Surveying and mapping caves by using 3D digital technologies

In this paper, we propose an original three-dimensional (3D) computer-aided approach for surveying and mapping caves to get line drawings. By introducing 3D digital technologies into the line drawing, our approach has advantages in improving the drawing accuracy while cutting a lot of time costs. The 3D digital technologies are used to reconstruct accurate 3D models of real scenes. Then, the lines on the model surfaces are extracted by analyzing the model geometry. To demonstrate the advantages, we compare our approach with the traditional method usually used by archaeologists. Results show that our approach is much more convenient and accurate than the previous method.