Writer: Marcus Helminiak
Last Tuesday, Lycoming College alumnus Jason Zan gave a presentation called “Depth From Above: Using Drones to Discover What’s Under the Surface,” in the Humanities Research Center. Zan graduated from Lyco in 2007 with an Archeology major, and earned his M.A. in Archeology and Biblical Studies at Southwestern Seminary in 2013. His presentation focused on how drones can be useful in archeology and forensic investigations, and how his company, Depth From Above, LLC explores that.
First, Zan presented a slideshow that explained drones’ uses, such as taking high quality aerial photographs. These photos can reveal details about an area that cannot be seen from the ground, and because they are taken by a close range camera, they are much clearer than pictures taken by satellites. Also, drones because drones are classified as small Unmanned Aerial Systems (sUAS), they usually do not interfere with the flight plans of planes or military training, so drones can be used almost anywhere, unlike larger aircrafts like helicopters.
After the explanation, Zan took everyone outside for a live demonstration of how his drone takes pictures. He set an automated flight path for the drone to fly around the area just outside the Academic Center. It flew about a hundred feet up and, over the course of its flight, took around thirty pictures. After going back to the HRC, Zan used his computer to stitch these photos together as one giant photo called an orthomosaic. It had the same perspective as an image from Google Earth, but high enough quality to zoom in on a single tree without getting blurry.
As of now, Zan’s company focuses mainly on using these drones for clandestine grave discovery, or locating unmarked mass gravesites that are usually dug during wartime. In April and May of this year, Zan assisted relief groups in Ukraine in recovering the bodies of both civilians and soldiers lost in ruined areas. He will continue this work when he returns to Ukraine to help the private recovery group Evacuation 200 in April of 2023