00:00.00 archpodnet Welcome to the show. Everyone joining me today is Heather in Southern California Andrew also in Southern California Doug in Scotland and I am also in Southern California I'm currently in palm springs. 00:04.12 Heather Hi everybody. 00:08.15 Andrew Hey guys, how's it going. 00:12.71 Doug Doug hey everyone and I am. 00:19.63 archpodnet Hot hot palm springs was 106 yesterday it's supposed to be 105 today and it's garbage but our air conditioners are killing it there. You go oh man, oh my god the conversion. 00:30.83 Doug I think we we were like in the high forty s at the moment I'm trying to do like the ah ah the yeah yeah I think like today's high was like C oh oh ° yeah Yeah 00:44.40 archpodnet Oh nice, nice I'll tell you what we're here for two weeks this is our second week. We're starting in Palm Springs and then we're going to ah another park on Oceanside California which is between Los Angeles and San Diego 00:45.41 Doug Today's high was 45 00:57.35 archpodnet The highs the week we're supposed to be. There are literally in the mid 60 s it's so different just going out to the coast versus like right here in palm spriggs. It's amazing. So yeah, yeah, nice. 01:00.55 Heather Go wow. 01:03.87 Andrew Yeah, yeah, ah Heather and I are in Coastal California okay yeah 01:09.44 Heather Yep, and it's yeah, it's it's it's cool right now I'd say it's like 60 s yep yeah. 01:15.78 Andrew Yet, you can say it Heather it's super nice. It's super nice right now. 01:16.61 archpodnet Yeah, they go is super nice. Ah all right right? right? Well you know what's not super nice. 01:23.80 Heather Ah. 01:23.35 Doug Yeah, my like 60 s is what we call like ah, a warm scottish summer so you know that's that's that's good temperature. 01:26.28 Andrew Right. 01:33.58 archpodnet All the myths about COrM archeology that people seem to believe Doug Doug lead us. Ah, ah. 01:36.40 Heather Oh boy, not so smooth. Ah I don't know how smooth that it was but ah. 01:37.30 Doug Ah, way to bring it back Chris way to bring it in Chris. 01:43.97 Andrew Ah, that's awesome. 01:45.79 archpodnet Ah, it's Doug's topic this week so elaborate on that doug. 01:47.98 Doug Oh yeah, so the topic is like ah we could call it myth myth um misunderstandings. But um, it's not like 100 % but there's there's certain myths out there about like. Professional archeology that just are are completely not true or only partially true like there. There'll be some truth to them. But um, it's those things that like just sort of won't die those those ideas about what we do and how we do things that um. Are just not connected to reality or only partially connected to reality. So that's that's the at the theme of this episode. Um and I guess it's it's your guys is like biggest pet peeves on those areas of um, sort of myths that exist that shouldn't exist in archeology. Um. 02:26.18 archpodnet Yeah. 02:36.81 archpodnet Um. 02:42.49 Doug So I'm just going to throw it out there. Ah and go down our list of who who we have first actually Chris ah my ah my screen you're first so I was going to throw it out to you. What's what's when your like the myt that you see in professional archeology. 02:59.51 archpodnet Well I've actually got I mean I've got quite a few based on like leadership and things like that. But I'll start with one. That's a little a little lower down the totem pole before when you're first getting into the field but um archeology is about all about. You know Indiana Jones and excavating right? it's it's exciting. It's it's digging in trenches and and units and and finding stuff all the time and it's it can be that but it's just simply not for a lot of places right there there is a lot of times in Cram Archeology where you don't find anything I've been on lots of projects where. It was just miserable. It was hot. It was humid I'm specifically thinking about you Georgia um, but it was hot humid. You're just like macheteing through briers and finding literally nothing like you're macheteing for 30 minutes to get to your next shovel test. You do that shovel test. It's garbage. There's nothing there and then you move on right and it is just. 03:37.24 Heather Yeah amen. 03:53.37 archpodnet Absolutely annoying now I'm not a very good example of this because my first I think 2 years in c or m just by luck of the draw I wasn't even searching for this I was just applying for everything I could my first two years was like all excavations. So but then I did like 8 years of survey with some excavations pop you know in between there or more. So. ah it was ah it was weird that it was all excavation. But I guess where that goes is it depends on where you want to work too if you work on the East Coast you're more than likely going to do more excavation. You're going to do a lot more so shovel testing which is which is excavation in its own right? But the excavation you would think of the the large scale block excavation. You're going to do more of that on the East Coast because there's less opportunity to move things when things are found on survey right? So they either have to abandon the project. The developer does or they have to dig it up. Those are your only 2 options. You don't like out here in the west you can just move the little push pin that is the pipeline and then. Put it around a site right? and then you got to survey that whole area now but you can get around some of the big stuff without actually digging it up so that happens out here at least in the desert west a lot I'm sure California. And and the busier parts of California are similar in that there's little opportunity to move things so there might be more excavation in those areas when they are when things are found especially with paleontology being a factor as well. But anyway that was one of the myths I thought of is you come out of school and you're you're reading about all these excavations. You don't read about miles and miles of boring survey. 05:17.00 archpodnet Exciting survey. It can be really fun. You know like that's that's the other thing is I always said that your worst day in the high desert in Nevada where you don't find anything is just an awesome hike where nobody's been for a hundred plus years and it's just you know, amazing scenery and it can be It can be really cool from that standpoint. But. When you do it 10 on 4 off all day long and you don't find anything it can start to wear on you professionally right? You're just like what am I even out here for and you stop looking at the ground sometimes and you're just like hiking at that point I mean everybody's done. It. Everybody's done. It. So it's ah it's something but that's. 05:46.37 Heather I Think yeah. 05:53.25 Doug Yeah I mean we're somewhat similar over like okay, not quite the same but like in the U K like something they don't teach you is like so you do which are a watching brief a lot of times so you know not, you don't usually have to do shovel test pitting you get out like a. 05:53.95 archpodnet That's what I'll start with. 06:12.59 Doug Um, jcp and they scrape away um a pattern throughout the area and you just look at you know a machine slowly tilling away the land hoping to find something um and so a lot of people do end up on excavation because that's you know you know. 06:22.10 archpodnet M. 06:31.17 Doug Monitoring you only need one to 2 people depending on where the site is and what's happening but like what they don't teach you is yeah that you might go like several months of looking at a machine dig a hole and find absolutely nothing. Um, and. 06:48.45 archpodnet See yeah. 06:50.89 Doug It actually can break a lot of people like I know I've known more okay, obviously not like a a good sample and not statistically ah sound. But I'm pretty sure I know more people who've left archaeology because of the boredom of that. Then like anything else like it just breaks you after like eight weeks of being out in the rain in the cold and watching machine dig a hole and you see brown dirt. Yeah and it kills. 07:17.50 Andrew Yeah I've I've seen that like in action I've seen people like break you know, like doing that and I think we can all understand that and the other thing that happens. 07:18.55 Heather I'd agree with you? Yeah, yeah, like you. 07:31.80 Andrew Is not only do they break, but they also just start to see artifacts everywhere because the human mind like has to you know? yeah. 07:33.33 Heather Yes, oh my goodness I was just going to say that? yeah. 07:38.73 archpodnet Nice, nice. 07:42.71 Doug Ah, Andrew how will we jump? ah 1 at a time and just head over to you on on one of your sort of myths of a professional archeology. 07:50.94 Andrew Okay, so in thinking of of myths. It's so funny as I thought of this I'm like man I can do this for the pseudo archeology podcast too. It's like 2 for 1 um. So for me, mine are largely technological. They kind of go under this umbrella of the myth of technology in archeology and for my first one I'm going to go with lidar now. Lidar is great I'm not here to say that lidar sucks. So are you know lidar is the work of the devil. Um. Lidar when you can get it for your site is really really killer. Um, so and I've worked at sites that have had this but the public perception is that these sites have like never been found then a plane flies over. 08:27.91 archpodnet Ah. 08:39.52 Andrew And now all of a sudden this amazing new site in the Maya Jungle has been found and that's not the truth. The truth is 99 times out of a hundred the site is already totally well known and already mapped to but the lidar goes over it and kind of checks our map. And every so often you do find like a little extra piece to the site or something like that which is really amazing and really great. But it's not magic and you still need to have people real archeologists ground truth it because even lidar. Can record a hill. That's only a hill so you really have to check and remember that this stuff is just a tool It's not magic. You need real people to continue the work. 09:30.22 archpodnet Right? right? I might expand that into your again coming from school right? Even if you're coming out of a master's degree you you've gone into this little bubble of here's how you know things should be done but coming out of your undergrad you might hear about all these you know these really great technologies that we do have as tools but you're. 09:42.37 Andrew E. 09:50.19 archpodnet Probably not going to use or see any of those in Crm for the most part. Ah yeah. 09:50.97 Heather Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah I mean you'll you'll use you may use them. Um, it depends on the company that you're working for and and the type of project I mean lidar I I think is very rare. 09:51.72 Andrew Yes, a great point. Yeah. 10:00.55 archpodnet Sure. 10:08.27 Heather Ah, at least in the United States you know where it is more popular now is in Hawaii because there's a lot of limitations first you know like topographical ah terrain limitations but also limitations and where you can even go um and where you can dig. 10:12.56 archpodnet Oh yeah, that makes sense. 10:14.87 Andrew Um, oh right. 10:26.10 archpodnet M. 10:27.97 Heather And so that we're finding out we have an office in Hawaii that lidar is used more and more now and not just for archeology. Lots of other ah biology geology. Um, and so lidar I think it just depends on and where you're on where you're at and remember also I don't lidar costs money like sense. Just. 10:36.60 Andrew E. 10:47.30 archpodnet Um, oh yeah. 10:47.11 Andrew Um, yeah, a lot. 10:47.93 Heather You know? and so if you're in a so you have a small Crm firm. Um, you know they're looking at their return on investment. It doesn't make sense so know it is no. 10:56.14 archpodnet Although that stuff is coming down dramatically there's 3 to $4000 drones with lidar included that and it's not super great lidar. It's going to be close in lidar but it's lidar nonetheless. It depends on what you need, but that stuff is kind of coming down and that's you know. 11:09.16 Heather Sure. 11:10.53 Doug Actually you can go. You can go even less so you can get so off your shelf commercial drone maybe like around a thousand and then um, you can get lidar. You could just attach to your drone again. Not not super great. Um, and. 11:21.68 archpodnet Um, right? but getting there. 11:27.23 Doug But if you're doing like a so a small site and that's like a hundred and fifty two hundred bucks like like yeah for like actually like a quarter of the price you were quoing there Chris you could probably get something they can do maybe like five hundred Square meters in ah, a passover or. 11:40.14 archpodnet Um, yeah. 11:44.14 Doug Probably actually more it depends and you know it all comes down to resolution and stuff and you'd want to go slower to get more points and stuff like that for better because ah if you're paying 150 for lidar. You're not paying for great lidar but you know, ah. 11:54.88 archpodnet Well. 11:55.32 Andrew Right. 11:56.70 Heather But but but the other thing that you have to think about is it's not just about getting the data you have to ask somebody who knows what they're doing looking at it you know and and that costs money too. You know so with smaller companies as. 12:02.36 archpodnet Um, yeah, exactly yeah. 12:07.76 Andrew Ah, yeah. 12:11.30 Heather Exciting as it is and fun to use new tools and useful Sometimes it's not again, it's the returned on the investment for a small company. It doesn't make sense for them. You know? yeah. 12:19.42 archpodnet But that's actually 2 skillsets too though, right? It's the person to if you're doing it in house with like a drone. It's the person to fly the drone adequately with the right search patterns and things like that to get the right coverage especially for something like lidar and photogrammetry and things like that you can't just fly transect. Yeah, and well you have to be certified of course. Yeah. 12:26.78 Heather Yeah. 12:31.70 Andrew Are. 12:32.87 Heather With the license with the license. Yep. 12:39.13 archpodnet And and then somebody which could be somebody completely different to actually do the analysis but building off our last episode I'm going to tell Doug that pretty soon I'm going to say maybe next year Doug I'm just going to go go hole in with it I'm going to say you're going to sell tell chat Gpt to go lidar your sites and it's just going to launch drones from an Amazon facility. 12:56.10 Doug Oh bad. Well ah Chris well played bad well played well played. 12:56.82 Andrew Ah, ah yeah, that was great. 12:57.58 archpodnet And it's going to. Ah. 13:02.97 archpodnet Ah, ah listen if we just put if we just put lidar on all the Amazon delivery drones that are going to be coming out then we could just get the lot of the whole area lidar for free. Ah. 13:06.45 Andrew Oh you know you know, even though that's a joke that that was one thing I also wanted to bring up is even though light are super expensive as time goes by. There's just gonna be more lidar maps. So small companies might just use a lidar map that was produced like eight years ago 13:10.52 Heather Um, ah, that's an idea. 13:19.18 Heather Yes, like that's already sure Sure yeah. 13:21.16 archpodnet Um, oh yeah. 13:24.15 archpodnet Um, yeah for sure. Yeah, there is some? yeah. 13:25.97 Andrew You know so there will be more of it. No matter what? um. 13:27.88 Doug Yeah, they've actually lidared most of the UK now at least most of Scotland I mean the but the resolution it depends again like what do you? What do you need it for but it's actually pretty decent resolution. There's like massive chunks. 13:41.26 Andrew Yeah, it's usually pretty damn good. 13:41.42 archpodnet Um. 13:43.86 Heather But get seer. Yeah Crm is done based on what's required so you know again, what's that and the budget right? Exactly what And what's required. So if there's. 13:45.50 Doug Of ah of of the area done now which used to cost a small fortune. 13:50.95 Andrew Um, yeah. 13:54.40 archpodnet And the budget in the budget. 14:02.88 Heather I Mean there's sometimes there's tools that we can bring out that are going to make our work more efficient and so the client doesn't need to where where the experts are doing what we need to do within the budget. But um, if it's not required if you know if it's not required and it's going to cost more money is not going to happen because it. 14:22.22 archpodnet Um, yeah. 14:22.63 Heather Clients not paying us to play around a half fun. So yeah, yes. 14:24.73 archpodnet Um, yeah. 14:27.69 Doug Hey Heather um, as you're the last person. Ah well actually I guess I should say something as well. But do you have ah another myth. Um, that ah you'd like to throw out there. 14:39.58 Heather Well Doug as matter of fact I do um, mine mine. Ah um, mine is a little bit more and I've said this before but I'm gonna say it again because I think it's worth saying is that? um. 14:40.00 archpodnet Are. 14:41.71 Doug Ah, or or Misss I imagine you have several heather. 14:47.66 archpodnet Um. 14:55.21 Heather It is a myth that you cannot make money in this business you can um now if you're going to. It's just like anything when you're going in and you're you're doing work in any kind of profession and the entry level. 14:59.84 archpodnet Um. 15:12.68 Heather You're not going to make money right away. I mean you are. That's just the way it is and in in any business. Really you start off at a certain point Sometimes you can catapult to a higher level because you have some kind of a skill set or your education has allowed you to do that. But you're not jumping in to the highest point of your career. So The you can make money in this business but you have to go for It. You have to be strategic. It is your destiny that not I should say you're destiny, but it is It is up to you. You know it's not something you just sit back and allow to happen to you. It is a lot of. 15:45.96 archpodnet Yeah. 15:51.48 Heather Hard work.. There's some you know businesses or some professional professions. Um outside of archeology. Obviously that you know you step in you make money a lot of money because that's just you know it's just that business. But in this business if you want to make money. It is possible. You can do that. But it's going to take. A lot of initiative on your part and um, so it just it irritates me because I I hear this a lot you see it a lot in social media you hear it a lot from other people and you know what? honestly a lot of it's Big. It's an excuse not to go out. And grab your destiny go out and do you know what? you need to do to make money in this business. Um, so that would be mice my myth Slash soapbox. 16:35.35 archpodnet Ah. 16:40.40 archpodnet Okay. 16:41.73 Doug Ah, Matt like you're you're stealing. You're stealing my thunder there heather if you hadn't said it I would have like because I do those surveys of archeologists and like I can tell you there are millionaire archeologists like archaeologists who. 16:58.12 Heather Archeologist. 16:58.77 Doug Who make enough who who are making you know I'm not going throw out numbers. But you know 6 figures I can't give exact because of you know data protection stuff like that. But basically you know after a couple of years if they're if they're saving. 17:07.31 Heather Know. 17:14.45 Doug Um, and also I should say these are in places where there's low cost of living as well. Um, obviously you could you could be making 6 figures and um, like living in a um, a cardboard box in Manhattan basically because that's all you could afford off of that salary. For like ah apartment. But like we're talking. Yeah low cost of living places where it's not going to cost you 6 figures um to have a 1 bedroomroom apartment that you share with like 4 roommates or something. Um, ah you guys are in California so I'm sure you you kind of. 17:50.11 Heather And. 17:50.53 Doug Know all that stuff. But um, yeah, man like there's it's a range and like as Heather said like starting out and actually to be honest, like starting out is a bit rough in that like we usually require a degree. 17:53.39 archpodnet Um, yeah. 18:08.96 Doug And so like for the money you get for a degree is not great, but honestly, it's still well above minimum wage. Um, in most places I mean like you could maybe compare like minimum wage in California versus. You might be making less of that and like I know Alabama or something but you'll still be making more than that the minimum wages in Alabama um, it's not It's not great money but is still heads and shoulders above and I get so sick of people on like social media who'd be like. Oh you know I could leave archaeology and go ah bad groceries and make more money and one you can't and 2 usually the people that say that couldn't actually handle a job like that. Um, but man it's yeah, no, ah. 18:49.89 Heather No later. Yeah, and and it's also it's also as far as again, return on investments. Also you know there's there's It's not a job that requires you to to get a degree from a expensive University. So yeah. 18:56.53 archpodnet Yeah. 18:59.64 Andrew Ah, yup. 19:08.87 archpodnet Yeah, all right guys. Let's take a break now because we've got I'm sure a lot more to talk about in segment two back in a minute.