Image- and Model-Based Reconstruction of the Small Buddha of Bamiyan, Afghanistan

Abstract

This paper reports about our efforts to generate a 3D computer model of the Small Buddha of Bamiyan, Afghanistan. This was one of two famous standing Buddhas, both of them being destroyed by the Taleban in March 2001. This adds to our previous work on the reconstruction of the Great Buddha and the precise modelling of the larger landscape around it. The main problem here was the lack of one suitable dataset (e.g. old images) which could have been used alone for reconstruction. So we had to resort to different kind of data, in order to make good use of everything that was available: Two old amateur images, taken before the destruction,newly made images of the now empty niche (acquired for the 3D modelling of the niche) and a given contour map, produced from the metric images of a past photogrammetric campaign of the University of Kyoto. We describe the fairly complex procedures thatenabled us to get, despite the insufficient material, quite acceptable results. This shows again how advanced photogrammetric techniques can be applied to reconstruct lost objects.