From photos to 3d model using Autodesk Remake

Having read about using photos to make a 3d model some years ago, I searched and found a lot of information on what programs could do this and asked the question "just how good are the results?"
I'm finally following up on this and running some tests on Autodesk Remake.

A few programs you'll all know automatically with 123 Catch for mobile phones being pretty much the main one.

Autodesk was working on Memento a while ago and it has finally been released into the world as ReMake I spent 30 mins today while waiting on a new belt for my 3d printer to arrive, (it didn't, maybe tomorrow) and took it for a test drive.


Some years ago I was given an old man statue by a friend making fun of a certain milestone birthday. It has seen better times and is quite beaten up and is used as a door stop these days and I figured it would make a good test subject.

I'd been saving for a tripod for my Canon 60D to do this very thing and at $70.00 + for anything decent, I never thought the day would come, as it was a low priority.....until I went to the communal dumping area in my units. I found a tripod sitting there, I expected it to be broken.

To my childish excitement (a happy dance may have been seen by anyone looking on) it was in good condition and has now found a new home at my place. Why you'd throw something like this out despite its age rather than sell it is beyond me.

This was the very thing I'd been waiting for, I now had a turntable/carousel for painting etc and the tripod I needed to control the way the objects would be captured.

My most recent goal is to scan my own head and save it in my 3d program, 3ds Max, so I can make sure it will fit inside helmets of any description like my Cyberman helmet, the first one, was too small for my fat head and this will, I hope, allow me to use my scan to then modify the size of things like this in the future so they fit my or anyone's head.

I marked my painting carousel into 8th's and marked a point on the side so when turned it I could make repeatable stops around the object being photographed. My tiny kitchen really doesn't have the room need but I made do. It's lighting was extremely suspect with only a bulb and window light. 

I reset my camera from raw to jpg as I didn't want to be farting around with huge files and having to convert them for upload to ReMake.

Autodesk Remake, can do the calculations of the photos on your machine, or in the cloud. I hadn't checked if my system could handle it and carried on regardless. Long story short, it couldn't, not enough Ram apparently, so the cloud, it was.

A total of 41 photos were taken 8 around the base looking up, 8 a little higher 8 about level, 8 higher still starting to look down and 8 looking down upon the head. Where I got the last one from is any ones guess. lol

I loaded in the 41 photos and sent it off to the cloud and waited about 10 mins or less as I wandered off to do something else and when I got back this was the result.

A fully complete scan of my statue with a hole in the base that had left because the software realised it was the object the statue was sitting on OMFG!

A gap was missed between his legs, something I should have planed for but I love to plow on in without instructions, to see just how intuitive the interface is etc

After playing with some of the settings to make the background dark and a measurement box around the statue. I am stunned at just how good the software is as picking out the object and rejecting the back ground. My camera settings were just slapped into the camera so it wasn't over or under exposed and very little thought was given to it on purpose. 

The results are fantastic at first impressions and here is the resulting file for you to load into your copy of remake (I put that I was a mentor and not for commercial use) which is true, so I didn't have to part with any money I don't have anyway.

When you consider just how little effort I put into setting this up in every way it is bloody amazing. More tests to follow along with reading the instructions and looking at the tutorials lol

Any suggestions of what to try and scan next?


File: Test_1


Some alternative solutions

http://wedidstuff.heavyimage.com/index.php/2013/07/12/open-source-photogrammetry-workflow/

https://en.wikipedia.org/.../Comparison_of_photogrammetry...

Agisoft Photoscan: http://www.agisoft.com/
Acute 3D Context Capture: https://www.acute3d.com/
Reality Capture: https://www.capturingreality.com/Prod...
Pix4D: https://www.pix4d.com/
3DF Zephyr: http://www.3dflow.net/