3D Scanner DIY

The most innovating music videos I've seen as of late (House of Card' by Radiohead) has inspired me to investigate the process of creating 3d data animation. Aaron Koblin is one of the guys behind the scanning technology used in the video. These are very smart guys with all of the right resources and what they've come up with is beyond amazing. But I want to find a way to do this on my own. I started looking around for solutions when I came across the DAVID-LaserScanner a DYI 3Dscanner kit. Next thing you know I'm head deep in getting this ****ing thing to work. The good news is I got it to work after a few days of fiddling around. The not so good news is that in order to save the models I scanned I'll have to buy a licensed copy of the software. The genius behind this product is that if you have the time to spend tweaking your setup you can have a low priced 3D scanner at home that works moderately well. You can purchase a starter kit or do what I did and look around the house for parts. You can try the software out free but there are restrictions when saving object.
How does it work? Well the software does all of the hard work. The most complicated thing for me was printing out the calibration sheets and pasting them onto foam core. But that's just because I I'm not very good with cutting and pasting. After making your boards, align them with your webcam and run the David software. Once the calibration in David is done you're ready to scan your first object.

Although it is possible to scan an object by hand I had more success anchoring the laser to a pivot. I used servos to control the laser a small turntable. Also keep in mind, certain types of surfaces scan better than others. If you have problems scanning an object try a matte paint! Also keep in mind, in order to scan you'll have to spend several hours a night, at home, by your self, quietly sitting, in a very dark room. On the flip side, check out how cool this program really is. After spending way to much time with myself in the dark here is the payoff!
Not to shabby for my first try. Sure there are still a few tweaks I think I could make that can help to improve the end results. I'm looking into getting a better laser and using an HDVcam but for now I think this is perfect.
Although this is not the end goal it puts me one step closer to being able to scan live 3d data. My next experiment starting from scratch is to create a spinning scanner with multiple lasers and use Matlab for interpreting the data. This will require much more research and take much longer. Until then I'm going to buy a license of David and try to fine tune my setup.


www.david-laserscanner.com
www.velodyne.com/lidar


www.geometricinformatics.com