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Show HN: I 3D scanned the interior of the Great Pyramid at Giza

https://giza.mused.org/en/guided/266/inside-the-great-pyramid

lukehollis · 3 years ago

Hey HN, I 3d scanned the interior of the Great Pyramid / Khufu's pyramid for the Giza Project this summer and just finished the guided version to share. Would love feedback and/or problems you encounter.

I used both a Leica BLK 360 and Matterport Pro 2 to do the scanning and the Matterport SDK for the web viewer. Matterport's web display with Three.js has been the most accessible to a wide audience in the past (previous iterations are in Unity and Unreal, but difficult to download over slower connections).

I've been interviewing social studies teachers around the 6th grade level to create teaching materials as well, and these along with other monuments that I've scanned at Giza are up at https://giza.mused.org/

Cheers from Cairo--and thanks for any feedback.

106 comments

petargyurov · 3 years ago
That is insanely cool.
The dollhouse view is nice. It would be great if you could see a 2D schematic of where you are in the pyramid as you're exploring.
Incredible job!
- citrons · 3 years ago
  Actually liked that it lacked a minimap. Got a better sense of scale. After going trough most of the tunnels and getting stuck and kings chamber there, couldn't crawl back, I zomemed out and was shocked by the scale of the tunnels.
  - lukehollis · 3 years ago
    Thanks to you both for feedback on the minimap--this is one that we've had some requests for but I haven't started on yet.
JohnJamesRambo · 3 years ago
Oh wow, thank you for doing this. I’ll probably never be able to go to the real thing and this has been a fascination since childhood! I’ve got every part memorized from a book I had that had line drawings of the chambers.
massinstall · 3 years ago
I’m curious to see it but FYI it doesn’t work on an iPhone with Firefox (you can never get past the first screen).
- elliotpo · 3 years ago
  i am using it on an iPhone with Firefox right now
- cormullion · 3 years ago
  Works fine on my iPad too...
hatsubishi · 3 years ago
Is it possible to see it in VR?
- seydor · 3 years ago
  Works great with Quest2 , and it s amazing
  - Bad_CRC · 3 years ago
    with the normal browser?
    seydor · 3 years ago
    Yes
    Matterport always worked well for me. Surprisingly i have found that some other startups in the VR real estate space do not work at all with the Quest. It's very odd to build a product that doesnt work with the (by far) most popular headset
sneak · 3 years ago
What is the reason that Mixpanel and GTM are on this page? Is there a specific reason that such invasive tracking is required for an educational resource that does not generate revenue?
- mikebonnell · 3 years ago
  They likely use some of the metrics to continue to get grant funding. You gave us $1m in grant money which we used to produce this webpage which has XXX millions of views. I'm sure other tools would suffice but given it's a project at Harvard, they may have institutional requirements.
easytiger · 3 years ago
Incredible. Going through this gave me similar sentiments to when i first used my school library copy of Encarta 98.
Question: there are some blurred out areas, how come?
e.g. https://imgur.com/a/6Ca5EYG
- mkl · 3 years ago
  I think it's just that the scanner doesn't look straight up.
- jackcarter · 3 years ago
  Camera limitation – it doesn't capture a full sphere. That's exactly the spot where I also noticed it.
  - easytiger · 3 years ago
    ahh, of course. thanks
nimrody · 3 years ago
Beautiful! Thanks for doing this work.
Can you explain a bit on the process that was used to create this? How do you determine your position inside the pyramid precisely?
(would make for a great dungeon-style game :)
- joshvm · 3 years ago
  I've used the BLK 360 before so some comment here. Essentially you scan at various points within the volume of interest, e.g. you walk around, place the scanner, scan, repeat. Each scan takes a few minutes at high angular resolution. Leica provides software called Register (or Cyclone) to match the scans together. Because you generally don't have GPS (the BLK doesn't have a GPS onboar and GPS is anyway much more inaccurate than the scan resolution - metres versus millimetres), the software has to do some kind of feature matching to stitch the scans. You get "links" between adjacent scanning points, and then you do a big optimisation pass to combine the scans.
  This scan matching is by far the most difficult and time consuming bit. Probably OP had to manually align the scans as a first pass and then the software takes over using some algorithm like ICP (iterative closest point).
  This is still only "internal" (i.e. scans are correct relative to each other, but you don't know where the full scan is) and you'd have to combine with an external reference point to geo-locate in the world. Doesn't really matter for this because you're just viewing the pyramid on its own, and you're not overlaying on a map. If you were, then usually what you have to do is take several ground control point (GCP) that are known with high accuracy and then reference that in the scan. You could geo-reference these using an RTK GPS or something, but it's quite difficult to get world coordinates at the millimetre scale and it rarely matters if you're that precise as long as the scan itself is consistent.
  This video from Leica shows the full workflow for a typical use case (scanning a house with indoor and outdoor points). Note the point where they link inside and outside, around 16 mins in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV0LPKowOXU
  - bambax · 3 years ago
    Complete newbie here, but wouldn't it be possible to affix some marks on the walls to help with the stitching afterwards?
    0_____0 · 3 years ago
    When working with LIDAR scanning systems (Total systems etc) that generate a point cloud, this is exactly what you'd do. Affix a target or fiducial (a pattern you can apply to a surface that shows up in the scan, either because it's very reflective or because it has a high contrast pattern on it), and use those as reference points to stitch your clouds together.
    MezzoDelCammin · 3 years ago
    yeah, this is how things used to be done maybe 10y ago. Spheres (good for 360 symmetry) or checkerboard stickers. Problem is, nobody will probably allow You to put stickers onto the interior of the Great Pyramid.
    These days there's a shift towards automatic "stitching" (scan registration) on an accompanying device (tablet or a laptop).
    Here's a demo of Trimble X7 (about 3y old product). Full disclosure - I worked on part of this. Not sure how much I can go in detail, but the video shows a pretty good basic demo of how this works:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PApO60lOhlg&ab_channel=Surve...
  - loufe · 3 years ago
    Awesome, thanks for sharing. We use cyclone for 3D CMS scans of open holes at the mine I work at. Cool to see other use cases. Were you using 3DReshaper before the rebranding?
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for visiting! I'll put together a blog post, but it was similar to the process in my previous work here: https://blog.mused.org/digitizing-luxor-temple-a-virtual-fie...
  Similar except I captured with Matterport Capture and then downloaded and aligned data captured with BLK after in Cyclone so that we'd have both sets.
  - mattfrommars · 3 years ago
    I had spent few weekends in my attempt to automate the process of generating 3D model from pictures. The underlying issue and concern folks have with matterport is their lock in. You are free to upload images to it but not allowed to self host or use their resource to generate the 3D dollhouse.
    The regular way requires to feed the photo into multiple layer of software. Example, generate a point cloud, create a mesh from it, clean up the mesh and port it a Fanwood to be consumed (unity. Unreal, etc) this is all manual.
    I am genuinely curious how the folks at matterport are able to do it with next to no human input after feeding it 2d pictures.
terhechte · 3 years ago
This is really really cool! I enjoyed the explanations as well as the fantastic images
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for visiting!
ryanmarr · 3 years ago
Where are the puzzles that open the door to the linking book?
layer8 · 3 years ago
The page crashes for me on iOS.
- malteof · 3 years ago
  Same! iPhone 12 on latest iOS.
  - ErneX · 3 years ago
    Try tapping the “aA” on the URL bar and disable content blockers.
    layer8 · 3 years ago
    Doesn’t help.
- moffkalast · 3 years ago
  That is so odd, after all Safari is known to have wide support for everything. /s
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for letting me know!
robmerki · 3 years ago
This is absolutely amazing work. I have been searching for something exactly like this for quite some time. I am beyond thrilled that this now exists. THANK YOU.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for visiting! There are a few of these scans in the works that I linked in the comments if they're interesting for Ancient Egypt or elsewhere.
- spaceman_2020 · 3 years ago
  Same feelings. I've been fascinated by ancient Egypt as long as I can remember and this is just about perfect.
ChrisMarshallNY · 3 years ago
That's cool!
Thanks for sharing it!
ErneX · 3 years ago
Crashes on my iPhone 13 Pro running latest iOS version / Safari.
Update: turning off content blockers solves the crashing issue.
sdo72 · 3 years ago
This is very amazing. Thank you very much!
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for visiting & feedback!
runjake · 3 years ago
As many others have commented. My first thought was "Amazing!"
The only thing I encountered is that my mouse wheel scrolling was a bit too touchy and I kept accidentally zooming too much into a 3D scene while scrolling the text.
But that doesn't really matter, because this is amazingly cool.
green-eclipse · 3 years ago
This is amazing! Incredible work! Thank you for doing this project.
FYI I found a typo - the word "cuts":
> It's 750 by 750 feet at the base and is made of over 2 million large, limestone blocks cuts from the surrounding area.
Also - from one of the angles shown, it looks like there's a golf course next to the pyramids? Not at all what I expected!
- groffee · 3 years ago
  There's a pizza hut across the road as well lol
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks! And haha yes, definitely visit Giza someday--it's an incredible place to work.
mkl · 3 years ago
This is great!
I noticed a few apostrophes missing in the captions in "King's Chamber" and "Queen's Chamber".
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for visiting&feedback--will get this fixed!
kodah · 3 years ago
This was a really cool experience. Thanks for putting this together.
_joel · 3 years ago
Awesome work! I've been in there and one of the things missing is the change it humidity and temperature that hits you, maybe on the next revision ;)
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Uff too real. I worked up a sweat on this one
neoneye2 · 3 years ago
Well made. Amazing to explore. Much appreciated.
Tested in my Firefox 106.0.1 on macOS Monterey 12.6, and it works great.
cush · 3 years ago
Aaaaand the site crashes in ios safari
- timbit42 · 3 years ago
  That doesn't mean there is a problem with the website.
cryptozeus · 3 years ago
I an sure its good, doesn’t work on safari on ios 16
- zach_garwood · 3 years ago
  That sounds like an Apple problem. Works perfectly on Firefox on Android, not to mention Chromium on Linux.
soared · 3 years ago
Incredible! I was under the impression there were tons of passages and chambers that were intricate, thank you for teaching me otherwise!
tmilard · 3 years ago
It's nice. Maybe the best matterport's example I have seen so far... The 3D in the transitions [of two 360 photos] are really good and the pixel quality is great.
But still... The very limited part of Matterport is that it is "mostly" a series of 360 photos.
Now, because a pyramid is mainly a long corridor, you do not see too much those limitations.
So great.
Thierry, developper of https://free-visit.net/
- arnaudsm · 3 years ago
  It's not only 2D 360, there's full 3D photogrammetry. Click on the dollhouse button on the bottom left.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  I hear you--I think this is limitation is useful for bandwidth/loading time constraints.
HPsquared · 3 years ago
Semi-related, the Great Pyramid was also scanned using muon radiography, by which a "big void" was discovered [0]. Muons can penetrate through a lot of material, so they can see through very large, thick things like the pyramids.
Muon tomography was also used to scan the Fukushima reactors [1] and see where the fuel ended up.
[0] https://arxiv.org/pdf/1711.01576.pdf [1] https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS-Muons-suggest-location...
- anshumankmr · 3 years ago
  A void? Is it another chamber? I have so many questions. Though from the images, it doesn't seem like a chamber. https://www.livescience.com/scan-great-pyramid-of-giza
  - klausjensen · 3 years ago
    I bet it's the aliens' server-room.
    simonh · 3 years ago
    Cryopod/Egg chamber.
    anshumankmr · 3 years ago
    Is there any non invasive way to see the interior of the chamber? I hope we are aren't gonna leave it be.
    LeifCarrotson · 3 years ago
    To whom do you refer to with "we"?
    I hope we leave it be until we develop the tech to measure it non-invasively.
    The tech available to Napoleon's Egyptologists or the British in the 1800s would not have allowed him to do it. They would have picked up anything they could carry and brought it back to Room 4 in the British Museum. Our tech in 2022 does not currently allow us to see the interior of the chamber more precisely than "there's a void there."
    It's likely to not have been breached for millenia, it would be positively criminal to drill to it.
    I say wait a couple hundred years until some future archaeologist will have a neutrino or muon scanner with sufficient resolution to read the hieroglyphics. It'll keep.
    anshumankmr · 3 years ago
    By "we", I meant society and the authorities/academics who are researching this.
    I don't there is a way in there without some amount of drilling. I was personally thinking of a fibre optic camera that could be somehow sent in there but there would be still some kind of damage caused to the Pyramid, though I am no expert on this topic at all.
    kridsdale2 · 3 years ago
    In a few hundred years geopolitical balances could be wildly different than today: Egypt could somehow come to dominate as a new global empire with Cairo as it's capital, opening it to the vulnerability of a nuclear attack, removing the pyramids before we ever get to develop the scanning technology.
    mwint · 3 years ago
    I wonder… would a nuclear attack wipe out the pyramids? Not one directly on them, but centered on the nearby city?
    mlsu · 3 years ago
    Now you have me thinking.
    What if we nuked the pyramids? I'm not saying we should, but I am saying like, you know, maybe.
    Nahhhh, we would never do something like that. It would be a travesty.
    But like, maybe, we could just like, ynkow, just drop 1 nuke on the pyramids. Just as like, a little thing.
    No, no way would we do that. Neeeever would we do that.
    But just 1 nuke? right on top? That would be, that would be something. It would be interesting. I mean the pyramid is so symmetric. It's one of those things with a mythical power. Same thing with a fission weapon! Mystical power. It would take just 1 nuke going off right on top of the pyramids for like -- something crazy might happen.
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Giant alien robots might wrestle each other while clambering around on it. It has happened before.
    (Cf. "Transformers 2")
    jakeinspace · 3 years ago
    The Giza complex is right next to Cairo. Actually, it might be within the city limits. Far enough from the downtown core to survive a single moderate nuclear blast I would think.
    LeifCarrotson · 3 years ago
    While the postcards show the pyramids standing in the desert, the city comes to within ~300m of the base. Downtown is only 10km from the pyramids.
    https://i.imgur.com/eKq7Zcz.jpg
  - david927 · 3 years ago
    A void. It looks uneven, not like a chamber, but quite large.
    zikduruqe · 3 years ago
    Stone contractor promised to deliver 1000 blocks, only installed 753 blocks. Pocketed the difference.
    GuB-42 · 3 years ago
    That contractor must have had really big pockets...
    zikduruqe · 3 years ago
    Thanks Dad.
    kragen · 3 years ago
    That's what I think whenever I play Minetest. My inventory can fit 40 stacks of 99 cubic meters of stone: 3960 cubic meters, about 10000 tonnes. I guess Sam's backpack is bigger on the inside than the outside...
    canadianfella · 3 years ago
    What is Minetest?
    codetrotter · 3 years ago
    Minetest is an open source voxel game engine. Fundamentally it is very similar to Minecraft.
    https://www.minetest.net/
    kragen · 3 years ago
    Relevantly, not only can you build 3-D models of pyramids in it, there's even a mod for it that generates them at random: https://content.minetest.net/packages/Wuzzy/tsm_pyramids/
    adrianmonk · 3 years ago
    It was the world's first pyramid scheme.
- fipar · 3 years ago
  Thanks for those links.
  This virtual visit mentions that, because it shows a similar experiment being done now (I suppose they're trying to find if there are more voids that could be hidden chambers)
- spullara · 3 years ago
  Wild. I was speculating about this in 2003 on my blog. Very interesting news.
  https://javarants.com/deconstructing-the-pyramids-76081876b3...
  - BossingAround · 3 years ago
    I thought this was going to be a conspiracy theory, but it was an interesting read about a simple (yet intriguing) idea. Thank you for sharing.
    As a side note, what's the blog architecture? I seem to remember seeing an XML error when I hit a link that does not exist (like at [1]) but I can't remember where :).
    [1] https://javarants.com/hn-error
    spullara · 3 years ago
    Just Cloudfront and an S3 bucket.
- zppln · 3 years ago
  Looks like that gear is still there (in the bedrock chamber) scanning. The 3D tour mentions it.
- a9h74j · 3 years ago
  Pessimism: We wonder how these pyramids were build thousands of years ago, and thousands of years from now, people will wonder what muons and such, which some later mythology refers to, might have been.
- jaclaz · 3 years ago
  As well loosely related, it is a few years that there are projects to use muograpgy to better undertstand how the dome of the Duomo in Florence was built by Brunelleschi:
  https://bldgblog.com/2022/09/
  maybe they will start this year.
andybak · 3 years ago
Thank you.
Is the scan data available and if so - under what licence?
cjauvin · 3 years ago
Many years ago I had the chance to visit the Pyramid of Giza but when it was time to go inside it, I've been instantly stopped by my visualization of how I would feel in this tight and claustrophobic space (almost crouching in some places, I've been told), especially if there are many people at the same time, and you cannot easily move.. So I'm very glad to be able to finally see it with such an amazing technology, thanks!
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks so much for this feedback—providing accessibility for these spaces is a huge concern for our future work.
fipar · 3 years ago
This is amazing, thanks for sharing!
sizzzzlerz · 3 years ago
Such a small volume of rooms and tunnels compared to the volume of the pyramid itself. The labor required is unimaginable.
site-packages1 · 3 years ago
I am amazed by this. I’ve been playing with a 3D scanning app on iPhone as a total amateur and totally new to the mode of collection and it truly produces amazing results with only iPhone lidar.
Scaniverse if you’re curious.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Very cool, I know Scaniverse! I think the lower bar to entry for digitization has already been transformative for preservation, conservation, and site education at heritage sites like these.
- ridgeguy · 3 years ago
  The new version claims not to even need the LIDAR.
rqtwteye · 3 years ago
Nice! I was just there last week. Are there any efforts to scan the ground in places like Saqqara? It seems there is still a ton of stuff left in the ground.
After seeing the pyramids and Luxor I am amazed at the scale and precision the Egyptians were building such a long time ago. Truly impressive.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  That's awesome! I wonder if we crossed paths. Are you still in Eg? I've worked with projects at Saqqara and Luxor too, some of it is public and being used for education if it's interesting:
  Luxor Temple: https://luxortemple.mused.org/en/guided/178/luxor-temple
MichaelZuo · 3 years ago
Great work, though the images of the entrance seems to be split into hundreds of tiny pieces, what's up with that?
dekhn · 3 years ago
Originally, the exterior of the pyramid was covered in polished limestone (casement) that has since fallen off/been removed. Apparently you would have been able to see them from many miles off as incredibly bright triangles.
- HPsquared · 3 years ago
  I wonder if they'll ever be restored.
  - TanguyN · 3 years ago
    Probably not as that would be quite a... pharaonic task.
    dekhn · 3 years ago
    More importantly, the areas are preserved now, not being restored to their former glory. Many of the stones were carted off and used in other buildings, with the rest sitting at the base of the pyramid.
sergiotapia · 3 years ago
This is incredible thank you so much for sharing this!
Something terrifying about how deep underground you go and then you reach a pitch black hole and there's still more to go. Wow!
How was it inside? Is it very silent? I imagine it gives off very weird energy.
me_bx · 3 years ago
Looks pretty cool.
Feedback about the 3D navigation experience:
* very laggy on Firefox android, on a decent device * very laggy on Firefox linux (Intel graphics) * smooth on Chromium with the same linux (Intel graphics)
- tetris11 · 3 years ago
  smooth on Firefox in Linux for me, Intel graphics
acdanger · 3 years ago
Amazing work. I'm also interested in digitizing artifacts and historic places, but haven't been able to figure out how to go about getting a project off the ground.
Any chance you'd do a write up explaining how you were able to get this project set up? I'm more interested in the logistics and the red-tape you had to go through in order to get access to do the scans. I see you've got a business setup around it as well, are you hiring? The jobs page leads to the blog right now.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks, and yes, I haven't blogged about this yet but will. It's really important that the local teams that make these scans happen are featured prominently. For similar process here's the blog that I wrote about working at Luxor Temple with the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the University of Chicago: https://blog.mused.org/digitizing-luxor-temple-a-virtual-fie...
  Drop me a line! I'd love to chat--I'm at luke@mused.org
onemoresoop · 3 years ago
This is very insightful. Thank you for all your work!!
blobbers · 3 years ago
AMAZING! Will try it out on a headset, and show it to kids who have been asking mummy questions.
Thank you so much!
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for trying it out! Would love feedback about how everything works in the headset
whoopdedo · 3 years ago
Someone lost their hat to the right of the entrance.
I was clicking around for quite a while before I realized I could use WASD+arrows.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Ah! I think that might've been one of the guard's. I love that Matterport added the WASD+Arrows.
lukehollis · 3 years ago
Thanks for the feedback! Didn't know if people would like this. If this is interesting, and you'd like to learn more about Ancient Egypt, here are a few more sites that I've worked at:
Luxor Temple: https://luxortemple.mused.org/en/guided/178/luxor-temple Tomb of Queen Meresankh III at Giza: https://giza.mused.org/en/guided/4/tomb-of-queen-meresankh-i...
I've mostly been working around the Mediterranean, Central America, and Eastern Asia. I'll publish articles on our blog as the next come out in the future https://blog.mused.org/
- ndr · 3 years ago
  I'm going on a tour in Luxor & other places in Egypt tomorrow. This amazing, thank you!
  - lukehollis · 3 years ago
    Thanks for visiting! Let me know if you have any feedback or questions
  - hi · 3 years ago
    @ndr I was just there earlier this year and would like to recommend a guide named Mohamed [redacted] to you (and anyone else who is visiting that area) who we met there and spent two days with in Luxor (Karnak & Luxor Temple) and driving down to Aswan (via Esna, Al Sharawna, El Kab and Edfu) from Luxor. Mobile: [redacted]
    zacharycohn · 3 years ago
    maybe don't post someone's phone number on the public internet without permission?
    atdrummond · 3 years ago
    This guide advertises his number for this purpose, as do most of the local guides. No worse than it being posted on Yelp, LonelyPlanet, etc.
    ygjb · 3 years ago
    Then link to the advertisement or webpage?
    alpha_squared · 3 years ago
    I was just there a couple weeks ago and, while Mohamed is an extremely common name, chances are it was the same Mohamed that was our tour guide as well. He's honestly phenomenal and (now) a good friend who I keep in touch with regularly.
- jjallen · 3 years ago
  By "worked at", what exactly do you mean?
  - lukehollis · 3 years ago
    I mean a site where I partnered with a local team and sometimes international partners to complete laser scanning and then built virtual tour with the Matterport SDK.
- Abundnce10 · 3 years ago
  I loved the tour! You did an amazing job.
  I thought I should pass along that I found a misspelling. You wrote "sarcophaus" instead of "sarcophagus" in the text within the King's Chamber.
  - lukehollis · 3 years ago
    Thanks for pointing this out!
  - pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Properly, "box". There is no evidence a body was ever in it.
    ant6n · 3 years ago
    Is a car only a car once somebody drives it?
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Does a thing sorta car-shaped without wheels count as a car? This thing never even had a lid. (You could call it a car, I guess... Rectangular, and you can sit in it.)
    Many people hope a legitimate sarcophagus, with an actual mummy in, might yet be found.
    pmontra · 3 years ago
    At which point of building a car separate parts become a car? And during maintenance (lets say engine replacement) is a car still a car? I'd say it is if meant to be used as a car again.
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Right. So, is a stone box in a pyramid chamber that there is no evidence ever held a corpse, or even had a lid, and certainly will not have a corpse in the future, really a sarcophagus? It seems to depend on overconfident assumptions.
    Given their experience, a decoy that looks like a looted tomb would just be good planning.
    jaza · 3 years ago
    It quacks like a sarcophagus.
    wl · 3 years ago
    It looks like all the other sarcophagi found in other Old Kingdom tombs. So no, "box" isn't specific enough.
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    "Other"? But is it really a tomb at all?
    Wasn't the word "cenotaph" invented for things like it?
    wl · 3 years ago
    Of course it's a tomb. You have the mortuary temple out in front of it, with texts telling you exactly what it is. It fits in stylistically with mastabas, step pyramids, and true pyramids that come before and after that are unquestionably tombs.
    Old Kingdom mummies don't tend to survive, probably due to a combination of their extreme age, the still-developing mummification process, how uncommon mummification was in that period, and that mummified bodies were targets for looting given the precious objects that could be found on them and in their wrappings. That a sarcophagus is empty that has been open since time immemorial in a tomb that has been known to be looted in antiquity is utterly unsurprising.
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Tomb robbers have not generally been given to making off with sarcophagus lids.
    wl · 3 years ago
    Tomb robbers are given to smashing anything that gets in their way.
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    Smashing is one thing, carting off is wholly another.
    hasmanean · 3 years ago
    Smart tomb robbers would have themselves buried in the tomb along with the king and all his gold, ostensibly to help him in the afterlife. Then they would escape out the back door.
    Have they ever found any skeletons of these royal helpers inside any tomb?
    pencilguin · 3 years ago
    It used to be common to execute retainers to help out the king or queen in the afterlife. Sometimes just a few, sometime hundreds. Supposedly everybody who worked on Genghis Khan's tomb was executed, along with his entire funeral procession, and all their executioners, so nobody would know where it was. It was finally found, just recently.
    I recall a story where an Egyptian priest tossed the royal mummy in the Nile and committed suicide in the pharaoh's tomb, thinking himself clever for it.
- qwertox · 3 years ago
  When I was in school, I visited my granddad during summer holidays. This was right before I would have history class for the first time at school, and my granddad showed me a book my dad gave him as a present, which was about the Pyramids in Egypt. I was fascinated by the book, and got to know that this is what history is about, so I got really excited.
  Holiday was over, school began, first hour of history class began. New book, looked at it, I think the first two pages were on Egypt. The topic took less than a class. I felt like "Wait, we can't go on, there's so much to learn about this" and immediately got disillusioned with history class.
  The site is awesome, it is what those first history classes should have been. It almost feels like you're there, thanks to the high resolution textures. And the guided tour feels so personal, as if there's someone with you at your site showing you the place. It really is a gift.
  Thank you.
  - UberFly · 3 years ago
    Beautifully written comment.
  - a9h74j · 3 years ago
    You might find some tiny encouragement seeing E.D. Hirsch's "Core Knowledge" curriculum efforts.[1] I don't see it on the reference page, but I have seen accounts of first-graders really taking to culture-and-civilization (and picture book) focussed units around "Ancient Egypt" etc.
    IIRC, E.D. Hirsch, in his book Cultural Literacy, related a conversation with educators. He offerred that children should be able to name and identify Earth's continents. As he reports it, the reply as if with disbelief was "Why would anyone need to know that."
    [1] https://www.coreknowledge.org/curriculum/history-geography/
- antman · 3 years ago
  Ok the pyramids are great, but it really doesn't compare with the fantastic job you've done on Luxor. I spent a whole day there, I think I will spent a couple more with this now. If this is compatible with Quest glasses I will buy them...
- TeeMassive · 3 years ago
  Do you use photogrametry or do you use professional 3D scanners?
  - lukehollis · 3 years ago
    For this scan specifically, I used a Leica BLK 360 and Matterport Pro 2 Laser scanner and took photogrammetry photos as well. In the presentation layer using the Matterport SDK, only the laser scan data is displayed.
mortenjorck · 3 years ago
Incredible work bringing so many moving parts together to make such a seamless, immersive experience. Online museums have been an aspiration since the early days of the web, and this exhibit sets a new bar.
One slight hiccup I noticed: The guided tour frequently clips through the geometry, which breaks the immersion a bit. I don't know if the Matterport SDK has any facilities for following paths rather than a straight line when automatically navigating, but if it's possible, it would be a nice addition.
- kridsdale2 · 3 years ago
  And if it doesn't, it's a request they should be happy to take on for academic work like this.
  They should recognize they have a big opportunity for great PR gains by officially supporting this kind of project, which could feed back to their primary real estate based business.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for the feedback—this is partly due to the way I built the scan tour points. Can revise in the future.
- thomasahle · 3 years ago
  What system are you on? With Chrome 106 on a 2019 Mac Book Pro the website is completely unusable at 1 frame per 2 seconds...
  - anthk · 3 years ago
    Type in about:flags in the Chrome URL bar.
    Search for "Override software rendering list". Set it to "Enable". Restart Chrome.
ibdf · 3 years ago
I'm impressed with the sharpness and the amount of detail you captured and the web tour transitions are super smooth too. Great work.
spaceman_2020 · 3 years ago
This is one of the best things I've seen online in years. Thank you so much!
jstanley · 3 years ago
This is superb! Great work, a really fascinating tour, thanks so much for doing this & for sharing.
trhoad · 3 years ago
If you open the image modals, and then click next, I see a blurred screen and cannot progress forward/back.
react-dom.production.min.js:209 TypeError: Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'indexOf') at _l.render (ModalImage.tsx:79:21)
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks! Will get a fix out for this
phasers · 3 years ago
This gave my PC a BSOD :(
Details: Windows 10, Firefox
Stop Code - DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL
What Failed - nvlddmkm.sys
- kridsdale2 · 3 years ago
  Update your nvidia graphics driver.
nidnogg · 3 years ago
This is very solid work, really exciting to get this perspective. As someone who's never left his home country and is often thinking of deserts every now and then, it's really inspiring stuff to see.
A very slight hiccup - I couldn't find a way to disable the "You're now standing on the blocks [...]" tooltip on Firefox. It's a litle big and immersion breaking - if it'd be shown once that'd be more fitting. While this could be fixed via console, I think it's something to consider.
divbzero · 3 years ago
If we wanted to build a monument today that would last 4000+ years, how would we do it? Is a large pile of carefully placed rocks still one of the best ways?
- jastanton · 3 years ago
  Here is one called the 10,000 year clock that is currently under construction (by Jeff Bezos). You can read about it here: https://www.10000yearclock.net/learnmore.html
guynamedloren · 3 years ago
Mind blowing. Really well done!
erickhill · 3 years ago
Very cool. I wish there was a 2D "dungeon crawler" map overlay of some kind so I could see where I am and what direction I'm facing as I progress into the structure. I start to lose my bearings.
I was fortunate to go inside the pyramid as a child in 1980 when I was 9. I remember it feeling quite claustrophobic at the time, and I wasn't exactly big. Once inside you quickly lose the scale of the thing (or at least I did).
- anthk · 3 years ago
  I want the reverse. Dungeons generated a la street view for a Nethack ascii map instead of tiles. As the game it's turn based, it would be usable after all even underpowered machines.
  - erickhill · 3 years ago
    Hah! That would be pretty interesting.
    I guess the inbetween would be DungeonHack...
    Be pretty wild to have a 3D interactive Rogue based on GeoGuessr realism.
    anthk · 3 years ago
    Like Noegnud but photorealistic:
    https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Noegnud
    https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Noegnud.jpg
    With a Street View design (with overlapping monsters/object per "tile", nothing too complex for a shader), the game would be incredible nice for newcomers. And, yes, I prefer ASCII/UTF8.
daggersandscars · 3 years ago
If you liked this, you may be interested in the Monte Albán Virtual Reality Laboratory (MAVRL) project. (https://montealban.oucreate.com/virtual-reality-2/). The site was scanned and put in Unity, allowing them to experiment with different positions of the sun, etc.
From the site:
In the summer of 2017, a DJI Phantom 4 Pro+ drone was used to take over 15,000 photos of the Main Plaza of Monte Albán. These photos were processed using Agisoft PhotoScan Professional software to digitally reconstruct the Main Plaza and surrounding Architecture producing a photorealistic 3D representation, and other highly accurate maps for archaeological study. A year later, Dr. Alex Elvis Badillo and Dr. Marc N. Levine developed the project MARVL to push the digital data captured in 2017 further beyond mere maps and 3D renderings.
kovek · 3 years ago
I really like the tool. However, I just hit an issue... Somehow, I was dragging in the view, and it did a text select on the whole view. Now, everything is highlighted blue as if I selected it, and I don't know how to de-select it.
- kridsdale2 · 3 years ago
  That sounds more like a browser issue.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for the feedback--and I'll test and try to replicate.
- gunapologist99 · 3 years ago
  Usually you can single-click on any non-link text (which admittedly can be hard to find in an SPA!) to un-highlight the selected text.
smusamashah · 3 years ago
You should try processing your photo dataset with a NERF based tool. They are much better at rebuilding the 3D structure from set of images.
EDIT: There is this for example https://github.com/nerfstudio-project/nerfstudio
- kridsdale2 · 3 years ago
  I want the future version of Google Earth or whatever to be the whole globe at a pixel resolution with this kind of technology.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks so much—I’ll try this out!
- yaddaor · 3 years ago
  That's inventing details that don't exist in the data though, correct?
  - smusamashah · 3 years ago
    Don't think so. Pictures have to be taken from multiple angles with overlaps so that summing them up contain the whole thing.
heavyheavy · 3 years ago
This has to be one of the most incredible things i have even seen. Thank you so much for this experience.
whycombinetor · 3 years ago
This is really cool. Free explore is really immersive. The guided tour would be better if the movement was on rails instead of glitching through walls though.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for the feedback—I’ll adjust the tour points and transitions in the future to try to prevent this.
dandigangi · 3 years ago
This is so cool. I went to the pyramids last Xmas for the firs time. Great project. Sincerely.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Cheers and thanks for checking it out. I’m super curious: how does the virtual tour compare to your experience on site?
  - dandigangi · 3 years ago
    Very good! I'll never forget climbing those stairs, the tunnels, angles, etc. It was very interesting. No way someone with any bit of claustrophobia is getting up there. It was a little underwhelming getting to the tomb but still cool none the less. Experience you did here felt on point.
    I almost gave my ticket to a guy faking working there. Haha
bragr · 3 years ago
This appears not to work under Brave due to a strict CORS policy. The call to https://static.matterport.com/geoip/ is throwing a MissingAllowOriginHeader.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks for letting me know—I use Brave also but must have it configured differently. Will test in the future.
ugh123 · 3 years ago
>"The ancient historians, like Herodotos, that recorded Khufu, mention that he was a fierce and stern ruler."
>"These accounts are from over 2,000 years after Khufu lived, however, so we might not be able to believe them."
I thought that second sentence was an unnecessary take.
- motoxpro · 3 years ago
  I thought it provided context for the first sentence. I was glad it was there.
- yamtaddle · 3 years ago
  A lot of readers probably don't have a rough idea of how old many of the major Ancient Egyptian monumental works were by the time the Greek Classical period began and we started getting a substantial amount of surviving Western literature outside monumental inscriptions and tax records and stuff like that.
sandreas · 3 years ago
This is just awesome... Thank you!
JofArnold · 3 years ago
Incredible. Thank you so much for that. What an incredible project and one I think will make a huge impact for years.
Question. I noticed a very unusual experience I've not felt before in a 3D world; I started to feel claustrophobic - so much so I had to close the tab. I'm curious; has anyone else experienced the same do you know? If so, any ideas why it should be so powerful a feeling in this particular case?
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  That’s super interesting—thanks for the feedback. I’m really curious if others have felt this also.
  - Ensorceled · 3 years ago
    Definitely count at least one more person experiencing claustrophobia ...
  - goldthwait · 3 years ago
    Yes! I felt the same and I was going to write a separate comment on that before I found this conversation. I don't know how you managed to crawl(?) through all those tunnels but it just made me sick following through the guided tour. Besides this personal note, I think this is an amazing work! Very informative, the transitions are well-thought and smooth. Thank you for sharing it with us.
    lukehollis · 3 years ago
    Thanks so much for visiting and the feedback. Yep, I was crawling on hands and knees through the horizontal passageways--especially getting to the Subterranean Chamber was tight. After crawling down the horizontal passage, I was accidentally locked in the Queens Chamber for about an half an hour before the guards came and let me out.
    Maybe we should have a content warning on the tour somewhere and for those in the future that have tunnel systems / confined spaces.. I'm sorry for everyone that felt claustrophobic during this tour!
- Ensorceled · 3 years ago
  I think it's the combination of "movement" and very high res pictures.
  Once you start moving into the tunnel you really get the feeling you are there.
  Also the rig might have been set at 6' (that's matterport's default recommendation, or at least it was) so you really feel the low ceilings.
  - JofArnold · 3 years ago
    I think you're right about that. The guided tour was fine but navigating to the top myself was where I got the reaction. I definitely experienced the height.
- gigaflop · 3 years ago
  I'm a tall guy, and started feeling claustrophobic when I saw what some of the tunnel entrances looked like. I never used the measurement tool to verify, but they looked like they'd have made me prefer crawling instead of crouching.
  Something that confirmed my suspicion: In the King's chamber, 'stand' next to the sarcophagus, and look behind you. I won't explain further.
  - coldcode · 3 years ago
    I am not normally claustrophobic, but being tall and some of these shafts are very low, I would be unlikely to make it very far before abandoning the attempt. I am glad I saw this though, I can at least do it remotely.
    How anyone did this originally and to rob the place, is amazing.
  - EricDeb · 3 years ago
    I went there and yes had to awkwardly crouch/walk up that whole thing.
- nevster · 3 years ago
  In person those tunnels are quite claustrophobic. You have to bend over quite a bit and at the same time you're thinking that there's thousands of tons of rock above you.
  Quite a few people in my tour group turned back because they couldn't handle it.
  Visited in 1995.
c7DJTLrn · 3 years ago
Egyptology is so fascinating. When I was in primary school, the teacher did a really special lesson I'll never forget. The classroom was decorated like a tomb - the windows were blacked out and the tables were arranged in a way that we had to crawl in to start the lesson. We went through puzzles and explored pyramids on the projector. When some pupils were distracted by the table tunnel, the teacher stayed in the character of an archeologist and warned them to keep away for the tunnel may collapse at any moment. Now that's teaching.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Sounds like a great teacher! Not in Egypt but elsewhere a tunnel collapsed on me + 4 really incredible people on site helping with the scan. We dug ourselves out with our hands. Your teacher knew the real deal.
  - c7DJTLrn · 3 years ago
    She was very good at her job.
    Glad you made it out, wow. What a story.
alberth · 3 years ago
My takeaways:
- From the entrance, all the way to the Grand Gallery ... it doesn't not feel like that was an intended entrance path. It gives the vibe of an auxiliary tunnel (not main path).
- It's extremely "industrial". For what historians claim to be a monument, there's not a single hieroglyphic that I saw. It was the opposite of being ornate or lavish.
- There's numerous deep groves intended to guide something large carved into the granite in many of the larger spaces (like immediately outside the Kings Chambers). Similar to what you'd find in a Steel Mill to guide large hot containers. It appears as if this was a structure used to manufacturer something (not a tomb of a pharaoh). See previous point.
Note: I'm not trying to spread rumors or create speculation. Just my observations from viewing this incredible 3D scan (much appreciation to the author for capturing this incredible marvel)
- mdswanson · 3 years ago
  It says "We're entering today through a Robber's Tunnel, a tunnel that some believe was created in 820 AD by Caliph al-Ma'mun, when he was trying to break into the pyramid."
  - alberth · 3 years ago
    Dumb question: if this is the robbers tunnel - why haven’t modern day archeologist excavated the main pyramid entrance?
    hfo · 3 years ago
    They have. It's a few levels higher. The robbers tunnel is easier to reach from the ground, so it became the main entrance for visitors for centuries now.
    thrdbndndn · 3 years ago
    Is the main entrance actually opened/digged through? (I know it's not really needed, just curious).
    It is not very clear from the picture outside. You can have a glance of the other side (as part of Descending Passage) as well in OP's tour, but again not clear, the view is blocked by something there.
- nosianu · 3 years ago
  > it doesn't not feel like that was an intended entrance path
  The accompanying text says the entrance was made by robbers forcefully breaking through some random section because they did not find the true entrance. So they dug until they hit the existing tunnels.
  - Razengan · 3 years ago
    Damn even after thousands of years the pyramids keep getting interesting!
  - gehwartzen · 3 years ago
    My first reaction was one of astonishment that the robbers tunnel is so close to the actual entrance and tunnel. If just some random location was chosen that was quite lucky. After some googling I guess there's still a lot of uncertainty.
    Here's an interesting article:
    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/inside-the-great-pyram...
  - hfo · 3 years ago
    The floor of the entrance is exactly at the right height, a little to the right of a crucial element to get access to the upper chambers: The crossing between the ascending and descending passage. This is where the ascending passage was blocked - you can see one of the large granite blocks still in place today. The (presumably) robbers goal was to get behind those granite blocks. This passage leads straight on to the crossing, then taking a sharp left turn just right behind the blocking. Whoever built this path must have known where it should lead to. That makes the story that Al Mamun did it so unlikely. He might have enhanced an existing tunnel, but there is no conceivable reason why he should have built it in the first place. Here is a rough illustration, the dark brown being the robbers tunnel: http://www.benben.de/Architektur/Cheops/Grafik/Mamun3.jpg
- LiamPa · 3 years ago
  It’s a power station, have a read of ‘The Giza Power Plant’
  - elktea · 3 years ago
    I enjoy reading far out theories like these. I recently[1] saw one that claimed all the weird tunnels that terminate just short of the outside resemble wave guides, the big tunnel with the grooves was a low pass filter and the whole structure was basically a giant antenna
    Any electrical engineers around feel like modelling it seeing how true it is?
    [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yb0zGX2gJIY
    wl · 3 years ago
    You wouldn't make an inverted-inverted-V antenna out of waveguide. The whole point of waveguide is to be a transmission line, not a radiating element. Even if we ignore that, a dipole antenna of those dimensions is two orders of magnitude larger than what you'd use to radiate on the hydrogen line.
- hfo · 3 years ago
  > For what historians claim to be a monument, there's not a single hieroglyphic that I saw.
  It's the pyramid of Khufu, 2nd king of the 4th dynasty. None of the pyramids of the 4th dynasty have hieroglyphs. That slowly came into fashion in the 5th (or 6th? Too lazy to check) dynasty. If you measure ancient egypt from the 1st dynasty to Cleopatra, you come up with roughly 3000 years. This pyramid was built around the year 500 on that scale. There is not much writing left at all from that period. The palermo stone being one example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palermo_Stone The most exiting recent find is the diary of Merer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diary_of_Merer It seems he was a middle manager in transporting stones to this, Khufus pyramid, which makes his writings the closest you can get to an eye witness account of the construction.
- salty_biscuits · 3 years ago
  It's really old and has a lot of history post ancient Egypt a fair bit of it abusive, e.g. it looks like the sphinx's nose was chiselled off (not shot off with a cannon by Napoleon in the myth). People used to climb all over the great pyramid, etc. It's cool to go to the more recently discovered places like the valley of the queens to see the paint and hieroglyphics. All the stuff near Cairo has had more human interaction.
- wl · 3 years ago
  Understand that the inside of pyramids were supposed to be sealed up for eternity, not visited by people. Visitors would instead go to the mortuary temples in front of the pyramids, which indeed had ornate interiors and plenty of hieroglyphs. With the fifth dynasty pyramid of Unas, parts of what was presumably a funeral liturgy began to be inscribed on the inside of tombs for the benefit of the dead. This idea that these early, looted (and thus, empty) pyramids aren't tombs because they don't have writings inside is as silly as objecting that modern yet-to-be-filled burial vaults aren't burial vaults because they don't contain excerpts from the funeral liturgy from the Book of Common prayer on the inside. The writings on the outside tell you exactly what they are.
thrdbndndn · 3 years ago
This is incredible. The image quality is also super high.
Just a quick question out of curiosity: how easy is it to get access of it? Or maybe you worked/collaborated with other orgs to makes it easier?
Keyframe · 3 years ago
Fantastic! Thanks for this. Do you plan to open the raw data you collected for others to tinker with it?
mseepgood · 3 years ago
I expected ornaments, wall paintings, hieroglyphics - at least in the burial chamber - but nothing. Just a plain sarcophagus.
amatecha · 3 years ago
Clicking "Explore" button does nothing for me -- what is it supposed to do?
When I load the page I can see the following JS error in the console:
Uncaught TypeError: o is undefined <anonymous> AbstractPlugin.js:12
Running Firefox latest Win10, "strict" Browser Privacy settings.
- akiselev · 3 years ago
  It looks like I have a related failure. Latest iOS Safari with DNS level adblocking.
Ensorceled · 3 years ago
Serious claustrophobia on a 4k monitor, had a reduce the window size.
Very awesome.
throwaway094534 · 3 years ago
This is so neat! I was curious about the graffiti that could be seen, and wondered at what periods it was accessible, and to what degree.
My only comments: - we clip through the walls sometimes - I would have liked to travel a little more slowly sometimes - some kind of indication of horizon (like airplane attitude guage to get a sense of how steeply we are descending?
flyosity · 3 years ago
This is truly incredible, I can't wait to show this to my kids after school. Thank you so much for doing this work.
- UberFly · 3 years ago
  Agreed. My only comment is just how cool this is. Wow.
pencilguin · 3 years ago
The King's Chamber measures 10x20x10 cubits, as precisely as Egyptians could cut stone, providing us a very precise measure of the builders' cubit. By outstanding coincidence, the chamber is exactly 5pi/3 meters wide. (This also equals 2phi² meters.)
The diagonal from corner to opposite corner is 10+sqrt(2) meters, to three places.
The ancient Egyptians would have been awed by such coincidences. Us, not so much.
I don't know of anyplace where ancient Egyptians demonstrated knowledge of phi, which has the wondrous properties that 1/phi+1=phi=phi²-1. They could of course measure pi as precisely as they liked just by tracing a big circle.
Some people make a big deal about the perimeter of its base matching its height times 2pi, and about ratios of these dimensions to the sizes of the Earth, Moon, and Sun. Khafre's is a bit smaller, so its ratios would be off.
imagineerschool · 3 years ago
The 'mystery' chamber in the base of the Great Pyramid is a functioning pulse pump - this researcher measured it and built a scale replica: https://sentinelkennels.com/Research_Article_V41.html
The mechanisms of the Great Pyramid can only be conjectured about in the present day because of the extensive damage to the structure, but it's pretty clear it served /some/ purpose.
- hfo · 3 years ago
  > but it's pretty clear it served /some/ purpose.
  One would think the sarcophagus in the center would give away what that purpose could have been...
GNOMES · 3 years ago
Site seems based on selling these custom tours, is there a link to all of the existing (free) ones?
Balgair · 3 years ago
Wow! Just wow! I really hope to see it in person now!
Quick question: Do you wear the Indiana Jones hat while scanning? Because I know I couldn't pass up that chance.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  I listen to the Pyramid Song by Radiohead on headphones :) couldn’t pass up either.
dwringer · 3 years ago
This is absolutely fantastic, the only thing I note with some sadness is that the well shaft leading down from the entrance tunnel of the Queen's Chamber is not mapped. The grated-off hole leading down into it is visible and the model does show a cavity there, but there is also a chamber (called the "Grotto" in old diagrams) partway down which is said to have been at the top of the limestone mound on which the pyramid is built. Was it not permitted to access this area?
- hfo · 3 years ago
  EDIT: I was wrong, it's all there. Amazing!
  Also missing: The horizontal passage, the queens chamber, the descending passage, the lower chamber and the passage to the relieving chambers of the kings chamber. They're all not accessible for tourists. The tour covers what you would see as a normal visitor (not ie an archeologist with special permission).
  - dwringer · 3 years ago
    That's not entirely true - both the queen's chamber as well as the descending passage are indeed mapped (though the very upper part of the descending passage is blocked). There's a note when entering the descending passage: "This is normally blocked off to visitors, but we can visit in our tour!"
    If you didn't get to them by clicking through the photos, you can click the lower left "Dollhouse mode" icon to get a 3d viewer, in which these things are visible. They are both included on the "guided tour" mode, however, if you just load the page and click through the prompts in the middle.
    I was hoping that the OP might reply to provide more insight on what specific restrictions there might have been, considering some special permissions appear to have been granted. It presents as a bit of a mystery since the site claims "for the first time ever, explore the full interior" and makes no mention of any missing areas.
spencercwood · 3 years ago
Dang this is rad, thank you for sharing!
stvnbn · 3 years ago
This is awesome! It's like being there. I always wanted a tour. Thank you!
TheBigSalad · 3 years ago
This is amazing!
CobrastanJorji · 3 years ago
I'd love to hear about the process you went through to get something like this approved. I am very curious and slightly scared of the sort of red tape that is involved for a proposal that starts "I'd like to do something to the Great Pyramid," even if it's as innocuous as taking pictures. Or was it maybe a right place right time sort of thing where you were there with an existing scientific investigation and it was significantly simplified.
hfo · 3 years ago
For anyone interested in the great pyramid, here is a book recommendation (free), IMHO it surpasses even the gold standard "Maragioglio and Rinaldi" (M&R). Unfortunately on that horrible academia.edu site:
https://www.academia.edu/72468121/The_Great_Pyramid_Part_1_A...
https://www.academia.edu/75544329/The_Great_Pyramid_Part_2_A...
club_tropical · 3 years ago
This is exactly what is needed in archeology. High quality imaging & survey, not historical speculations tied up with this or that professor’s ego-driven “school of thought”.
- iancmceachern · 3 years ago
  Exactly, share the facts not interpretations
- mattfrommars · 3 years ago
  This is by far the best and most enjoyable experience I tend to have in VR. Meta Quesr is an incredible piece of device to experience this in. I can't wait to fire mine up and enjoy this ;)
  - snailmailman · 3 years ago
    I just tried it in VR on my Quest 2, and while it was neat, it was only photospheres, and wasn't really 3D. very disorienting. Weird because there is clearly a 3d model, but in VR everything seems to be a fixed distance away.
    I think this is a matterport limitation?
    lukehollis · 3 years ago
    Thanks for trying it and pointing this out--I haven't been working on the VR version for this reason. The web viewer provides movement through 360 photos instead of the 3d model.
Bellend · 3 years ago
I really really enjoyed this and the information. Thank you so much for putting the time in to make it. I doubt I will ever see the Pyramids but I always wanted to and this was the closest I will likely get. My mind is blown by the whole topic.
shmerl · 3 years ago
Moving with arrow keys is very cool!
1970-01-01 · 3 years ago
Very cool! I suggest pairing with the Myst soundtrack.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zboL71iRFBE
monksy · 3 years ago
My work network classifies this site as adult content.
mwidell · 3 years ago
Wow! After going through this tour, I feel like I don't need to visit in real life. I can imagine an "IRL" tour wouldn't be as good, with queues, lots of other tourists, etc. This was the best virtual visit experience I have ever had, to any real world place. Kudos!
- sdbrady · 3 years ago
  Having been inside earlier this year, you would be doing yourself a huge disservice not visiting this IRL. Yes, the visual fidelity of this is amazing, but there are a lot of intangibles missing (i.e., the sonic resonance).
matthewhartmans · 3 years ago
This is super well done!
Going through the pyramid brought back so many amazing memories. Had such a great trip here and because of this, I got to experience it again.
The website interactions are silky smooth and beautifully done and the image quality is just incredible!
Thanks for putting this together!
alanwreath · 3 years ago
I wish looking straight up wasn't blurry, I know this is a common problem with 360 camera's but I'd hoped that a camera of this caliber would account for it (even if with a little stitching)
EDIT: I didn't say it (it goes without saying), but this is awesome, especially as a work of preservation.
- samplatt · 3 years ago
  It's using a [Matterport camera](https://www.amazon.com.au/Matterport-Professional-Experience...) - they capture from 3 vertical directions (+45.deg, level, and -45.deg), and then rotates in a circle.
  Though the technical limitations are frustrating, the end result tends to be much higher quality than other, more manual software pipelines. Not to mention _significantly_ easier to process.
herdymerzbow · 3 years ago
Amazing stuff. Very immersive. Didn't think I would ever get to see inside the pyramids and while this isn't quite like being there in person, it does help scratch the itch. Your tour gives a much greater sense of their scale due to the length of the tunnels you have to navigate.
Meanwhile I have seen them from the air while flying from Dubai to Europe. We flew over Cairo and I managed to spot them, which I was very pleased about and began my first step into unconventional ways of appreciating the pyramids.
qq66 · 3 years ago
Is this available in VR?
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Yes, you should be able to open the link in a VR headset with the in-headset web browser and then fullscreen to move through the 360 images in the virtual tour Free Explore mode if you like it, but I've only been working on supporting the web experience on desktop/mobile.
jbverschoor · 3 years ago
Super cool. How difficult was it to scan? I’m tend off walking and post processing
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  It was a challenging scan--but not very large. The toughest part was working around the tourists.
ridgeguy · 3 years ago
Thank you so much for your work! I loaded your tour of the Great Pyramid onto my laptop and settled into bed next to my wife, who is recovering from knee replacement surgery. I said "May I take you to Egypt for awhile?". She loved it! I really appreciate the effort you've put into giving access to historically important sites fir those of us who are unlikely to visit in person.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  I love this story, and thanks for visiting & sharing! I hope she makes a quick recovery.
  If it's interesting apart from the other scans I mentioned in the comments, one of the favorite places that I've worked is in the Sinai at St Catherine's Monastery:
  https://stcatherines.mused.org/en/ has three scans of the Holy Summit of Mt Sinai, Burning Bush/Monastery, and Monastery Museum.
_dark_matter_ · 3 years ago
Just amazing. I "walked" through with my kids (8 & 10 years old), and they couldn't get enough. They read every piece of text and wanted to go on to the next tour! We'll have to wait for another day.
Thank you!
soheilpro · 3 years ago
This is amazing. Thank you!
xzatious · 3 years ago
Really wonderful experience. I don't comment here much but this is really great. Bravo.
qersist3nce · 3 years ago
Thanks for the amazing work! Here are my notes:
1- Actual surveying of the site was a bit annoying. On one hand, I wanted to scan everything and look at every detail. On the other, I didn't know where I was and didn't want to miss out by my depth-first approach. The automatic surveying routine (clicking next) moves the camera way too fast. Also I guess it doesn't present everything we know of the site. For example I wanted to have a more clear look at the shafts.
So A) provide a minimap for every detail we know of the site to make idealists of us, happy :)
B) slow down the speed of auto-surveyor.
I experienced these same technical problems while traversing the Perspolis site: https://persepolis.getty.edu/
2- What's with the utility wiring in the King's chamber? Is it customary in archeological sites? I thought it should have been done more neatly.
Also, do the "cosmic ray detectors" work by battery power in those wooden boxes? Is there a rule that scientific instruments should be in wooden boxes?
3- How do we know what the main purpose of the Great Pyramid was? Why were the chambers named as King or Queen's chamber when we didn't find any mummies or hieroglyphs inside?
This question especially becomes important when we don't know what the purpose of those clear-cut shafts in chambers was.
4- As an archeologist, what do you think of the works of Erich von Daniken or the claims that ancient human technology couldn't have cut those clear cuts or moved those giant stones?
5- Before seeing this, I just woke up early from a nightmare. I rule out most of it due my brain mixing my personal experiences of the day and university. But, the strange part of that dream was that at the end of it, someone trapped someone else (like in a dome wire-frame cage that is used in catching birds) , and I heard a serious stern voice ordering him to "dig". Next up I woke up and saw this on HN, deciding to have a virtual visit of the internal chambers of the Great Pyramid. Phew! What a coincidence!
- piceas · 3 years ago
  On mobile, for the tour, I found the camera moved a bit quickly and would also cut corners.
  I think it would be helpful to break the movement down a bit and add intermediate positions. Rotate camera, move along in the direction that your head might realistically travel through the space, and then a final rotation at the destination if needed.
808 · 3 years ago
A most excellent series of resources tied together in a thoughtfully refined fashion.
Managed to get it working on an ancient 10yr old 'droid mobile with latest FF, likewise on a decade old tablet in latest Brave.
Not sure if you have any intention of scanning the Hawara complex, but if you can gain access to the below discussed datasets, & if there were any chance of linking your modelling to these scans, it would make a mindblowing visit to the underworld!
Scans of beneath Hawara are discussed by Dr Carmen Boulter & Klaus Dona here:
https://piped.kavin.rocks/watch?v=hw1RSYIgr3I
As others have said, Muon scans have revealed hidden details in the Great Pyramid, but I have heard less chatter about these Hawara studies from 2014-15, regarding multiple long-distance water tunnels, possibly linking back to Giza & the water beneath the Great Pyramid.
When linked to the historic water damage around the base of the sphynx, the water separation/hydrogen power station theories suggested by various physicists (& HN posters) seem less fantastical. A feeder into the Great Pyramid (the specific name escapes, but can be seen as a peaked entrance towards one side) from these waters would cascade down through the complex & onwards towards Hawara, possibly explaining why the water under Giza & in the inland lake at Hawara are saline, but neither chemically match Nile or Med' waters.
Keep up the good work. ^_^
gaurav_k · 3 years ago
This does not work well on Brave browser - keeps reloading. Will definitely check it on my desktop though, looks super cool
botanical · 3 years ago
This is amazing! It reminds me of exploring with Encarta as a child. Only one minor annoyance is it uses imperial units. Also it would be nice to know the temperature at the subterranean chamber
Schinken_ · 3 years ago
Amazing work! Ever since I watched the documentary about the ScanPyramids Project I've been waiting for a full 3D Scan (moreso even for a VR Project, but that's only a small step from this). I figured they were probably not allowed to publish their scans, so this is a nice surprise.
This looks a bit "segmented" to me? As in, the scanned parts are not necessarily 100% overlapping (and resulting in a single union model?). Nonetheless amazing work.
If you're interested in VR compatibility, I believe A-Frame (https://aframe.io/) (also threejs and webbased IIRC) might do the trick.
pabs3 · 3 years ago
The Mused jobs link points at the blog, is that intentional?
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Thanks, I'll update this--I've been working with a few of my friends this year, and I think we're still looking for product-market fit so haven't been thinking of hiring recently.
  Maybe since 19th and 20th century archaeologists have a sometimes terrible track record (Elgin Marbles, Benin Bronzes, etc.), it's important to not be similarly extractive with the 3d data now but instead find ways to connect the local and international communities using the laser scans. That's one of the areas we're exploring next.
  - pabs3 · 3 years ago
    I noticed you have released some source code on GitLab, but it appears to be all rights reserved (no license information in the repo), but is also still viewable by the public, did you mean to make it a private project on GitLab instead?
djmips · 3 years ago
This is awesome. I desire a high res skybox at the entrance so I can take one look back out onto the Central Field before I delve inside. It would add to the experience! Great job though I love stuff like this.
- lukehollis · 3 years ago
  Great idea--I'll see if I can head back out to capture this along with more of the path to get to the Robber's Tunnel.
mnw21cam · 3 years ago
I'm getting a nice video flyby of the outside of the pyramid, and a spinny thing at the bottom that says loading, and has done since last night.
Chromium 106.0.5249.119 on Debian, JS is switched on, webgl works correctly.
Edit: I should also note that in the console I also get stats.g.doubleclick.net…AAI~&z=1802238861:1 Failed to load resource: net::ERR_CERT_COMMON_NAME_INVALID
zengineer · 3 years ago
Wow, this is how a digital trip to a museum should be! Really well done and interesting - not giving too much information at the same time.
mikestaub · 3 years ago
Any plans to upload a highres photogrammetry model to be explored with webXR?
downboots · 3 years ago
Out of curiosity, if you were to extend the lines of the chamber tunnels would it reach an interesting place in the earth or sky? Could the angles carry meaning?
lukehollis · 3 years ago
In case anyone comes across this in the future, I finished the blog about the process here: https://blog.mused.org/building-a-guided-tour-of-the-great-p...
Thanks to the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, especially Doctor Wael Fathy and Inspector Ezzat Salama at the Giza Plateau who worked on site with me this summer.
And thanks again to everyone here for visiting and the feedback!