Al Ain Museum
Archaeological Site
Rescue Excavation
The Al Ain Museum was built in 1969 as the country’s first museum and is located adjacent to the eastern border of Al Ain Oasis, within the UNESCO World Heritage serial property. An archaeological site was discovered within the museum boundary plot when excavations began to make way for a new expansion. Construction was halted until a rescue excavation/survey could be conducted. Several archaeological findings of historic significance were found at the site including a tomb, aflaj irrigation systems, a water well and more. In addition, it was hypothesised that the archaeological site had historic connections to Al Ain Oasis.
The falaj at Al Ain Museum.
Photogrammetric model of the tomb in Agisoft Metashape.
3-D point cloud cross-section of the site.
3-D model of falaj
Section plan orthophoto of the falaj.
Section orthophotos of the falaj.
As a rescue excavation the work had to be done as fast as possible to identify the main features of the site and their level of heritage value.
It was concluded that each spatial level would be used: landscape (site), the structures found and the elements to assess the heritage values.
It was concluded that as it entailed a rescue excavation, fast tools for recording data should be considered and ground photogrammetry could be used for recording elements of high heritage value. Al levels of detail were used depending on the levels of scale and findings.
36 control points were measured throughout the site with a Leica total station. This data was used to
orient the 3-D scan data.
3-D scanning was conducted with a FARO laser scanner to capture the geometry of the excavation site. A total of 22 scans were performed.
Aerial photography was conducted with an RPA (drone) to capture the data for the site and this took only 45 minutes. It could be repeated while excavations were taken place.
Photographs were taken with a high-quality digital camera for use in the photogrammetric applications. Terrestrial photography was used to capture the details of the trenches, and the process took approximately 20 minutes per trench.
A metrically accurate 3-D point cloud was created for the site using FARO SCENE 3-D scan software in addition to AutoDesk Recap software. Based on the cross-section, it was concluded that there is likely an historic connection between the archaeological site and Al Ain Oasis due to the similarity in ground level between sites. Therefore, further investigation was required.
Photogrammetric models were created for the site, the tomb, the well and the falaj, using Agisoft Metashape photogrammetry software. The accuracy was increased by integrating the control points measured with the total station (blue flags).
Highly detailed and metrically accurate 3-D models of the falaj, well and tomb were developed.
Orthophotos for the site and its elements were developed from the photogrammetric models, an example of which is depicted in Figures 71 and 72. Orthophotos allow for an accurate and highly detailed representation of an element projected onto a given plane, and as such proved a useful tool for the documentation of the rescue excavation’s historic environment.