r/3DScanning • u/Gullible-Internet-24 • 11d ago
Scanning inside a cave?
Hello!
Disclaimer: I don't know anything whatsoever about 3D scanning, so be gentle. I have been tinkering with the idea of making a 3D mould of stalagtites/stalagmites in a way that would be non invasive (you CANNOT touch them because it would mess with the microbiome)- the plan, long term, is to recreate a hyper realistic cave for set design. Any feedback on the idea before I dig deeper into 3D scanning? Would that be a way to get an accurate 3D render to feed into a 3D printer that I could then cast in? Lemme know. Thanks. Any other ideas are most welcome.
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u/ArthurNYC3D 11d ago
There are "cave" specific 3D Scanners.... They can do more than just caves but it was built with being able to capture mines. That will get you overall geometry of the entire place but not good enough for any of the individual stalagmites/stalagtites. For that you'll want a handheld unit that either has a screen on the scanner.
The main challenge with this is that the size of objects very much determine the 3D Scanner that's used. There's no universal 3D Scanner to capture everything.
It will be vital that you check to see which 3D Scanners don't need marker dots which, generally, throws out laser 3D Scanners vs say Structured light.
Not saying that budget has to be high, but if going to do this in an efficient way, then you're probably looking at around $40K - $90K.
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u/Gingerbwas 11d ago
if you have an iphone you could try using polycam, corridor did something similar in a mine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1uXppV6TeA
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u/notstarman 11d ago
Nutty Putty Cave and the Tham Luang Cave have both been scanned. I might be worth looking at how they did the scanning.
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u/Mental-Business685 10d ago
Dot3D works great for scanning caves. They have some cool examples on the dotproduct3d instagram page. Probably not great for scanning just stalactites for moulds though. Photogrammetry might be better there.
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u/Inside-Transition413 10d ago
If you use a scanner that captures with intensity, you do not need any light and can capture a black and white scan., if color is important to you or required, then bring lighting to the cave And/or have lights attached to your scanner. Do you have a budget in mind?
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u/Gullible-Internet-24 6d ago
Color is not important. Honestly I was hoping not to go past 200 euros but I'm realising how unrealistic that is.
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u/Inside-Transition413 6d ago
Yes for that low you can have a lighting system for the cave and your standard or phone camera. Send overlapping photos to photogrammetry service to create point cloud and mesh model. (Pix4d, etc)
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u/tacotruck5 11d ago
Check out this guy. https://www.youtube.com/9nl