Fuel3D scanify

[leon-knook 4]

It is really hard to find a good handheld 3D scanner for a reasonable price. Now I see your results with this brand my last hope is at the lowest point. We had a demo of the two Artec scanners (Spider and Eva) and the results where disappointing (for that price level). Maybe our expectations are to high, maybe we want to make to fast a quality comparison with 2D printing. Thanks for sharing this nice review Arjan.

 

[oliv 0]

I received my scanner last week. I make some first tests. I try to make 3 shot from my son's head (ear to ear) without moving, crop the file and try to stitch then in meshlab as discribed on tutorial videos. That doesn't give good results. The 3 parts of visage are aligned but i have holes and protusions on nose. Before working on meshlab i export the file into .stl perhaps .ply work better (without volume thickness).

Then i try to scan a apple, an orange, a little white owl. Only a little part of the scan is accurate. I have to crop a lot to have something close to reality. I try to scan these items on my concrete floor or on a big textured carpet ( dark or clear) but i always have a fusing ( and deformation) between my item and the floor or carpet. Perhaps a little support under the item will help ?

I noticed the same thing : the target must not be to close of the subjet otherwise the target edge is fusing with the item. This is bad because it reduce the area of shoot.

 

[nallath 1,120]

Scanning is HARD. Hand held scanning is even harder. I did my master thesis on scanning and that only scratched the surface of 3D scanning.

It's a shame the fuel3D isn't open source, as i've got a few ideas how I could dramatically improve the accuracy and speed.

 

[fuel3d-oliver 0]

Hello everyone, it is a pleasure to join the forum and we are very keen to support the discussion with points we can help with.

We are also really pleased that this type of discussion is occurring as we want to tie our software development into feature sets and updates driven by end users. In the first instance we want to assure everyone that we will always be shipping the Fuel3D SCANIFY device with free software to support the functions of the scanner.

We are beta testing the new version of Fuel3D Studio and still plan to release this is 2Q15. We will address other points made in the forum over the coming days.

We are keen to engage with you all!

Thanks,

Oliver

[ultiarjan 1,223]

Hi Oliver, welcome!

would be great if you could be sharing some best practices and examples of successful scanning with the scanify.

with regard to your software "assurance" ... currently retailers offer the scanify at 3 price points (starter/plus/advanced), while its totally unclear (also for the retailer) what to expect in which package.

As far as I can now interpret the unclear message it should be something like;

starter > basic Fuel3D Studio for scanning, no stitching support, no mesh alteration except some very basic cropping

plus >Fuel3D studio, including stitching and more advanced mesh modifying, based on Uformia software.

advanced> customized solutions for special customers

When talking to Andrew (Fuel3d) during RapidPro2015 he assured me all users who ordered before a certain date, and basically paid for the "starter" would receive the "plus" software as a compensation for the long waiting times. He assured me I would receive the "plus" software, but it would be good to communicate a bit more clear about this....

Obviously I'm speculating with the above , it would be really helpful if you would be more clear on what to expect.

Any idea when in Q2 we can expect Fuel3D studio ?

It would also be appreciated if you could share some insights on what you think are some of the more fundamental limitations of the scanify technique, and what are the types of current limitations you expect to be improved with possible firmware updates.

 

[Simon-Fuel3D 0]

Hi

We recognise that we are late with this detail and the team is in the final throes of clarifying features and pricing.

SCANIFY will always come with free software and we expect that the free Fuel3D Studio Starter will provide the ability to capture and view models in multiple modes including full color, monocolor, wireframe and topographical.

Studio Starter will also include tools to light, crop and export your full color 3D scans to popular file formats such as .STL, .OBJ and .PLY.

Our thinking is that the free version of Fuel3D Studio will be ideally suited for advanced 3D professionals, who already utilize high end 3D software packages and do not require any additional features to help them process or manipulate their scans. However exporting for simple 3D printing will probably (note probably) also be included.

We are planning that up to 5 individuals will be able to download the free software per single SCANIFY device.

Stitching: whereby users can combine up to six scans to create a single model from multiple scans; and Automated registration: enabling the automatic alignment of multiple scans will probably be features of the paid-for versions of Fuel3D Studio. Like I said, we’re still working on this and promise to revert to the group as soon as we are able.

[nallath 1,120]

Why is the stitching in the paid only version and how is this stiching any better than say cloudcompare / meshlab / PCL?

Is the software also capable of only outputting a normal map so people can experiment with using a different system (say a structured light system, kinect one, project tango) for the 3D depth scaffolding?

[Simon-Fuel3D 0]

Hi forgive me I don't want to take over this post but to quickly answer the two questions

Why is the stitching in the paid only version and how is this stiching any better than say cloudcompare / meshlab / PCL?

Stitching is a paid for option, we felt that many users would already have some method of stitching so rather than charge everyone for something they may not need we felt it better to make it optional.

Our Stitching solution differs from the existing products on the market primarily due to its simplicity and automated nature.

Is the software also capable of only outputting a normal map so people can experiment with using a different system (say a structured light system, kinect one, project tango) for the 3D depth scaffolding?

When saving out obj or ply file format it is possible to save out normals

[olaf_nz 1]

Wow, I just received my Fuel3D Scanify after waiting almost a year, and I have to say I am somewhat underwhelmed.

The actual hardware appears very solid and professionally put together, nice packaging, etc, but the software itself seems very immature (seems very hard to get a green circle on the target (to allow you to actually take a photo), and the viewfinder image sometimes appears upside down).

But the most important is that the actual 3D results that I have been able to achieve so far have been nothing like the samples on the Fuel3D website. Particular issues seem to be what other people have noted, i.e. that bits like under peoples' noses don't really make an accurate shape. To be honest, looking at a scan of a face from the side, the overall shape is definitely not accurate at all, even though the number of points is very high (the scan meets the advertised "resolution", but perhaps the limitation of the technology means that the accuracy can be quite low).

There were also big disconnects in the 3D image.

One thing that may help is being able to stitch multiple scans together to make a 3D model, but this doesn't yet seem to be included in the base software, and based on the comments above it is unclear what level of functionality I can expect.

For those who have achieved good results, could you please give me some tips as to how to achieve them. I don't know if there is a Scanify-specific forum but I haven't found one yet, so I am posting here as it seems to be the most active community.

Thanks,

Anton

[ultiarjan 1,223]

Anton, I've not been able to put much time into my scanner yet, but I'll share results here when I have them..

There should be a software update "Q2" whenever that may be ... I'll see what I can learn next week at the 3d print show London.. If you want to try there beta stitcher you can mail them and ask the dropbox link.. but it's not very good imho..

[olaf_nz 1]

Thanks, much appreciated. Perhaps you should ask if they are willing to grant refunds too...

[Camelworks 0]

Hello . Playing with Scanify stitching option.

is there a guide anywhere about this?

[medicalmodeller 5]

I have just received my Fuel. I plan to use it to scan a whole hand in 360 degrees. I plan 12 scans. Can someone tell me if I have to put the target into every scan shot?

Once done I will use the advanced version of the software to stitch.

I will feed back!

[ultiarjan 1,223]

Yes you need the target in every shot. what you see as one shot is actually multiples in a fraction of a second, the target is needed to combine the "multiples of one shot".

The target is not used for the stitching of the scans, it will also not be in the same spot, as you have to re-position it for every scan.

Curious about your result....

[medicalmodeller 5]

Yes you need the target in every shot.  what you see as one shot is actually multiples in a fraction of a second, the target is needed to combine the "multiples of one shot".

The target is not used for the stitching of the scans, it will also not be in the same spot, as you have to re-position it for every scan.

Curious about your result....

 

Not having great success. Having almost 30 seconds between shots is a big issues. Handholding the scanner to get the whole hand and the target in frame is surprisingly difficult too.

I am not have a lot of luck with the stitching software either.

So all in all, I am not overly impressed!

[ivan-lipunov 15]

Hi, folks.

Just read an interesting news about sharing the Kinect and polarized glass. Sorry, couldn't find the original news in English, but just in case I will post the link here. Text mainly in Russian but with a translator from Google this should not be a problem. If someone has a Kinect and unnecessary glasses with polarization, it would be interesting to check the difference in the results. 8)

[nallath 1,120]

If someone has a Kinect and unnecessary glasses with polarization, it would be interesting to check the difference in the results. 8)

 

The article is bs. I've read the original paper and it looks almost nothing alike the press release.

[ivan-lipunov 15]

 

@nallath I.e. do you think that such a drastic increase scanning accuracy is impossible for Kinect? Or the text of news limping on both legs? If there is a link to the original news, please share it

[peggyb 170]

here it is:

http://web.media.mit.edu/~achoo/polar3D/camready/manuscript_iccv.pdf

this is the press article:

http://news.mit.edu/2015/algorithms-boost-3-d-imaging-resolution-1000-times-1201

Edited January 8, 2016 by Guest

[ivan-lipunov 15]

Thanks, @peggyb!

[nallath 1,120]

The point is, they aren't increasing the accuracy or resolution of the kinect. In their paper they mention that they strap a 15 mega pixel DSLR camera onto the kinect camera with a moving polarized lens. This camera needs 3 images to compute a normal map.

They then use the data from the kinect with the normal map to improve the data. However, you can make a structured light scanner with 3 images, which does not even need moving parts and would probably give you even better results.

They are making a very, very unfair comparison.

[ivan-lipunov 15]

Hmm... In that case the idea didn't make sense. Wouldn't it be easier to take the David and had to make two cameras the same distance along the radius of the left and right, thus interpolating the results of arrays of points?

[nallath 1,120]

Hmm... In that case the idea didn't make sense. Wouldn't it be easier to take the David and had to make two cameras the same distance along the radius of the left and right, thus interpolating the results of arrays of points?

 

Yes.

[yellowshark 153]

Just got a Fuel 3D email

We can’t quite believe that SCANIFY has already been on the market for over a year!

 

The team here figured there was no better time (than now) to consider purchasing our industry-leading 3D scanner. Why?

 

Well, today we’re releasing the new version of Fuel3D Studio software, which now:

1. Comes FREE with every SCANIFY 3D scanner.

2. Has new algorithms to boost SCANIFY’s 3D scanning capabilities to whole new levels.

3. Offers cloud processing for managing complex scans.

4. Enables you to stitch together up to 6 scans to create 360-degree models.

5. Is also available in advanced (annual subscription) levels with even more 3D too.

[nallath 1,120]

4. Enables you to stitch together up to 6 scans to create 360-degree models.

 

Seriously? Up to 6 scans? My scan software could handle 20+ without any issues...