Reconstruction of a Nineteenth Century Plaster Piece Mold and Recreation of a Casting

This paper describes the 3D documentation of an incomplete nineteenth century plaster piece mold, the techniques used for the virtual replacement of missing mold pieces and the virtual recreation of the lost cast. The work by noted nineteenth century American sculptor Hiram Powers, is a rare surviving direct link to the artist’s creative process. Scan data collected from the Powers mold were used to virtually recreate the lost pieces of this mold. The virtual reconstruction will be used to fabricate the lost pieces and provide a physical copy of the mold for proper storage of the original as well as for display and public programs. A recreation of the cast will also be fabricated from the mold data. 3D imaging by structured light scanning was used to record all spatial data for the mold pieces. This data was then processed further to virtually replace the lost pieces and to extract the piece mold surface data. This mold surface is assumed to be the same as the surface of any casting from the mold. Virtual reconstruction of a lost cast from the artist’s mold results in a unique opportunity to view Powers’ work as it was originally intended.