It’s almost Christmas and one thing you know for sure is that there will be
- Friends and Family
- Food
- Pictures of the above
The first two will probably never change, and this is a good thing. But tradition number 3 offers an opportunity to stand out. Maybe one of your friends will bring a Polaroid camera to try to wow the others with hipster nostalgia, but you can beat them by taking your Christmas Photography to a 2017 level instead of 1977 (the Polaroid 1000 Land camera was the best-selling camera of that year).
How? By capturing your Christmas Eve in 3D — For Free!
Here’s an example by Sketchfab‘s Phillip Alexeev:
Okay, it’s technically a Thanksgiving Turkey and it was processed with the photogrammetry software Reality Capture (which I will review in Q1 2017) which not free.
But chances are you just spend all your money on Christmas Gifts (hopefully from my 3D Scanning & Photogrammetry Holiday Gift Guide) so here are some free ways of making 3D scans through Photogrammetry — a technology that uses multiple, regular photographs and smart software:
- Use one of these 3 Free 3D Scanning Apps for your Smartphone (iOS & Android)
- Make photos with your smartphone or standalone camera and upload them to the free version of the web-based (also works on mobile browsers) of Autodesk ReCap 360 by following this tutorial
Some of these tools offer their own way of sharing the result in interactive 3D, but I advice you to download the 3D models and upload them to Sketchfab for easy sharing on Twitter and Facebook. Your friends can even view them in VR! (Something that will probably sound hipster nostalgic in the year 2057…)
If want your 3D-scanned Christmas Dinner (of Gifts, or Tree, or Friends in funny sweaters…) Retweeted, please /cc tag @3Dscanexpert in your Tweet.
Merry Christmas!
-Nick
