Quick 2d to 3d with Archipelis
I came across Archipelis out there on the web. A tool designed to take 2d free hand drawing and turn it into 3d objects. I was instantly struck with the simplicity of just being able to draw. It is certainly not aiming at the high end 3d engineer market, but it is so simple and easy to use that I think many people may find the approach of use. If nothing else for just prototyping things in 3d.
You are able to import a photo and draw around it, the resulting object takes the texture as that photo. Objects can then be exported in standard formats like OBJ. I am not going to explain all the features, as their site is the best place for that.
I did do a very quick exploration with some of the masked off images I had of Roo from some other real to virtual experiments. None of this approach aims to replace the proper way to scan and capture real objects, but as a quick way to see what works, with a simple “at home” approach is it good to explore the potential.
I imported the image into Archipelis, drew around roo and then exported him to a standard format. I then used another tool to convert him into one of the internal metaverses we have going.
The result is not perfect, but it was quick. The Roovatar from real life to virtual in just a few minutes.
It has also been very theraputic to just draw and model in 3d in a freeform way, very similar to the prim modelling we see in SL. Lots of curves, the ability to cut away and add etc. Its very impressive.
August 27th, 2007 at 13:52
3d Som was mentioned in a previous post (ARTag). Would this be a poor man’s version of the same thing?
August 29th, 2007 at 14:06
@karagines I think things like pictomod are more like 3d SOM. they use reference photos in all rotations to create a model and texture it. Archipelis is more about free hand drawing and converting that to 3d. With the nice addition you can draw around and texture from a single photo
September 22nd, 2007 at 02:47
How would one get the Archipelis model into Second Life?
January 8th, 2008 at 12:01
[...] It seems to be safari week here on eightbar. The guys over at archipelis told me about their new sculpty exporter for second life. They have some sample files here. I wrote about Archipelis a little while ago as it is such a simple way to draw and create complex objects I really enjoyed using it. Now that there is the potential to create sculpties, and quite complex ones at that it has got even better. I created the rhino from the sample whilst I sort out my own models just to see it work. I think you will all agree it is very good. [...]
August 21st, 2008 at 16:47
[...] has previously covered software and methods for taking 2d images to 3d models here on Eightbar. Michael Ackerbauer here at IBM just brought this research from Volker Blanz and Thomas [...]