Mayan civilization is known to be a very advanced civilization as compared to other civilizations of their time. But they had disappeared before the Europeans could reach the American territory. Many researchers and historians have been fascinated regarding Mayans and their effect on the social science. 3D scanning projects have helped in discovering many new facts about the Mayans and getting a deep insight into their culture. The project was on for 5 years and proved to be very useful. It could be used in various different archaeological projects and researchers have started using them in most of their projects.
Ancient monuments build by Mayans were scanned with the use of the3D scanning at Peabody museum by CMHI. This is an archaeological institution that is affiliated to Harvard University. In the 5 year 3D scanning project 30 monuments were scanned that included the hieroglyphic inscriptions. It also included hieroglyphic stairway located in the Honduras. Most of the scans of monuments were shared with different researchers across the globe. This helps in getting views of different people and makes them figure out importance of each of these inscriptions. The monuments are scanned in different sections that mainly depend on their size. The scans are then joined together in a computer with the help of measurement data so that all the pieces fit properly.
To improve the accuracy level every monument had been scanned minimum 4 times. Then 4 different resolutions are created out of these scans and used for several purposes. To import them easily for other projects they saved in several formats. The ones that have low resolution are good for online sharing and others are used through software like Google sketchup.
Several scans that are shared with only some archaeologist and not available for everyone have been in existence. These scans required more protection and could not be shared with all the researchers. 3D scanning makes it easy for the users to view even the minute scans easily and manipulate them from different angles. 3D scanning helped in understanding the Mayan civilization and helped in viewing even the weathered hieroglyphs.
The scientists combine 3D printing and 3D scanning so that exact models of all the monuments can be created. This includes both scaled down models and scaled up models of different monuments. These are very useful for exhibits and museums. This technology will help amateur archaeologists for discovering things that were missed in the past.