Good practices in Gratangen

In the second half of May 2014, the North Norwegian Ship Preservation Centre in Gratangen near Narvik hosted workshops devoted to contemporary documenting techniques applied for historic vessels. The workshops were attended by all partners of the “Polish and Norwegian Maritime Heritage” project. Riksantikveren, the Directorate for Cultural Heritage in Norway located in Oslo, was the main organizer of this meeting.

The Ship Preservation Centre in Gratangen acquires funds for maintaining its activities from business undertakings, which include repair of boat engines commissioned by private investors, as well as from subsidies granted by Riksantikveren.

The workshops conducted from 19th to 23rd May were devoted to the documenting method applied for ships which involves photogrammetry and is practiced by the centre staff members. The theoretical part included features of photography equipment, photography methodology, as well as specialist software designed for photo retouching. Another significant topic of discussion was the importance of object marking system for creation of a permanent reference point and consequently, for coordination of acquired photos in a three-dimensional space via Agisoft PhotoScan computer programme.

The practical part of workshops involved preparing a series of photos of a simple boat which underwent computer retouching process. As a result, participants created a three-dimensional visualisation of the photographed object which included all details of surface texture and elements placed on it. The image of the boat could be easily rotated in every direction, and what is more, the rotation caused no deformation or incompleteness of the image. Fully dimensional computer model of the vessel could be used for further processing in order to receive theoretical lines and much more.

During the course of workshops, the participants were taken on a tour of the centre with workshops and shipyard located on the same premises. The shipyard is used for repair and preservation works conducted on old vessels.

For more information on documenting techniques applied for traditional boats, please see the attachments.

Comparative presentation regarding documenting techniques applied for historic boats and ships in Poland and Norway (PL)
The programme of educational activities (PL)
Worksheets (PL)
The programme of educational activities
Veiledning i dokumentasjon av flytende kulturminner (NO)

The project is conducted due to support of Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway and funds acquired from the EEA Financial Mechanism 2009–2014 as a part of the “Promotion of Diversity in Culture and Arts within European Cultural Heritage” project.
Co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.