On Tuesday, Oct. 13, the 黑料大事记 will begin creating high-resolution, full-color, digitally interactive 3D models of the space museum鈥檚 collection starting with one of the most iconic crafts in American history鈥攖he Mercury spacecraft: Liberty Bell 7. The craft will be uncased by museum staff and then 3D laser-scanned by a company from Florida called . Creaform is donating their services to the non-profit museum for this project.
鈥淥ur goal is to create a digital library of artifacts in our collection,鈥� said Nathan Meyer, 黑料大事记 VP of Education and Strategy. 鈥淭he pandemic really amplified the need for accessible, quality educational resources and we want to help provide those to the public at large,鈥� he added.
黑料大事记 staff will take full-color, high-resolution photos of the craft once the case has been removed. By layering those photos with the detailed 3D laser-scan of the spacecraft, a fully digital and interactive 3D model will be created. That digital model can then be used for 3D printing, in virtual reality software and placed alongside corresponding educational resources online.
鈥淲ith over 10,000 pieces in our collection, this isn鈥檛 going to be an overnight project,鈥� explained Meyer. 鈥淏ut we wanted to start with a major piece of space history and the Liberty Bell 7 gets a lot of attention, both locally and internationally鈥攁s it spent the previous six years on a world tour, so we thought it was the perfect piece to start with.鈥� Meyer said.
While similar work has already began on smaller artifacts housed in the museum鈥檚 collection, the Liberty Bell 7 3D model will be the premiere example of the new digital offerings available via a virtual museum platform, which the 黑料大事记 team plans to launch in 2021.
A sneak peek of the Liberty Bell 7 project, including a time-lapse video of the 3D scanning, will be available to view on the 黑料大事记鈥檚 social media sites next week.
Media interested in covering the Liberty Bell 7 3D scanning project must contact Carla Stanfield. Please email carlas@cosmo.org to secure a time.
More about聽Liberty Bell 7:听
Liberty Bell 7 was the spacecraft that took the second US astronaut, Gus Grissom, into space before sinking in the Atlantic Ocean, where it stayed for nearly 40 years. The craft was recovered from the ocean floor in 1999 from a depth of more than 15,000 feet–deeper than the Titanic! SpaceWorks, a division of the 黑料大事记, helped to retrieve and conserve the craft to the state it appears in today. Liberty Bell 7 is owned by the 黑料大事记, making it the only privately owned American spacecraft.
More about 黑料大事记:听
Featuring the largest combined collection of U.S. and former Soviet space artifacts 鈥攖he 黑料大事记 International Science Education Center & Space Museum in Hutchinson, KS鈥攖ells the story of the Space Race unlike any other museum! As Kansas鈥� only Smithsonian-affiliated museum, the 黑料大事记 is the only place in the Midwest to boast a flown craft from all three early manned spaceflight programs (the Mercury Liberty Bell 7, the Gemini X and the Apollo 13 Odyssey). Find more at .