3d scanners - anyone got one?

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Erasmus@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨3dprinting@lemmy.world⁩

Just wondering if anyone has any experience with them, got one, etc.

I had been eyeing the Revopoint brand but keep hesitating on buying. I don’t know anyone that has one and really would like to get more feedback. The Amazon reviews seem decent enough.

I am looking for something that can scan objects about hand size or larger and that I can walk around the object scanning. I don’t want to be limited to sticking the object on a scanning mat or turntable. I’m not going to be scanning minis (eg Warhammer). I do use the iOS and OSX platforms.

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monotremata@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
I've had pretty good results with photogrammetry, although the software I use is Meshroom, which isn't available for Mac. There are alternatives like Regard 3D and Agisoft Metashape, but I haven't tried them.

I do find it's pretty important to get a good surface for scanning, though. The technique that's worked best for me is to apply a thin layer of white tempera paint, and then flick on tiny spatters of blue tempera for texture. Tempera is nice because it washes off with water even after it's dried, and it has a nice matte quality that's useful for getting even lighting, which is important for the scan. If you've got an object where this is an unacceptable thing to apply to the surface, there are self-evaporating surface treatments you can get specifically for scanning, but they're crazy expensive, so I rely on tempera whenever I can get away with it.

I've looked at several of the scanners that are available, but for the price I'm not satisfied that they're enough better to make it worth it. Surface prep is still important, and the scanning software itself seems like a weak point for a lot of them. Meshroom is kinda slow, especially if you don't have an nvidia gpu, but it's free, which is hard to beat, and it's pretty surprisingly usable.

If you look on YouTube there are a bunch of folks who have made reviews of the Revopoint and Creality scanners. They seem alright, but not good enough to be worth hundreds of dollars to me.

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nyan@lemmy.cafe ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Maybe what you want is actually a phone app? I can’t give specific recommendations, but I know there are apps that will attempt to reconstruct a model from photos taken at different angles.

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- Erasmus@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I have tried a few of them without much satisfaction. Usually the scans are disappointing when it comes to the detail level. I want something that I don’t have to spend a lot of time cleaning up in blender or another 3d program.
  
  The other issue I have had is no matter how careful I am with moving the phone around the subject, often it will error out which is mind boggling frustrating. Go to quick, it errors, too slow it errors, turn to fast, errors, get mad and throw your phone - well you get the picture.
  
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  - Hazdaz@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    
    I have tried a few of them without much satisfaction.
    
    Same.
    
    Its a shame because I know the technology is ALMOST there, but just not quite workable. I am sure some people have gotten good results, but still looking for a better solution.
    
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  - rambos@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    If that is the only problem there are many solutions like this.
    
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  - mrfusion2000@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Most phone apps likely won’t reach the quality of a standalone scanner for a variety of reasons. For instance, a lot of the ones I’ve played with don’t optimize the shutter speed, which can wreck havoc when some captures contain motion blur.
    
    That said, have you tried the free 3d Scanner App yet for iOS? Yes, you may need to clean up your scans like any other phone app, but since it also lets you use the front-facing TrueDepth sensor as well as the rear, it can return a pretty darn good scan when it can combine that TrueDepth data with the usual photogrammetry point cloud. Plus, it’s got a bunch of post-processing tools to modify your scans afterwards, like cropping out extraneous elements using a box or a sphere, selecting mesh pieces to remove/retain, etc. It’ll also export to SketchFab as well as your usual 3d printable file formats.
    
    And no, I’m not affiliated with it; I’m just a happy user who was able to successfully use it to 3d print my doggo sleeping as well as scan some gallery exhibits.
    
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- yopyop@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  The word for that is photogrammetry. With this word you can look up for foss and non foss solutions. Some seem to work really fine.
  
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