Visualizationandreconstructionofthree-dimensional.PDFVIP

Palaeontologia Electronica METHODOLOGIES FOR THE VISUALIZATION AND RECONSTRUCTION OF THREE-DIMENSIONAL FOSSILS FROM THE SILURIAN HEREFORDSHIRE LAGERSTÄTTE Mark D. Sutton, Derek E.G. Briggs, David J. Siveter, and Derek J. Siveter Mark D. Sutton. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PR, U.K. Derek E.G. Briggs. Department of Earth Sciences, Wills Memorial Building, Queens Road, Bristol, BS8 1RJ, U.K. David J. Siveter. Department of Geology, Bennett Building, University of Leicester, University Road, Leicester, LE1 7RH, U.K. Derek J. Siveter. University Museum of Natural History Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PR, U.K. ABSTRACT The dominantly soft-bodied fauna of the Silurian (Wenlock) Herefordshire Lager- stätte of England is preserved as three-dimensional calcitic fossils within calcareous nodules. These fossils are difficult to interpret from study of sections produced by split- ting, and are difficult also to isolate from their matrix. CT scanning of nodules is feasi- ble, but is expensive and unlikely to be able to image the fossils at a sufficiently high resolution. We describe a technique based on serial grinding and digital photography which enables the capture of three-dimensional morphological information from the fossils. Computer video files are used to package the resulting datasets for inspection . Three-dimensional reconstructions can be created by a method involving the manual tracing of outlines on each image, but we consider this approach inappropriate in this instance. Datasets from grinding are treated i