The Digital Evolution at Chan Chich, Belize

Summary

In 2012, the Chan Chich Archaeological Project transitioned from paper field forms to a relational database on iPads in the field and an iMac in the laboratory. Since then, the database has evolved each season, becoming more powerful and more useful with each modification. The project has also adopted Structure from Motion as a standard method for documenting excavations over the past three seasons. The digital revolution has not been without its difficulties, but the evolution of the database and attendant technologies has moved the suite of methods from a novelty to be discussed to a powerful set of tool to be employed. This paper discusses the CCAP database and reflects on the ways it has changed how the project approaches data collection and analysis and how those changes, in turn, have transformed how we interpret the ancient past. The digital data and models allow excavators to reconstruct and consider cultural contexts across multiple excavation units much more easily than traditional paper-based systems do.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Archaeological Epistemology in the Digital Age

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 15101