3D Laser Scanner

It seems like every week 3D scanning technology is getting easier and easier to get in your home, but this week one MacGyver-esque individual managed to build a 3D scanner out of a few custom parts and a pile of Lego bricks.
Pillipe Hurbain, who goes by “Philo” on his Website, constructed an earlier version of the 3D scanner last year but has recently taken it to another level by adding the only thing better than Lego bricks to his creation: lasers.

Objects to be scanned are placed on top of a small platform against two surfaces that create a reference for the software doing the scanning. A lego NXT device created by Philo then sweeps the red laser over the object and a webcam feeds all that info into the David laser scanner software to produce 3D LDraw files for creating lego parts out of the models. The models produced are surprisingly accurate and great for modeling some of the rounder objects you’d like to add to your lego collection.

Now Hurbain just needs to hook up with the makers of this recent fully-automated lego NXT factory and the self-replicating lego revolution can really begin.

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