Protecting history: Japan will use drones to create digital twins of Japanese historical landmarks.
by DRONELIFE Staff Author Ian J. McNabb
![](https://dronelife.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Hiro-Holdings-300x172.jpeg)
Hiro Holdings
The Hiro Holdings Group, based out of Nara, Japan, has recently announced a partnership with Clever Planning Co. Ltd which is able to see the usage of drones to map and recreate Japanese historical landmarks in 3D. Digital archiving, where digital scans of historical objects are kept as a technique of preservation, is becoming an increasingly necessary tool for archeologists and historians worldwide, especially as over-crowding or over-handling could cause irreversible damage to delicate, ancient environments and artifacts. On top of this, lots of Japan’s most vital ancient buildings are fabricated from wood, and are highly vulnerable to fireside damage or erosion, making digital preservation uniquely necessary on the island.
Hiro and Clever plan on using drone-based photogrammetry to create detailed 3D models of buildings, together with smaller camera rigs designed to create a repository of smaller objects (equivalent to those found inside museums). Using LiDAR-equipped 360-degree cameras, Hiro’s recent digital preservation firm’s UAVs can create extremely accurate point-cloud models of landmarks and cultural properties which is able to allow researchers and tourists access to extremely accurate recreations of each the interiors and exteriors of historical buildings regardless of where they may be.
Operating their very own flights and handling all of the video editing and processing themselves, Hiro Holdings and Clever Planning hope to create a brand new form of digital artifact that may have an effect each in Japan (protecting delicate historical environments and ensuring research will be accomplished without further risk) and abroad. This represents a crucial step forward for Japanese businesses within the UAV industry, as more corporations find ways to integrate drones into their existing workflows to create exciting recent projects like this one, which mixes an existing 3D modelling business with UAVs to guard priceless cultural resources.
More is on the market from their website here (in Japanese).
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