About the Project
An inventory of the City’s historical aerial photographs has identified nearly 300 photographs taken over a 60 year period from 1926 to 1986. For the majority of prints, these are the sole copy in existence. In an effort to archive these photographs for preservation against accidental damage through fire, water, or theft, the City of Fayetteville, CAST, Fayetteville Public Schools, and the Bank of Fayetteville have joined forces through the CADIS internship in order to bring the hardcopy photographs into a digital format. This will increase the public’s access to this resource.
There are five CADIS interns in the 2004 project. Michael Griffith, Joshua Dunn (Fayetteville High School), Tracy Wenzinger (Roger’s High School), Justin Swicegood (Farmington High School) and Shea Tackett (Fort Smith High School).
The CADIS interns scanned the majority of the historical photographs at the best possible resolution for archival purposes (200 dpi). The digital photographs will be made available to the public through the City of Fayetteville (LINK –watch this space). Throughout the duration of the CADIS internship the city received several requests for this historical data. Having the photographs in a digital format has allowed quick and easy distribution to interested parties.
Several key collections were analyzed further. Using PCIs’ Geomatica software, and several cups of coffee, photographs from key years (1926, 1941, 1966, and 1978) were ortho-rectified and used to illustrate the changes that have occurred in Fayetteville over the past 80 years. This involved much image enhancement, correction of distortion that may have occurred during the scan process, geo-referencing, and terrain correction. The aim was to create an aerial view of the Fayetteville region as it has changed through time.
To ensure that the photographs align correctly with other geographic data, the interns used 2003 satellite imagery to “tie” points from the scanned aerial photographs to “real-world coordinates”, plus the elevation at each of these “Ground-Control Points” (GCPs). This was easier said than done, as over the past 80 years Fayetteville has experienced many changes, from the expansion of the city limits, along with new roads such as Interstate 540.
Additional Projects
Historical building recreation: In addition to using the aerial photographs, David and Hilary Huff from Bob’s Studio have allowed us to use an oblique historical photograph of the Bank of Fayetteville building on the square to create a 3d model as it was in the 1960s. The model can be downloaded on the “Products” (was applications) page for you to examine.
Updating the CADIS webpage: Michael Griffith was in charge of updating, revamping and giving a complete overhaul to the CADIS webpage. As CADIS has been in existence since 1999, there were links, applications, and projects that needed to be brought up to date. The new webpage can be found at http://www.cast.uark.edu/local/cadis/. Please explore the webpage to find out previous CADIS internship projects.
