For many years, the heritage community in Johannesburg has been searching for a way to let property owners know up front whether they need to follow heritage processes before carrying out work. This Heritage Month, I am happy to announce that such a tool has arrived with the launch of The Heritage Register (click here to view).
Cutting edge 3D laser scanning technology was used to create highly accurate digital models of the historic corbelled houses of the Northern Cape. The corbelled houses are excellent examples of the ingenuity of the early pioneers who moved into the Karoo semi-desert landscape from about 1820 through to the end of the nineteenth century. They discovered that trees were sparse and set about building their dwellings using the only available material, stone.
Toward the end of last year, team members at Africa Media Online were excited to take delivery of a brand new Phase One XF camerawith an 80-Megapixel CCD digital back. For some years now we have been looking for a more versatile high end medium format camera technology to boost our scanning capability.
[First published 28 January 2013] If all goes to plan over the next few months, Johannesburg could become Africa’s first Wikipedia City. This means that visitors will be able to use their smartphones to scan QR codes placed on historic landmarks and be taken to a Wikipedia page containing fascinating information about the site. (A QR code is a smart phone readable bar code that contains web addresses).
