3D Scanning Newsletter - December

December's newsletter has been sent out and is also posted on our website.

Articles this month include:

How 3D Imaging is Changing the World: The last decade has seen some amazing advances in 3D imaging technologies, from the introduction of light weight, hand held systems to new advances in large scale scanners. With the technology evolving rapidly, we talked to our President and founder, Michael Raphael, about the current state of the industry and what innovations we can expect to see in the coming years.

VA Medical Center BIM: When Clark Constuction needed to include an existing building into a BIM (Building Information Model) they were creating, they turned to Direct Dimensions to help save time and money.

Football Player Digital Double: When tasked with creating a commercial for the AFL, Eye Candy, a commercial editing firm in DC, decided to use 3D animations based on a real person. Our team utilized many different scanning technologies and software to create a realistic digital double.

3D Scanning an Historic Sculpture

This month saw the completion of major project that began, for us, in 2007.

The Genius of Connecticut bronze sculpture, standing eighteen feet tall, started its life perched at the top of the statehouse in Hartford in 1876. It was damaged in a hurricane in 1938 and subsequently placed in a storage facility, where it stayed until 1942 when it was melted down for the war effort. All that was left of the sculpture was a full size plaster model which was later coated in bronze and displayed in the lobby.

In 2005 the Connecticut State Legislature decided to recreate the original Genius of Connecticut sculpture in bronze and place it back atop the Capitol Building.

Direct Dimensions was brought in to 3D laser scan the eighteen foot sculpture in 2007. A 3D model was created from the scans and the model was used by Polich Tallix foundry to create a new bronze sculpture using traditional casting techniques.

Earlier this month, the completed bronze recreation was installed in its temporary home in the Capitol lobby. Check out the video below for footage of the sculpture being installed.

ShapeShot wins "Best Pitch" Award at First Maryland TechCrawl

On December 16th, the Emerging Technology Center (ETC) of Baltimore held the first Maryland TechCrawl.

According to the ETC, "At the first Maryland TechCrawl, 21 local technology companies presented their products or services. The event drew people from the Baltimore - Washington, D.C. region, bringing startup companies, investors, executives, community connectors and local media together to forge partnerships, increase visibility and showcase the new technologies."

Direct Dimensions took the opportunity to present our new ShapeShot technology. It was a wonderful chance to get some feedback and refine our message.

The event also included a pitch competition where each of the 21 companies had 60 seconds to deliver their best product pitch/demo. At the end of the evening the ETC's board of directors chose the best pitch. We were honored to have ShapeShot chosen as the winning pitch.

It was a great event and we are looking forward to next year!

You can read more about the event here.

Case Study: Reverse Engineering WWII Jeep Frame

DDI Vintage Jeep Frame Presentation 2008

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Recently, Direct Dimensions had the unique opportunity to scan a 1940’s Bantam Jeep underframe. The Bantam BRC-40, alongside models like the Willys MA and the Ford GP, were among the first Jeeps produced by the U.S. Army. Due to their extensive use in WWII, they quickly became iconic of the war and of the era in general.

This particular Bantam frame, provided by client Todd Paisley, posed a challenging 3D problem, as it had rusted and corroded to the point where it was no longer usable. Direct Dimensions was brought in to reverse engineer the component in order to produce a digital model upon which new underframes could be manufactured.

DDI engineers Michael Lent and John Kelbel completed the scan in one day using a 12’ Platinum FARO Arm paired with the Laser Design SLP 2000 laser line scanner. The SLP 2000 proved ideal for this challenge, as its dual cameras and wide laser range reduce scanning passes, saving time while still ensuring high accuracy.

According to John Kelbel, the heavily warped underframe was scanned in sections from two separate positions, both from the front of the frame and from the back. These scans were then digitally combined using Rapidform software. Using Rapidform XOR software, the data taken from the scan was reverse engineered to produce a CAD model of the original ‘design-intent’ of this part suitable for manufacturing. The final deliverable allows the production of components based upon the historic Bantam underframe for several generations of Jeeps to come.

You can see additional documentation on the Jeep Reverse Engineering Project, including an interactive 3D model on our website.

3D Scanning Newsletter - November

November's newsletter has been sent out and is also posted on our website.

Case studies this month include:

Reproducing a Rare Darwin Bust - In honor of the 150th anniversary of On the Origin of Species and 200th anniverary of his birth, the National Academy of Sciences commissioned a replication of a one-of-a-kind bronze Darwin bust.

3D Imaging Brings Robots to Life - 3D laser imaging technology helps rapidly create a digital CAD model of hand-sculpted robotic components for Hanson Robotics.

Monkey Skull Sculptures - 3D scanning of primate skulls helps artist create sculpture series

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Thankful in 2009

Despite the economic challenges of this past year, Direct Dimensions has been fortunate to have had a very successful 2009 – our 15th year in business! In the spirit of the Thanksgiving holiday, we would like to express our thanks to:

Our great customers - thank you for entrusting us with your ships, your sculptures, and your airplanes and everything else you send to us, or send our team out to scan for you, including Northrop Grumman, Jeff Koons Studios, Carlson & Co, Lockheed Martin, FBI, Clark Construction, Harley Davidson, Nurad, International Truck, John Milner Associates, National Gallery of Art, Praxair, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, and all of our other new and returning customers!

Our great vendors - thank you for providing us with top-notch 3D products and for all of your support including Basis Software, Dimensional Imaging, FARO Technologies, Geomagic, Innovmetric, Konica Minolta, Kreon, Laser Design, Pointools, Rapidform, Verisurf, and Vialux.

Our great employees - thank you for all of your creativity, initiative, dedicated long hours, last minute travel, and all of your hard work everyday. It is very much appreciated.

Our employee’s families - thank you for sharing your loved ones with us, probably more than you’d prefer.

Our friends and partners at SME, CMSC, SPAR, GBTC, ARC, Trilumen, and especially Mimic Studios, practically our L.A. office.

And a special thank you to Gene Roe for supporting us so often in his blog. Gene puts out a fantastic blog about the 3D scanning industry called Lidar News at http://lidarnews.com which everyone should check out.

And thank you all for reading our monthly newsletters and regular blog postings, and please have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Digitally Preserved and Reconstructed Coffeehouse Now Complete!

This Friday, November 20th is the grand opening celebration for the newly reconstructed Charlton's Coffee House in Colonial Williamsburg. It is the only structure of its kind, an authentic 18th-century coffeehouse, in the United States.



You can read about the events planned for opening day here.

Direct Dimensions was lucky to be involved as part of the pre-construction team, utilizing our 3D technologies to help document the coffeehouse's 18th century foundation.

To learn more about how, keep reading.

Case Study: Digital Preservation of Revolutionary Coffeehouse
In the summer of 2008, Direct Dimensions visited Williamsburg, Virginia to document the condition of the existing remains of an original ‘coffee house’ that George Washington was known to frequent.

This particular coffee house, owned by Richard Charlton during the 1760's, was one of several that had flourished in the area due to their popularity in London and abroad. Coffee houses of that time were known for more than their coffee, tea, and chocolate served to the colonials - they also hosted informal and spirited intellectual conversation. This activity made Charlton's coffee house one of Williamsburg's political and business ‘hotspots’ of the time.

DDI worked with the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation to laser capture what remains of the coffee house’s stone foundation. Of the original structure, only part of the brick foundation and some wooden fragments are still intact. We scanned the exposed foundation and the earthen floor with our Surphaser HSX spherical scanner.

This unique scanner captures extremely accurate and high resolution data over a medium-range (2-10 meters). The Surphaser is a non-contact laser scanner so none of the delicate centuries-old foundation was harmed during the data capture process.

The raw 3D ‘point cloud’ data gathered in Williamsburg was then digitally modeled back at the Direct Dimensions facility in Baltimore, Maryland. The final surface mesh model can be used to analyze the archaeological features found at the site.

Additional digital preservation projects:
Historic Site Scanning
Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers

Software Overview and Tips for Dense Point Cloud Processing

Last month we posted a presentation that Michael gave at SME's Aerospace Measurement, Inspection & Analysis Conference on Reverse Engineering Airplane OMLs. One of the issues that often comes with large scan jobs, such as airplane scans, is how to handle massive amounts of 3D scan data.

At that same conference Michael and Peter Kennedy, our production manager and a specialist in processing data from large jobs, also gave a presentation on tips and software for dealing with dense point cloud data sets. You can view the presentation below.

DDI Dense Point Cloud Processing Presentation Oct2009

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If you have any questions, feel free to contact us. We're happy to help!

TEDx MidAtlantic 2009

We had a wonderful experience at TEDx MidAtlantic, meeting and talking to new people, exchanging ideas with them, and of course, imaging them in 3D with our new face imaging concept.

All of the speakers were thought-provoking, but we really connected with the presentation by the first ever CTO for the Federal government - Aneesh Chopra. Mr. Chopra spoke primarily about utilizing technology to improve peoples lives, particularly through medical technology and innovation. He even briefly talked about facial prosthetics which is a topic that has always been very important to us at Direct Dimensions.



Also, if you had a ShapeShotTM 3D face image taken at the event, you will be receiving an email shortly with a link to your very own personal website with your 3D face.

It was really a special day. Thanks to Dave Troy and all the TEDx MidAtlantic volunteers for making it all happen.

Direct Dimensions' President Michael Raphael poses two attendees for their ShapeShot

3D Model of Lincoln's face included in "Lincoln, Life-Size"

Last summer we had the opportunity to scan an amazing piece of history: an original life mask of Abraham Lincoln cast in 1860 by Leonard Volk. The life mask is owned by the Kunhardt family, who are 5th generation Lincoln scholars, and was scanned for research purposes for a documentary they were making. You can read about the original Lincoln lifemask project here.

High quality renderings of the digital model made for the documentary have subsequently been used by Philip B. Kunhardt and Peter W. Kunhardt in their book Lincoln, Life-Size.



The book examines images of Lincoln's face, each page containing various portraits at life size. As the owners of one of the largest 19th century photo collections, the authors have a specific interest in comparing how Lincoln’s actual appearance fares against artistic renderings of the man, as well as the often-distorted daguerreotypes and photographic media of the mid-1800s.

Lincoln, Life-Size is being released today and can be purchased online or at a bookseller near you. If you want to see some incredible images, photographic and digital renderings, make sure to check out this book.

Additional 3D Lincoln reading:

Lincoln Memorial: Digitally Preserving America's National Monuments
Bringing Lincoln To Life in Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian