Gadgetory

what you see in science fiction's tech fiction is very quickly becoming possible if you point the structure sensor out into the world you're capturing the world it's like giving some sort of a superpower to average Jodha budget what if you could give your mobile device a new sense the ability to not just capture the world in two-dimensional images but to actually understand it in three dimensions the structure sensor does just that it's the world's first 3d sensor for mobile devices what I really am excited about the destructor sensor is it makes it so easy you can clip it to a mobile device and walk around your world basically pull your world into a digital form my name is Jeff powers and I'm a founder of occipital we're passionate about giving devices the ability to see and understand the world around them this isn't about taking pictures it's about computer vision and interaction we call it spatial computing it's much bigger than just us and it's going to change the way we interact with the world let me show you what you can do with that you'll be able to capture every dimension of an entire room in a matter of seconds and you can send a model to your phone so you can get any dimension you need at any time you'll be able to easily capture and send three-dimensional objects across town or across the world and make decisions together even when you're apart you'll be able to play games games where the real world becomes the game world building hardware is something we have never done occipital is fundamentally a software company so to create this device we had to teach ourselves Hardware design and we were lucky enough to work with some of the best technology companies in the world not the least of which is primeSense the company whose technology actually powered the original Kinect applying 3d technology to mobile devices is an immense challenge our secret is geared to make that the panel 360 and read lays there so this is a team that can actually pull this off structure works by capturing a pattern of invisible laser projected light which allows you to measure thousands of distances all at once the iPad has arguably the best user experience of any tab and it was important to us to go the extra mile to make structure work specifically with it structure latches securely to your iPad it connects via the new lightning connector the end result is actually thermal design mechanical design industrial design open put together into one perfect object structures single piece body is machined from high-grade anodized aluminum it serves as both a beautiful exterior and as a thermal core that keeps the precision optics inside at an optimal temperature what's really important is get a platform out there and see what developers do with it for the first time you'll get an SDK that lets you tap into a 3d sensor on iOS you'll have complete low-level access to the sensor and if you don't feel like processing raw depth data you can tap into the high level API just write your application in Xcode and hit deploy you can even launch your app on the App Store if you want to develop on another platform we're giving you everything you need a USB hacker cable open source drivers and even open CAD specs so you can 3d print your own attachment for almost anything so this started about a year ago where we have to measure the contours of an organic surface turns out that's a very hard problem the only available solution cost twenty thousand dollars and that that's ridiculous so we started to build our own we looked at what was available out there at the intersection of computer vision and surface measurement and we couldn't find a single solution that was compelling the 3d scanners ever precise cost tens of thousands of dollars and the ones that were affordable one processor today that changes we're only just beginning to explore the possibilities of capturing the world in 3d 3d printing is an amazing tool it converts a digital file into a physical object some call it an industrial revolution the eora 3d scanner does the exact opposite of the 3d printer it lets artists makers and designers captured objects and surfaces and turn them into high-quality 3d models and use them as part of the creative process we knew we had to use a smart phone smaller phones are simply amazing we use them to take pictures edit videos update social media even for gaming the eora 3d scanner is powered entirely by your smartphone using it as easy just open the app and press scan it'll automatically adjust focus and exposure and drive a green laser to scan your object as it sweeps we take over 1,000 photos and analyze them in real time to give you a 3d model a typical scan takes three to five minutes and gives you a full-color mesh with up to eight million points with a range of one meter you can capture objects big as one accurate to less than 100 microns that's the thickness of a single sheet of paper when engineering the scanner we had one objective in mind precision all that's possible thanks to a design that's both beautiful and machined from a solid block of aluminium with over 35 milling operations we've designed it to be both robust and precise the light ring gives you quick visual feedback and the adjustable knob lets just secure any model smartphone the green laser let's just scan in any lighting conditions as most cameras are twice as sensitive to green than any other color for water type models we also design a Bluetooth turntable it will sync to your scanner and rotate your object to make sure you get every angle your bat digitizer quickly turns the things in your world into 3d models that you can modify improve share and 3d print today we're gonna take a look at how it works and do a quick run-through the first thing is to find a nice sturdy spot for your digitizer pay special attention to lighting and make sure that there are no bright lights in the cameras field of view and avoid sunlight in Windows as much as possible once you've found a sturdy spot for your digitizer and it's all plugged in and ready to go you can download the maker way for digitizer software from our website MakerBot comm the first time you open maker way for digitizer software you'll be prompted with the welcome screen this will guide you through a simple three step calibration process to ensure that your scanner is ready to go let's take a look at how that works the first step is to ensure that your filter is over your camera lens if it's not slide it over and ensure it clicks into place the next step is camera calibration to perform it take your calibration tool ensure that the a is pointing upward and fit the peg on the bottom into the center hole in the turntable click in the software to continue after camera calibration you then need to perform turntable calibration your calibration tool should be flipped over so that the B is pointing upward and again the peg on the bottom fits into the center hole in your turntable and click in the software to continue finally you need to calibrate your lasers remove the insert from the calibration tool make sure the C is pointing upward and place it in the center of the turntable as shown click in the software to continue now you're all calibrated and ready to scan once you've calibrated and you've selected an object you want to scan go ahead and place it in the center of the turntable Center is usually best but it's not always the case feel free to experiment with object positioning in the software you'll see the new scan screen you'll notice the camera feed is very dark this is good this tells you that there are no lights flooding your camera now select the shade of your object there are three settings light medium and dark select the one that best suits your object then click start scan to get the whole process moving you'll notice your first laser will turn on and your object will begin to rotate the laser light is reflecting off the object into the camera sensor and the software is processing it into a 3d point cloud all on screen after the first rotation completes the lasers will switch and it will do another full rotation you will then have to point clouds that will then be merged and meshed together into a 3d printable water-type mesh once your scan is complete you can choose to share it on Thingiverse which will prompt you to take a photo or you can share it with your other social networks you can also save a copy as an STL directly onto your hard drive or hit the print with makerware button which will open it into a maker or window where you can export it to a 3d printable file and bring it right over to your MakerBot replicator 2 and get it printing on the right you'll see the original MakerBot gnome and on the left you'll see the digitized and printed note you'll notice a slight loss in detail but the MakerBot digitizer still makes an excellent replica of your original model