We had an interesting chat with the folks from AESUB and discovered several ingenious accessories for 3D scanning.
The company is perhaps best known for their scanning sprays. These are used to cover up misbehaving reflective and transparent surfaces on scanned parts, which normally confuse scanning equipment. The best part of these sprays is that they automatically evaporate over time, leaving the parts unchanged. I’ve tested these sprays and they work extremely well, and we continue to use them in our workshop.
Their sprays came in three colors, each of which indicates the usage time: four hours, twelve hours, and permanent. They’ve now filled the gap in their spray portfolio with a new spray (Diamond) that lasts less time, enabling more rapid turnaround. They’ve also added a transparent spray, which enables capture of color textures for scanned objects.
I had thought that the company was doing well with the scanning spray products, but it turns out they have quite a few other products related to 3D scanning.
One of the consumables used by some 3D scanners is “dots”. These are highly reflective stickers that are placed on scan subjects. They help the 3D scanner register its current location in 3D space and ensure tracking continues properly.
However, applying dots to a subject is a huge amount of work — and removing them after the scan is even more work. AESUB seems to have taken that concern and come up with several products to simplify the use of scanning dots.
Of course, they supply a variety of dots that you can peel off and stick manually, but there are more interesting approaches.
Here we see a “dot applying tool”, much like a packing tape gun. The idea is to load it with a spool of dot tape and then repeatedly touch the subject, depositing a dot each time.
Another approach is this unusual “dot tape”. The dots appear on the tape at random intervals, meaning the tape is designed to be directly applied to the subject, and the dots are instantly ready to be scanned. This reminds me of those “seed tapes” you see in gardening.
For those in a big hurry, they have a number of “dot gadgets” that you can simply place beside the subject. These provide dots facing different directions, making them ideal for scanning in 360 degrees.
Finally, for the laziest 3D scanning operators, they have some loose dots, which can literally be tossed around the subject as shown here. These provide reflective surfaces on all sides, and are easily seen by scanners.
Once the scan is completed, a special tool uses magnets to quickly pick them all up!
Scanning was never this easy.
Via AESUB
