Hi Bridget,

As someone investigating the possibilities of 3d scanning, I obviously
found this interesting. Interesting from the crowdfunding aspect too, but I
am coming at it from the 'how are they doing it' point of view and realised
they *may not *be doing the entire spacesuit, in particular the glass visor
and other highly reflective objects such as air and comms connectors
because 3d digitisation isn't quite yet up to speed on these items because
reflective objects *can* confuse the laser scanning process. However, if
they are going to plough the money into better scanning of difficult items
then this would be a great project. In terms of suit layers, 3d scanning
can only scan what it sees (no occlusions), so I imagine they would be
making composite scans, unless they are doing CAT scans as per the recent
BM mummy projects. I imagine it's easier to scan each suit layer then layer
them together, but imagine how difficult it will be to get the fabric to
stay in the correct position so that each of those layers sits digitally
inside each layer! You don't want one layer digitally poking through the
next layer! Of course you can manipulate the texture map, so maybe they'll
just do that instead??

My view is I'd like to know more about how they are doing it, which I am
sure we will get in due course. It sounds a very difficult and challenging
project, but great to see once it is done as it will have pushed on the
boundaries of what we can do.

Tony

*Please note my new telephone number – 020 7211 2426*



[image: cid:image001.png@01CF86F9.22C2BC80]

*Tony Harris*
Digital Media & Photography Officer
Government Art Collection
tony.harris @culture.gov.uk <[log in to unmask]>* |* 020 7211 2426
[image: cid:image002.jpg@01CF86F9.22C2BC80]@govartcol  [image:
cid:image003.jpg@01CF86F9.22C2BC80] /governmentartcollection |
www.gac.culture.gov.uk



On 24 July 2015 at 12:50, Bridget Mckenzie <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hello all
>
> I thought this might stimulate a bit of discussion and co-learning. I heard
> on Radio 4 about this Smithsonian project (which is - interestingly - on
> Kickstarter) aiming to conserve, digitise and display Neil Armstrong's moon
> suit.
>
> I found it interesting that an object like this can be digitised in 3D (not
> just photographed from a few angles). The suit has 21 layers so you'll be
> able to explore the object in depth, due to the digitisation.
>
> I'm not sure I have a question. Just thought I'd put it here and see what
> questions the story raises for you.
>
>
> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/smithsonian/reboot-the-suit-bring-back-neil-armstrongs-spacesu
> ?
>
> Bridget
>
>
> www.flowglobal.co.uk
> aboutbridgetmckenzie.wordpress.com
>
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