoduction of technology?
I would also ask how many on site tasks can actually be undertaken in a warm dry office compared to a freezing cold wet miserable site. I have just spent the last hour measuring grave markers. It takes about the same time to take the measurement via a digital recording system as it does on site -which is better?
I suspect the attributes I am recording will not actually yield any useful infomation so is it worth bothering? If in the future this data becomes vitally important it could be retrieved from the archive.
Peter Wardle
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3rd November 2008, 10:24 PM
Weegie and Trowelfodder,
I'm quite interested that the paper record has remained an integral part of the system. Is this as a back-up if the system failed? Presumably the time and analysis benefits are thought to be worth the double handling on site. Do you think this could work for a commercial unit?
The system we are using involves digital recording on site with PDAs, and I think if we could get away with digital drawings we would try it. It is hoped that there will be time savings both on site and in post ex. I have yet to be convinced, and I think there are gaps in what we are recording, but am trying to remain open minded about it.
Dr Pete and Oxbeast, the technology that holds the most promise for limiting on site recording is I feel close range photogrammetry as used last year at Silbury Hill. I have tested these techniques in watching brief situations and also on commercial sites and it works very well. A conclusion for the Silbury work was that the skilled archaeologist was still needed to interpret the strat, no matter how detailed the photogrammetric recording. Not only that, but the interpretation had to be done on site, not in the comfort of the office looking at a computer screen. Not so different from the traditional methods then. Perhaps greatly improved resolution will change this, but I doubt it. After all you can't check the relationship between two deposits through a computer screen.
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3rd November 2008, 10:31 PM
You'll never replace the good old digger. The ability to interpret is the crucial one. That and dig stuff while interpreting it. TSTs, LIDAR and all the rest are great for recording, but that's only a small part of the story...
Of course low wages hold technology back. Two site assistants with a TST costing £3k or one with a GPS costing £20k. I know which would come out of a project budget... (if capital funds were avaialble you could make the long term business case, but...[sighs and looks heavenward])
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4th November 2008, 12:43 AM
The ability to interpret is the crucial one.
How true... now lets find and support the digger than can... worth more than gold!
"I don't have an archaeological imagination.."
Borekickers
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4th November 2008, 09:00 AM
Sorry, that should be the ability to state evidence to explain and justify accurate and concise interpretations. Not just invent it.
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4th November 2008, 12:07 PM
Sort of reminds me of an earlier thread (can we be totally objective in archaeology). All the all-singin'-an-all-dancin' total-stations and GPS's in the world couldn't (and shouldn't) replace one decent archaeologist. You can have all the wonderful technology on the planet, but it ain't worth jack-sh*t if it ain't used and applied properly.
Instruments just record things (provides data). Manipulation (albeit using technology - software), analysis and interpretation is an entirely human thing. At the moment, a total station can't jump out of its box and set itself up, it needs one of those human things (archaeologist or surveyor) or plant it in the ground. A prism, by itself, cannot follow (actual or supposed) archaeology scratched into the surface. Furthermore, the actual feature to be followed has been defined by an intelligent, practised, realistic, interpretative and rational archaeologist (hmmm... sometimes not all of those definitions apply). Then once recorded and number-crunched, it will still take an archaeologist time and (yes) training to interpret the results and put it into a form where it can be understood by fellow archaeologists and non-archaeologists alike.
One thing I worry about is over-reliance on technology in the recording of archaeology on-site and in the creation of archives. Much like tapping away at computer keyboards is killing the art of writing... if we keep going down the road of laser and digital recording, will the ability to actually draw a plan or section be lost? If the laser-recording machine thows a tantrum... could we still thrust a pencil into into the muddy paw of someone and tell them to get on with planning their feature at 1:20? Moreover, the actual drawing of a feature is an interpretation in itself... from the actual drawn section, the scribbled interpretative notes that may go with it, right down to the mud-encrusted permatrace that arrives into the office (it can be indicative of site conditions, the weather, the actual soil type and the mind-set of the excavator!). Site photography... a photograph taken using the equivalent of a box-brownie (ok a realtively cheap manual SLR) will be far, far, far better in resolution and contrast range than anything a current 10 to 12 megapixel can produce. There is also the issue of preservation; there are many tales of hard drives crashing or being stolen, or of CDs that held thousands of images being damaged. Unlike film, where there is the not positive to rely on, digital images are intangible and most of the time, stored on computers. Moreover, with digital cameras there is another important point - magnification factor. This means that if you use a film lens with a digital camera (as many places do), you may not necessarily get the image you expect.
Archiving... yes, paper, photographs and permatrace are bulky and are inherently degradable. But so are digital records (cd's degrade). Furthermore, anyone can pick up a sheet of paper, read it, analyse it and then have a stab at interpreting it. You could (in theory) look through the paper archive of a site that was dug back in the 1930's and make it your own. Could you say the same (in a few years time) for purely digital sites? At present, not everyone has access or the nouce to use Access, Word, PDF's, GIS and the Internet... furthermore, it is also a pretty big assumption that [u]everyone</u> in the future will be able to use these things (if they still exist). In the future, what will happen if the technology goes down the pan?
ps... the Neo-Luddite views expressed here by the author are not representative of those of his techno-savvy employers
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4th November 2008, 01:26 PM
Back to the 1980s again...
Security.
Paper archives can be destroyed by fire, water or vermin. A digital record can be copied immediately and located in a different place.
"Magnification" focal length of lens on digital cameras. The focal lengths of lens on digital cameras is about the same as on medium format lens. There is a change of about 1.5 in the focal to get the same effect. So thus a digital 35mm lense give the same result as a standard lense ie 50-55mm. This is a none problem.
Quote "The resolution is not as good as a cheap film SLR." Maybe/Maybe not -digital photography wins hands down for ease of use and in particular for looking at detail. They are different mediums and have to be used in different ways. I have a collection of 214796 digital photographs available to me in a matter of seconds.
Quote "Unlike film, where there is the not positive to rely on" why not print out the digital images. How many slides are printed and how many B&W photos are printed other than a contact print.
The heart of the objection to the introduction of technology is simply one of protecting jobs. There are a number of reasons for introducing technology:
Increasing productivity
Increasing quality/objectivity
To do things which are not possible without the kit.
As for the notion that there is a single archaeologist out there who does not know how to use the net......
Dr Peter Wardle
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4th November 2008, 01:27 PM
Quote:quote:Moreover, the actual drawing of a feature is an interpretation in itself... from the actual drawn section, the scribbled interpretative notes that may go with it, right down to the mud-encrusted permatrace that arrives into the office (it can be indicative of site conditions, the weather, the actual soil type and the mind-set of the excavator!). Site photography... a photograph taken using the equivalent of a box-brownie (ok a realtively cheap manual SLR) will be far, far, far better in resolution and contrast range than anything a current 10 to 12 megapixel can produce. There is also the issue of preservation; there are many tales of hard drives crashing or being stolen, or of CDs that held thousands of images being damaged. Unlike film, where there is the not positive to rely on, digital images are intangible and most of the time, stored on computers.
Hear hear!
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