Coins and Computation

Money Talks
Coins and Computation: New Developments in the Computer-Aided Die Study

With Zachary Taylor and Dr. Peter van Alfen

Saturday, April 25
1:00 pm EST

This Money Talks will be held live via video conference. As with any Money Talks, you will be able to ask questions and hear responses in real time. The session is open to ANS members only. RSVP to Emma Pratte at membership@numismatics.org to get the link. 

Die studies help numismatists learn about the ancient money supply, mint layout and manufacturing processes, and much more, but can be tedious and strenuous to conduct. The Computer-Aided Die Study (CADS) aims to solve this problem by automating a vast majority of the ‘busy work’ in a die study, cutting the time needed for sorting and clustering by orders of magnitude. Zachary Taylor, who will be graduating this May with a degree in Computer Science from Trinity University (San Antonio, TX), undertook the development of CADS for his honors thesis and will present the preliminary and promising results in this Money Talks. He and Chief Curator Peter van Alfen will introduce and demonstrate the CADS tool, summarize the computer vision and clustering methods it uses, and finally suggest how CADS might be used to aid numismatists going forward.

Money Talks: Numismatic Conversations is supported by an ANS endowment fund generously given in honor of Mr. Vladimir Clain-Stefanelli and Mrs. Elvira Clain-Stefanelli.