The King’s Throne in the Forbidden City
Team Members: Mike Ma, Jérôme Baillargeon, Simon Côté
Technical Details
- Work done using 1 MAXscan and 1 VIUscan
- 2 days and 8 hours to complete the scan
- 35 million triangles, reduced to 22 million using decimation for rendering
- 100 hours of post-treatment on the STL file
- 150 hours of work to produce the film (including rendering)
- The throne was virtually “split” into 20 sections in order to make rendering easier
The greatest challenge facing the team was to obtain the consent of the Forbidden City Museum curators. The idea of using the images for the purpose of a contest did indeed disturb them somewhat. The team had to promise to keep the 3D model totally confidential for the curators to finally agree to the scan.
Considering the uniqueness of this artefact, many groundbreaking 3D scanning technological means had been tried to immortalize it. However, the throne is covered in pure gold; such a reflecting surface wreaks havoc with most conventional 3D scanning devices.
Fortunately, the Handyscan 3D laser scanners are outfitted with adjustment functions on their laser parameters, and since they are handheld, the operator can easily vary the angle of attack on the surface.
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