3D scanning of daguerreotypes

Abstract

Daguerreotypes are historical photographic images made on mirror-like metallic plates. These are heritage objects whose shape cannot be measured with invasive techniques, like contact probes, but the high reflectivity of their surfaces makes the use of non-invasive, 3D-measuring optical techniques challenging. Moreover, the dark areas resulting from their degradation produce a very high contrast, which add extra difficulties to their measurement. In the last few years, several strategies have been developed to overcome the limitations of optical techniques when measuring reflective metallic surfaces. Many of these solutions are not applicable to the study of cultural heritage artifacts, as they are invasive. We attempted the use of conoscopic holography in a 3D-scanning system using a double-exposure strategy. This is a promising option for 3D measuring of daguerreotypes, as we experimentally demonstrated in this work. We present the results obtained from the analyses of two 19th-century daguerreotypes with different superficial conditions. The double-exposure allowed us to obtain high-quality data from the entire object surface. This enabled the measurement of micro-scale details related to the manufacturing process and/or to the corrosion deposits. The proposed methodology can be exploited to monitor the overall health of highly reflective metallic objects but also the outcomes of some conservation treatments, such as cleaning.