It’s not an Illustration; it’s a Graphic Database: Rock Art Documentation in the Digital Age

Summary

Shumla incorporates new technologies that are revolutionizing rock art illustration and documentation. This presentation discusses the method developed by Shumla to engage these technologies in the production of graphic databases. Using Adobe Photoshop and a Wacom Cintiq Interactive Pen Display, digital Photoshop layers are used to graphically document data for individual figures. These living documents include accurate scale illustrations and the color calibrated and enhanced photographs used to produce the illustrations. Additional layers serve as maps documenting locations of analyses conducted in the field, such as digital microscopy to determine paint stratigraphy, non-destructive elemental analyses of the pigment, and collected sample locations for radiocarbon dating. This approach not only increases data integrity and replicability, it also provides a dynamic, visual record for individual rock art figures and, collectively, entire rock art murals.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Rock Art: Methodology and Interpretation in the Archaeology of the Site

Keywords

Spatial Coverage