Cultural Heritage Imaging Lab

The Cultural Heritage Imaging (CHI) Lab is a experiential research workspace centered on MISHA—the Multispectral Imaging System for Historical Artifacts—an accessible, low-cost, open-source multispectral imaging system funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and developed by RIT’s imaging science and museum studies programs. The CHI Lab supports the documentation, analysis, interpretation, and preservation of cultural heritage materials. Courses that have access to the lab are IMGS 115; ITDL 210 Cultural Heritage Imaging, Preservation, and Research where students learn how to capture and process image data that can reveal faded, erased, obscured, or otherwise unreadable information in historical artifacts, while building practical skills in cultural heritage imaging, digital workflows, research, and public-facing interpretation.