We come in....pieces?

This semester our big group project for our Digital History class is somewhat of a digital experiment with an overall exhibit theme of "The Sky", the website for which will be coming in April, 2008. My group is based on archaeoastronomy and will be a model of ancient Stonhenge with an interface that will allow the viewer to interact with various aspects of the model. There will be information on the Neolithic culture that constructed Stonehenge, the various theories of its usage, history of the structure, as well as various facts about other megalithic sites in Britain and Europe that will provide more contextual information.

Last weekend, my group and I finished moulding the clay stones that will come together as Stonehenge (hopefully). Moulding the clay was both fun and interesting as we all got our hands dirty playing with air-dry clay and seeing all the pieces come together. The task and greater challenge now before us is the configuration of the electronic and digital components. Apprehensively, I volunteered to work on the digital side of things along with Adam Crymble. Adam has been very helpful in suggesting different programs we could use and with showing me how to use some of them. One of the ones we will definitely be using is a program called Bryce, which is a 3D model, landscape and animation package. Adam has already made an amazing animation of the solstice sunrise at Stonehenge, and has kindly started showing me to use the program as well. I will be attempting to make an animation of Dromagorteen, another stone circle in County Cork, Ireland that is also believed to be aligned with the solstice sunrise.

This here is an image of what Dromagorteen looks like now along with the sign that explains about the site and its astronomical significance:








I took these photos last summer in Ireland in a relatively unmarked off-road historic site that was filled with many interesting archaeological remains.

And here is my attempt using Bryce to digitally reconstruct it:








My group and I are also trying to figure out a way to present all the information about Stonehenge and other megalithic sites in an engaging, interactive way. One program that has potential is Python, an object-oriented programming language that has a huge selling point of being relatively user-friendly. Having absolutely no programming experience I am excited to learn using a program that is more understanding of us less computer-oriented people. Reading through the guide last night I still felt like this might be something a little out of my league. So far I have not even been able to install it successfully on my computer. Not a good sign. Once I do get it working, it will be interesting to see how I fare getting it to work.

While we can not hope to match the overwhelming accomplishment of the people who originally built Stonehenge, I am excited to see how our scaled-down version will work with all of the electronic and digital interfaces that we will be using. The pieces of the past few months are all coming together. Let's see what we can accomplish.

It's the Little Things

For many people it is the little things that count. Those small contributions that go a long way in the betterment of yourself, the human race, and even the planet. GreenPrint World is a free version of GreenPrint software. GreenPrint has created a solution for what is seemingly a minor problem, but which has large implications. Almost everyone, I am sure, has noticed the extra pages that appear only after a document has been printed (for example, pages with just a URL or a run-over Excel column). GreenPrint solves this problem by using a technology that analyses the document and then highlights and removes the essentially blank pages. This technology also incorporates an easy to use PDF writer, a print preview called GreenView and a neat feature which reports the number of pages, trees and money you have saved every time you use it. The publisher claims that "GreenPrint Technologies creates products that help protect the environment while increasing efficiency and saving money." A mission that is both innovative and environmentally considerate.

Many digital technologies in the humanities field have similar environmentally beneficial features, though they are not often advertised as such. The number one argument it seems for having publications and other research tools available online is the increased accessibility. Saving the environment is big business right now. Maybe by putting more of a spin on the fact that digital resources mean decreased deforestation and pulp mills, less packaging, and less waste the more attention it will receive in the public sphere.

Besides being environmentally beneficial, this technology also seems analogous to the Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology that is increasingly being used by archives and museums. Both scan the document for information and produce a result which is beneficial to the user for time/money saved. OCR-ing quickens the transcription process when digitising typed text (handwritten text recognition is still being developed) by scanning and recognising individual characters and placing them into Notepad where it can be formatted using HTML. This "scanning technology" seems to be everywhere in the digital humanities field and its benefits for both the field and the environment have yet to be fully realised. I look forward to more of these "little things" that seem to be making such a big difference in our world.