It’s very subtle, but if you saw [Greg]’s 3D printed stone to Lego adapter while walking down the street, it might just cause you to stop mid-stride.
This modification to real objects begin with [Greg] taking dozens of pictures of the target object at many different angles. These pictures are then imported into Agisoft PhotoScan which takes all these photos and converts it into a very high-resolution, full-color point cloud.
After precisely measuring the real-world dimensions of the object to be modeled, [Greg] imported his point cloud into Blender and got started on the actual 3D modeling task. By reconstructing the original sandstone block in Blender, [Greg] was also able to model Lego parts.After subtracting the part of the model above the Lego parts, [Greg] had a bizarre-looking adapter that adapts Lego pieces to a real-life stone block.
It’s a very, very cool projet that demonstrates how good [Greg] is at making 3D models of real objects and modeling them inside a computer. After the break you can see a walkthrough of his work process, an impressive amount of expertise wrapped up in making the world just a little more strange.
That is really, really, really cool. It doesn’t really come across in the image at the top… but the video is insanely eye opening.
[Greg]’s skill and the overall effect are amazing.
Though if that 3D printed corner fit perfectly on the real rock the *first time* without any trimming, I have to say I’m more amazed with Photoscan; as I didn’t know such accuracy was possible.
I’ve never even heard of PhotoScan until now, and I didn’t even think it was possible to take photographs and turn them into a 3D map purely because of quality issues. I thought it could only be done with “3D scanners” such as the Kinect.
No shit this photoscan software beats the pants off everything on the market right now. I’ve tried it a bit and it’s incredible.
it’s not cheap though, and the pro version is very very expensive.
Super cool. I assume he has his parts printed by Shapeways? Owning a high-res full color printer is unlikely, and while hand painting is possible it sure looks like he’s using the textures from his models.
Also he never once used Blender in the video. He used Z-brush and 3dstudio max.
There is a little mistake: [Greg] uses “3ds Max” and not “Blender” (But, as he said: same process/result may be achieved with other soft like Blender)
But It does nothing to the fact that it’s amazing !
Thanks Hackaday to highlights this work !
This is cool and all, but I think this was posted before.
Isn’t that 3DS Max, not blender?
Brilliant.
Completely Awesome! I want a sandstone lego replacement.
Sorry but I can’t see him using Blender.
Ok, I absolutely love this.
LOL, Dave, it’s a good thing your name wasn’t Alexander, or something equally long…
He’d go hex
Why base 16? Why not octal or base95?
Octal would suffice, but hexadecimal would seem like the way to go….
I’d print some holodeck grid to cover broken bits of wall.
Except it takes quite an effort to get it right, and thus dedication.
How about using it as a top banner for this website, i mean essentially this hack is awesome. Its the hack of the year.
From a hackers point of view, it shows that the world isn’t made of atoms, quarks, neutrons etc.
Its a hacking proof that the world is made from lego
Anny comments from the LHC… ?
No ?
Ok nobel price granted haha ..its awesome !
Love it. Now do it with Minecraft blocks :D
Seriously though, the meltey brick was almost as cool. The skull in the ‘unused models’ bit at the end would have been amazing to see on film as well.
I was so about to suggest this!
Typo: The Agisoft PhotoScan link has a extra single quote in it.
Correct link: http://www.agisoft.ru/products/photoscan/standard/
The world is secretly constructed of Legos!
Soon we will all live in a biltmore house!
First glance I thought he had done the reverse, made custom LEGOs that looked like stone. That would be equally cool. A modern version of those fake rocks you hide keys and crap in.
Open source, we cry (rather pathetically, and with little hope of an answer). Building the rock around the lego is the way to go monetarily, sadly. Software =$200, 3D print maybe $50, tools to cut the sandstone about $150. Compared with lego (free-ish from bleating kids) and some sand and cement (“borrowed” from a building site)
It is cool though.
For those of you like me who can’t seem to get any vimeo embeds or links working, WIMP caught it with a much better player:
http://www.wimp.com/creativeprinting/
It looks like the objects that have many features work pretty well with this software.
I did a test with quite uniform object and with the same amount of pictures did not get very good result.
I will do more tests because the software looks very interesting.
I don’t own a 3D printer but this point cloud method is really impressive.
I see a future in this concept with prosthetics? Artists like this guy, with the 3D bio printers of tomorrow, will be replacing bones instead of bricks.