Replicas of ancient Egyptian artefacts belonging to a Cumbria museum are being printed in 3D so schoolchildren can have the chance to handle them.
Engineers at Lancaster University made hundreds of photographs of the 3,000-year-old pottery and sculptures.
These were digitally stitched together to create a 3D virtual image of the original, which was then printed out.
It is hoped the technique will also make it easier to repair broken antiquities.
John Kaufman, a PhD student at the Department of Engineering at Lancaster, photographed each object from every angle.
'Touch and interact'
He said: "Normally this would be done with a laser scanner, but as part of my research I used a much cheaper digital camera to see if I could make this method more accessible."
Morag Clement, from Kendal Museum, said: "These ancient Egyptian items are so rare that normally we don't let anybody touch them.
"With these copies, people can pick them up, touch and interact with them, instead of just viewing them behind glass."
