3D Imaging of Musical Instruments: Methods and Applications

This treatise is intended as an introduction to three-dimensional (3D) imaging for stakeholders working with musical instruments, e.g. ethnologists, musicologists, curators, and instrument builders. The work should help to find the appropriate method for a specific purpose and further highlight several possible applications for the obtained data. Firstly, three techniques of 3D image acquisition are introduced. Advantages and disadvantages of the proposed methods are discussed in terms of ease of use and obtained information. Secondly, a workflow is presented to post-process the captured raw data. Finally, several examples of possible utilization of the generated virtual models are introduced. As far as possible, the proposed procedures are based on the use of open source software/freeware and should be applicable on regular current personal computers. Parts of this work are based on a proceedings abstract published in 2017 [29].