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Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

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11–20 of 27 posts

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#11
That’s going to depend a whole lot on their budget, your capabilities, and the final requirements — is this being used for visuals, or metrology?

I have suggestions for getting visual fidelity but if you’re looking for an explicit 3D model maybe that’s not what you’re going for. (There are new approaches like NeRFs and Gaussian splats that don’t use traditional 3D formats, but look truly great.)

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#12
post #9

You would need an actual 3d scanner. I've used iPhone 12 Pro and scaniverse to scan some things outside my home but it wasn't as accurate as I would like. The more accurate you want to get the more money you will generally have to spend.

I tried Scaniverse with my iPhone 16 Pro Max’s “LiDAR” (in quotes because people tell me it’s not “real” LiDAR) and I’ve been very happy with the results. I guess the sensor hardware has improved since the iPhone 12?

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#13

If you are on a budget maybe check out Creality's new offerings in this area. For ~$1500 you can have a handheld 3d scanner. Their marketing materials show a scanned Hummer hood and a car door. I have never used it though so I am not endorsing it. https://store.creality.com/products/cr-scan-raptor-3d-scanne...

I've had a terrible experience with the low/medium end 3d scanners in the few thousand range. They are too much of a pain to be worth using.

Obviously there are usecases, but man are they a pain.

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#14
Quick and easy? Phone apps:

• Scaniverse - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/scaniverse-3d-scanner/id154143...

• Polycam - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/polycam-3d-scanner-lidar-360/i...

• Luma3D - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/luma-3d-capture/id1615849914

Higher quality (potentially), more time/effort (definitely)? Dedicated camera + desktop apps:

• RealityCapture (free) - https://www.capturingreality.com

• Metashape (paid) - https://www.agisoft.com/

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#15
“ client is interested in 3D scanning cars, outdoors and in varying conditions.”

The implications of these requirements (ie car _in specific location_) is not obvious to me. What are they planning to do with the model?

Have they customized the frame and / or paintjob or is it a typical production model?

In the latter case it would likely be easier to source a 3d model rather than scan it.

If it’s some “playing around” Luma is pretty good nerf based scanner.

Without nerf you might have a hell of a problem with the specular surfaces.

If it’s production use with a budget I would recommend subcontracting the scanning - there are parties professionally doing this.

Re: Ask HN: How to produce a 3D scan of a car from a mobile phone?

#20
If you are looking for an existing car, there's a lot of sites selling pre-made vehicle models for pretty much anything, that's probably going to be higher quality and need less cleanup than anything you can get from scanning.

One of the problems you'll have is photoscanning does not do well with shiny surfaces, as the highlights move and confuse the reconstruction. If this were a model or maquette or something, they would probably spray paint it matte before scanning, which I doubt you want to do with a real car.

If you need high quality, honestly I'd just hire a hard surface modeller. There are people out there who make cars all day every day. If you just need low quality, Unreal's RealityScan app, Polycam, or AliceVision are good places to start.

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