====== Beginner's Tutorial for your ASUS 3D Scanner ======
The photo to the right depicts the ASUS Xtion PRO 3D scanner located in the DASL lab. The scanner works by sending out pulses of light and recording how long it takes for the pulse to reflect back to the scanner. A sensor picks up the pulse of light that reflects of an object and determines the distance from the object by triangulation. As the laser reflects off the scanned object, the scanner can determine at what angle the pulse is returning to the sensor.
The purpose of this tutorial is to give a quick run through on how to scan an object with the ASUS 3D scanner using Artec Studio so you can then scan your own part later and 3D print it!
3D Scanners collect immense amounts of data, so software like Artec or ReconstructMe are needed to process the data into something usable that other software can handle. This tutorial will use the Artec Studio scanning software to scan an object and convert it into a CAD model that can be printed later using a 3D printer.
Before installing Artec, you will need to install the proper drivers to use the ASUS scanner. OpenNI provides an open source software development kit (SDK) that includes all other software needed for this tutorial.
1. Download and install the OpenNI SDK.
2. Download the Kinect Drivers and unzip.
3. Open the unzipped folder and navigate to the Bin folder. Run the msi Windows file.
4. Download and install the OpenNI-Compliant Sensor Driver (NiTE).
5. Download and install the OpenNI-Compliant Sensor Driver.
6. Plug in your ASUS scanner. Wait until the driver software is
found and applied. Navigate to the Device Manager through the
Control Panel, and you should see that your computer has recognized the
scanner.
Now you have the proper drivers installed, you can try out the existing
demo applications at C:\Program Files\OpenNI\Samples\Bin\Release.
7. Lastly, download and install Artec Studio from their main website here. This will require creating an account on the website from which you can upload your scans for others to download. Be sure to also save your username and password because you will use them again later.
For this tutorial, the object that will be scanned is a computer monitor, though you can feel free to scan whatever you wish as long as you are able to scan the entire object completely.
1. To start scanning your part, click on the Artec Studio icon.
2. Click "Scan" in the top-left corner of the screen.
3. The Scan tab will appear on the left side of the screen.
Click on "Advanced" and be sure to check the "Don't record texture"
box. Most computers will not be able to handle the textures, causing
the program to crash. Better to be safe by leaving textures off for
now.
4. Click on the green "Preview" button to start the scanner.
On the screen you will see what the scanner sees. Any blue area
represents what the scanner sees now in the preview. The range and
frame rate at which the scanner scans can be adjusted in the Scan tab,
but for now, keep everything as is.
5. Click on the "Record" button to start the actual scanning process.
Parts of the image will turn green while the the rest will remain gray.
Green particles are parts of the image that are being recorded and
updated while gray particles are objects that were already recorded.
6. Slowly pan around the object, making sure you scan every side of it.
Be sure to scan slowly, because scanning too quickly will cause the
scanner to lose track of the object's position, in which case, you will
have to stop the scan and try again. When you are done, click the Stop
button to finish the scan.
8. When you are done, the scan should appear on the screen like so and
in the Workspace tab on the right side of the screen, the scan should be
called Scan1. If you don't like how the scan looks, feel free to
delete this scan and perform another one. This scan will later be
polished and tidied up for exporting.
1. Click on the Tools button on the left side of the screen. Doing so
will cause the scan to undergo Fine Serial Registration algorithm to
commence. What this does is try to align some of the frames and
rate the overall quality of the scan. You can see this quality under
the Workspace tab. Lower ranking means higher quality and higher ranking
means lower quality. If the overall quality of the scan is greater
3, you should probably do the scan again.
4. Click on Global Registration to commence the Global
Registration algorithm. What this does it it tries to align all the
individual frames that make the scan. You will see a window that asks
if you want to switch to Geometric only registration. Just click Yes
for this.
5. Click Fast Fusion under the Fusion section. What fusion does, as
the name implies, is fuse the frames together to create a mesh of the
overall scan. Fast Fusion does a quick mesh while Smooth Fusion and
Sharp Fusion produce preserve the finer parts of the scan like smooth
and sharp edges. Your mesh should look much cleaner and an item will
appear in the Workspace called Fast Fusion1.
6. Because we just want to just print the object, we will need to get
rid of the background. On the left side of the screen, click Editor,
then Eraser. These are the tools you will use to remove parts of the
scan we don't need. To start erasing, simply hold down the Ctrl key
and the left mouse button to highlight parts in red. Erase the
red parts by clicking on the Erase button.
The only thing left on the screen should be your object.
7. As you can see, there are still holes in the mesh. To fill these
holes, click on the Edges button in the left side of the screen. In
the Edges tab is a list of all the holes that the mesh still contains.
To fill these holes, click Select All to check all the holes, then click
Fill Holes to fill all the selected holes. Once the holes are filled,
click Apply to save the changes made.
8. To add finishing touches, go back to the Tools tab and use any of the
tools under Post-Processing to smooth everything out and add finer details.
You can also use the Smooth Brush in the Editor tab to manually smooth
out surfaces that seem to bumpy. The Eraser can also be used to erase
any more unwanted parts, but doing so will recreate holes that must be
filled.
1. To start uploading the mesh, click Publish on the left side of the
screen. This opens the Publish tab where you can change things such as
license, privacy, and name of the mesh. For now, just rename the mesh
to something you would recognize later. When you are done, click Publish.
2. Go to the Viewshape website.
Click the Login key in the top-right corner of the screen and type in
your email and password you created earlier when registering for Artec.
3. Once logged on, place the mouse cursor over your name in the top-right
corner of the screen then click My Gallery.
4. In My Gallery, you can see all the meshes you uploaded from Artec.
Under the mesh you just uploaded, click Edit. Check mark "Everyone can
download shape" to make the mesh available for download, then click Publish.
5. Afterwards, you can click back on your mesh and from here, download it
as a .ply file.
6. To convert the .ply file into a .stl file for printing, use a mesh processing
software to import the file, then export it as a .stl. I recommend
using MeshLab for this task.
Below are 3D meshes of a chair and Hubo hand from DASL.
If you need any questions answered, email me at 1c599@drexel.edu.