3D, fly-through movies to explore Medieval Nottingham Caves

Archaeologists have struck upon a brilliant technology to explore the unseen network of nearly 500 tunnels and caves, in a layer of rock called Sherwood Sandstone beneath the Nottingham Castle.

These manmade labyrinths were used for everything from brewing ale to mining and even imprisoning the famous bandit Robin Hood.

Although some are still being used today as pub cellars and tourist attractions, most aren't public or even known about. Now, new technology is shedding light on these previously unseen wonders.

The Nottingham Caves Survey, carried out by archaeologists from Trent and Peak Archaeology at the University of Nottingham in England will now use laser scan technology to create three-dimensional images of the caves.

The lasers fire beams of light that "ping" off surfaces and reflect those dimensions back to a meter. The meter measures the amount of time the reflection took to bounce and calculates the object's size based on that number.

The Nottingham Cave lasers can produce up to 5,00,000 survey points per second, making each image incredibly detailed.

"This remarkable new technology will create a full measured record of the caves in three dimensions," Discovery News quoted David Walker, of Trent & Peak Archaeology, as saying in a press release.

"This gives us two really important things: a highly detailed archaeological record of the historic caves, and a new way for people to view caves they may never have seen before. For the first time visitors will be able to explore Nottingham's unique caves with a laptop or smartphone over the web."

"The experience of visiting these domestic caves is far removed from the clean regularity of modern urban living and offers a tangible link to medieval Nottingham," the survey's website says.