A new mobile 3-D scanner can help you scan physical objects, including your family members
It’s amazing how many designs are available to print on a 3-D printer. Take a look at Thingiverse. Never again will you want for a chip clip or bust of Yoda. But the most impressive thing is something you make yourself. It’s time to take the next step.
Several increasingly affordable technologies can help you scan people and physical objects—imagine a little model of your family sitting on your desk—capturing the geometry needed for 3-D printing. Photogrammetry uses software to analyze a series of standard digital photographs of a subject, taken from many angles. You can try it yourself using Autodesk ’s 123DCatch, free and available on most platforms.
The problem is, the process requires many photos, an uncluttered background and plenty of wait time, as your photos get crunched into a model in the cloud. And after all that? Results can be downright terrifying. With practice, you can capture OK models, and it’s great to not need extra hardware, but there’s a better way.
Real-time Scanning Feedback
While you are scanning, the Skanect app (on Mac or PC) reveals the geometry that the Structure Sensor is recording.
Infrared scanning is another approach now catching on. Microsoft ’s Kinect Xbox motion controller—forward-looking but not always popular with gamers—can actually be used to make great quality scans. You just need software such as Occipital’s Skanect. The downside: The Kinect must always be connected to a power supply, so it’s probably not going with you out into the wild.
Luckily, there’s an untethered alternative to the Kinect, built for 3-D scanning. Occipital’s Structure Sensor, a former Kickstarter hit, first shipped in 2014.
The sleek, well-engineered aluminum gadget is about the size of a Snickers bar, and starts at $350. It snaps onto your late model iPad with a sturdy, included bracket. You could also use any recent iPhone 6 or 6s model. (You may want to 3-D print a scanner-holding case for it.) The Structure Sensor has its own lithium-ion battery, so you have to charge it. But it won’t drain your phone’s juice while you’re out scanning.
When you point the sensor at the subject of your scan, it fires out a pattern of infrared laser dots, invisible to human eyes. Objects closer to the laser reflect brighter dots, and software turns the brightness info into a 3-D model. As you move around the object you are scanning, the Structure’s app gives you a live view of the emerging scan. This is helpful, as you have to get above and below the subject to make sure you cover all of the angles.
So what are you going to scan first? Your family, of course.
Over the holidays, I took it as a challenge to scan most members of my extended family. When scanning my children, I was struck by what a unique snapshot in time I have of them now. When I got them right, that is. It can be hard to get the young ones to sit still for a clean scan. Also, glasses and shiny surfaces don’t work well, so you may have to experiment.
Once you’ve scanned your people, it’s action-figure time. Export the models as an industry-standard STL file to send to your printer.
The Skanect software will let you fill holes in your model and clean up your scan for better printing. (A pro version of Skanect, sold in a $500 bundle with the Structure Sensor, lets you export more detailed scans.)
To further tweak your models, use Autodesk’s excellent Meshmixer Mac or PC app, which has lots of powerful tools for preparing your models for printing.
As I print out the statues of my own offspring, I can’t help but feel that this is the modern take on marking a child’s height on the door jamb.
They’ll never be this age—or shape—again.
Resource: http://www.wsj.com
It’s amazing how many designs are available to print on a 3-D printer. Take a look at Thingiverse. Never again will you want for a chip clip or bust of Yoda. But the most impressive thing is something you make yourself. It’s time to take the next step.
Several increasingly affordable technologies can help you scan people and physical objects—imagine a little model of your family sitting on your desk—capturing the geometry needed for 3-D printing. Photogrammetry uses software to analyze a series of standard digital photographs of a subject, taken from many angles. You can try it yourself using Autodesk ’s 123DCatch, free and available on most platforms.
The problem is, the process requires many photos, an uncluttered background and plenty of wait time, as your photos get crunched into a model in the cloud. And after all that? Results can be downright terrifying. With practice, you can capture OK models, and it’s great to not need extra hardware, but there’s a better way.
Real-time Scanning Feedback
While you are scanning, the Skanect app (on Mac or PC) reveals the geometry that the Structure Sensor is recording.
Infrared scanning is another approach now catching on. Microsoft ’s Kinect Xbox motion controller—forward-looking but not always popular with gamers—can actually be used to make great quality scans. You just need software such as Occipital’s Skanect. The downside: The Kinect must always be connected to a power supply, so it’s probably not going with you out into the wild.
Luckily, there’s an untethered alternative to the Kinect, built for 3-D scanning. Occipital’s Structure Sensor, a former Kickstarter hit, first shipped in 2014.
The sleek, well-engineered aluminum gadget is about the size of a Snickers bar, and starts at $350. It snaps onto your late model iPad with a sturdy, included bracket. You could also use any recent iPhone 6 or 6s model. (You may want to 3-D print a scanner-holding case for it.) The Structure Sensor has its own lithium-ion battery, so you have to charge it. But it won’t drain your phone’s juice while you’re out scanning.
When you point the sensor at the subject of your scan, it fires out a pattern of infrared laser dots, invisible to human eyes. Objects closer to the laser reflect brighter dots, and software turns the brightness info into a 3-D model. As you move around the object you are scanning, the Structure’s app gives you a live view of the emerging scan. This is helpful, as you have to get above and below the subject to make sure you cover all of the angles.
So what are you going to scan first? Your family, of course.
Over the holidays, I took it as a challenge to scan most members of my extended family. When scanning my children, I was struck by what a unique snapshot in time I have of them now. When I got them right, that is. It can be hard to get the young ones to sit still for a clean scan. Also, glasses and shiny surfaces don’t work well, so you may have to experiment.
Once you’ve scanned your people, it’s action-figure time. Export the models as an industry-standard STL file to send to your printer.
The Skanect software will let you fill holes in your model and clean up your scan for better printing. (A pro version of Skanect, sold in a $500 bundle with the Structure Sensor, lets you export more detailed scans.)
To further tweak your models, use Autodesk’s excellent Meshmixer Mac or PC app, which has lots of powerful tools for preparing your models for printing.
As I print out the statues of my own offspring, I can’t help but feel that this is the modern take on marking a child’s height on the door jamb.
They’ll never be this age—or shape—again.
Resource: http://www.wsj.com
No comments:
Post a Comment