A partnership formed of the US National Park Service, California-based CyArk and the Glasgow, Scotland-based Centre for Digital Documentation and Visualisation (CDDV), is using lasers to create a 3D digital scan of the four presidential faces and other features of the Mount Rushmore National Monument in the Black Hills of South Dakota, US.

The work - scheduled to take around two weeks - is primarily for historical documentation and preservation purposes, although the 3D modelling will also allow virtual tours of the iconic monument. If it is ever damaged, the data collected will enable workers to replicate the sculpture to the smallest degree. CDDV is a joint venture between Historic Scotland and the Digital Design Studio at the Glasgow School of Art and the Mount Rushmore project is the first overseas site it will scan with 3D laser scanners as part of the Scottish 10.

This is a five-year project designed to create exceptionally accurate digital models of Scotland’s five UNESCO designated World Heritage Sites - the Antonine Wall, New Lanark, Neolithic Orkney, the Old and New Towns of Edinburgh and the island of St Kilda - and five international sites. CyArk is a not-for-profit entity of the Kacyra Family Foundation, formed to digitally preserve cultural heritage sites through collecting, archiving and providing open access to data created by laser scanning, digital modeling, and other state-of-the-art technologies.

Pic: Mount Rushmore, showing (left to right) Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. Image copyright of Dean Franklin