Afghanistan's past in Geomagic Studio

In the sandstone cliffs, which surround the Valley of Bamiyan in Afghanistan, two large niches stare out from the rock. Long ago, there stood the two huge buddhas of Bamiyan; the buddhas have been carved out of the stone by monks. The taller buddha was 53 meters tall, the smaller one 35 meters. In March 2001, the 1500-year-old statues have been destroyed.

Now, an international team of architects, engineers and restorers is employed in rebuilding the Buddha statues of Bamiyan. For this job, the team of restorators used 3D Systems’ scan software Geomagic Studio and ProJet’s 3D printer with ColorJet technology. Already in 2009, the team began planning the rebuilding of the statues.

After collecting and categorizing all remains of the buddhas, the parts of the statues and the niches have been scanned with a 3D laser scanner. Based on the sediment structure, the architects wanted to define the position of each statue part. After scanning, the team processed the scan data. By means of Geomagic Studio, the 3D scan data have been transformed into very precise surface models.

Afterwards, the statues and niches were printed at 1/25 of the original size by means of a 3D printer. The scaled models shall be sued for reassembling the buddha statues step-by-step.

 

Fragments of the Buddha (Image source: 3D Systems)

 


3D printed niche and debris pieces (Image source: 3D Systems)