3D models and archaeological investigation

The introduction and the diffusion of digital technology have strongly affected the way archaeologists manage and perceive the information detected during the field investigation process. In the last two decades digital instruments have been used in archaeology at any level, and their constant employment increased the opportunities for researchers and scholars to detect, document, analyse and visualize almost all the information collected during the field investigation. In particular, in the framework of archaeological practice, the introduction and diffusion of instruments dedicated to documentation and mapping, and the development of powerful visualization platforms, such as the Geographic Information System (GIS), have created the opportunity to reconstruct and visualize, with high accuracy, the spatial and temporal relations between the different data detected during the field investigation process. In particular, the implementation of such tools and the development of new integrated digital techniques allowed (i) the systematic production of digital referenced maps representing the on-going investigation activity performed on site (ii) and the possibility of non-professional users employing mathematical tools to process the data imported into the GIS and generating new archaeological information.