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The Space, Place, Sound, and Memory: Immersive Experiences of the Past project was led by dr James Cook, in collaboration with the Digital Documentation and Innovation team at Historic Environment Scotland, Soluis Heritage, the Binchois Consort, and scholars at the universities of Birmingham and Melbourne. It used cutting-edge technology to reconstruct the visuals and acoustics of Linlithgow Palace chapel, before situating reconstructions of liturgical music within it. Beginning with HES’ 3D scan of the chapel, the project then used archival, archaeological, and musicological research to bring to life the sights and sounds of the 16th-century chapel. This chapter explores how Digital Documentation can be harnessed in the production of innovative interpretation and research material.

The quality of digital documentation of cultural heritage sites and objects is influenced significantly by the complexity of the subject. Complexity is an encompassing concept comprised of a range of factors including material properties and surface characteristics. Highly reflective items pose a challenge to traditional workflows, which has been previously addressed with a range of mitigating techniques and strategies, often including cross-polarised photogrammetry lighting setups to omit specular type reflections. However, in the removal of reflections to achieve more robust surface geometry, important information about the specular albedo of the surface can be lost. In this paper we demonstrate an accessible single camera cross-polarised photogrammetry workflow to retain the diffuse and specular albedo information. The results have enabled qualitative assessments about the individual objects and their materials through the workflow. The items discussed include ceramic, metal and wood material types, and through the separation of specular information offer unique improvements to their visualisation and insights to their physical condition for conservation purposes.