Last updated: June 8, 2020
Video
Panther Cave 3D
Descriptive Transcript
This video does not include sound.
A distant look across the lake at a cliff identified as Panther Cave. Upon zooming in, a dock and several steep, metal staircases with handrails going up the rocky cliff are visible.
We gradually continue to zoom into the rock shelter or cave at the top of the stair cases. There is a fence that goes from the top of the rock shelter all the way to the bottom and covers the sides. A gate is open on the side closest to us and backpacks line the metal walkway in front of the rock shelter. There are five people, some sitting and some standing, inside the fenced off area.
Switching to a computer-enhanced, 3D image of the cave, the fence fades away giving an unobstructed view of the computer image. Low lying slabs of rock litter the back and the middle of the cave with a level walkway aound the center pile. On the far wall is a red, painted panther with a very long tail. The computer image slowly zooms in and rotates to provide a view of the rock shelter wall nearest where the gate was.
The panning and zooming of the image stops where a large panel of faint, red paintings are obvious but difficult to interpret. The picture contrast and color are brightened greatly and identified as "enhancement". Standing out among the red paintings, known as "pictographs", are a four-legged animal of some sort and a striped figure that may be humanoid with a squiggly line like a snake. The enhanced image fades back to the natural colors, and the image continues to pan to the right passing over other evident but faint, red and black pictographs.
The panning stops among a group of pictographs. The enhancement here helps reveal what appears to be two animal-like creatures on four legs, with rounded bodies, running to the right with a tall humanoid-type figure behind them. While still in the enhanced mode, the image continues to pan to the right where three more of the round-bodied animals appear to be running the same direction as the first two. The panning stops, and the color fades back to the natural colors resulting in the last in the line of four-legged animals being very faint and difficult to make out once the image returns to its natural color state.
The image slowly zooms out and pans upward. Fewer red or black pictographs are visible here. However, a very long one becomes evident and the image stops on it. With the enhancement, what appears to be a humanoid figure in a robe that has fringing or feathers along the sides emerges. The arms are raised skyward. It appears to be wearing a feathered headpiece. The enhanced image fades back to the natural colors and the pictograph almost blends into the rock.
The image slowly pans to the right stopping on a smaller, nearby red humanoid figures very similar to the one just described. The paint is more vibrant on this one but the enhancement shows other red, painted details that are much fainter. Among all the shapes and other figures is a large, red cat that appears to be in the act of pouncing. Behind the long, slender, red figure with upraised arms is a black shadow-typre figure that appears to be a head and torso without arms. Lots of crosshatching resembling feathers is here. The image fades back to natural colors.
The image continues panning to the right past more faint red and black pictographs and settles on a collection of faint red images. Lots of pictographs are evident in the enhancement, but it is difficult to pick out any single outstanding image. It appears as though over time pictographs were painted over pictographs, which were painted over other pictographs and so on. A long, black, humanoid figure is in the middle of this almost blending in with everything else. It appears to have some sort of fringe or feathers on both sides of its arms which are down but away from its body. The image fades back to natural again and continues panning up diagonally to the right.
It stops on a larger red humanoid figure. With enhancement, it appears that one arm is up and the other arm is reaching across its chest. It appears to be holding something in each of its hands. Again, there is lots of activity in this portion of the panel with evidence of painting being painted on top of other paintings. Because of this, it's difficult to determine if there is a large wing coming out of the humanoid's back or if the humanoid was painted over the head of an image of an animal. The image returns to natural coloring and pans to the right and down at a slight angle.
The enhanced imaging at the next pause again shows many pictographs almost completely filling the frame. In the center is an image that could be a humanoid with arms outstretched or stick with a crossmember or a sword and hilt pointed toward the ground. The left half of the image is black with an undulating serration. The right side is red with red fringe or feathers running the length of its side and tops and bottoms of the crossmember, which is black. Images of two long, red feathers appear to hang from each side of the crossmember. Red lines are sticking up from the top. To the left is the image of a red post that appears to be fainter than the glyph just described. The post to the right of the main figure appears to be a very large, purplish-red humanoid figure with arms outstretch to either side and a squared off head. Below it and even with the first figure in this section are many red, squared-off figures interspersed with yellows. The image returns to natural colors and continues panning to the right.
The enhancement at the next group of pictographs shows many red figures, though not quiet as dense as the two previous groups. The main figure appears to be a red tube with rounded end with a cross sticking from its right side by the crossmember. There are tufts of fringe or feathers along the rounded top and on the top and bottom of the crossmember. To the right of these is a yellow humanoid with red-orange, stick-like outstretched arms also outlined in red-orange. A black feather appears to be sticking at an angle out of the top of the black-faced head.
The image zooms in and pans further right in the image's natural color until it arrives at and focuses on what resembles a wavey, red snake with a red humanoid under it and two large, red humanoids to either side. The natural colored image rotates some, zooms back out and continues panning to the right where the larger, red humanoid to the right of the snake is visible. It has its arms stretched out to each side with the elbows appearing somewhat bent. To the right of that is visible a considerably smaller, black humanoid figure with arms outstretched in a similar fashion and red lines running down each side from the shoulders to the hem. Right of that is what appears to be a black filled-in circle that is drawn in red with two short feathers and two long feathers hanging from the lower, center edge of the circle. Red dots are sprinkled down from the top to either side of the feathers and under them. Red hash lines come out from varying directions from the red circle.
The image goes to natural color and pans to the right now reaching the red cat or panther with the very long tail that appears to be mid-pounce. This was the first pictograph seen. The image now rotates and pans back giving one last view of the rock shelter wall, this time from the opposite side then fades to black.
Audio Described by NPS/J. Frost
Description
This clip shows a 3D view of Panther Cave with color enhancement to better see the pictographs at this site.
Duration
6 minutes, 15 seconds
Date Created
02/27/2013
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