MAPPING WITH AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHS: Recording the Past, the Present, and the Invisible at Marj Rabba, Israel

Aerial photography in archaeology is nothing new Recent years have witnessed an expansion in use and utility thanks to the rapid development of a variety of technologies. There are many ways to get a camera into the air over archaeological sites and landscapes and even more uses for the resultant aerial photographs. At the Chalcolithic site of Mad Rabba, Israel (part of the larger Galilee Prehistory Project http://galileeprehistoryprojectorg/) over five seasons we used a variety of tools to record the site, the excavations, and the landscape. Along with traditional plan and section drawing, digital and paper record keeping, and careful excavation approaches, we use satellites, historical aerial photographic archives, fixed wing unmanned aerial vehicles, rotary-wing unmanned aerial vehicles, poles, and terrestrial hand-held photography and photogrammetry, all in the quest for a comprehensive record of our work. In the following we discuss mapping this archaeological landscape with varied aerial photographs.