Why an Atheist Thinks the Shroud of Turin is the Real Deal

The Height Map

As with any 3D computer graphic, XYZ values can be stored as a long list of three numbers. But for terrains, computer programmers found an interesting and practical way to store this information in a pseudo-image called a height-map or height-field. In a height-map the X and Y values are as you expect them to be, the coordinates on the surface such as a piece of paper. The Z values, however at stored by miniscule dots or pixels of varying degrees of gray from black to white. A black dot represents the minimum height such as the floor of the crater and a white dot represents the maximum height somewhere on the rim. Various shades of gray represent different heights. You can create a height-map on a piece of paper but it would take you a year to do it if you want to be accurate.  For every point on you crater you must put a dot that is somewhere between white and black until you get something that looks like the fuzzy smoke ring pictured in this book. But radar and laser devices connected to computers can do the job faster than the blink of an eye.

If our height-field is on paper, as ours of our imagination is, then we need to get it into our computer. The easiest way to do that is with a scanner. We then need some software to examine every XY point on the paper and examine the dot at that point to determine the shade of gray. We are now ready to plot. But because we are interested in producing a 3D representation on a 2D surface—our computer screen, we need to tell the software what our viewing angle should be and where virtual light is to be introduced to give the shape a visual sense of three-dimensionality.

It turns out, and this is quite astonishing and completely unprecedented in the world of art or photography, the images on the shroud are height-maps. To be totally precise about it the images are not images at all. They are height-maps that happen to look like images. What is encoded in what we see, that looks like the image of a man, is the data for plotting the shape and form of a man’s head and body as a terrain.