3D Scanners

Rapidform works with any device that creates dense point clouds or polygon meshes, which come in many different forms. For simplicity, we call all these devices 3D scanners. Other names for these devices include 3D digitizers, laser scanners, white light scanners, industrial CT systems, LIDAR, and many more. The common uniting factor of all these devices is that they capture physical objects and represent them as point clouds or meshes.

There are many different approaches to 3D scanning, based on different principles of imaging.

Laser Triangulation

Laser triangulation scanners use either a laser line or single laser point to scan across an object. A sensor picks up the laser light that is reflected off the object, and using trigonometric triangulation, the system calculates the distance from the object to the scanner.

The distance between the laser source and the sensor is known very precisely, as well as the angle between the laser and the sensor. As the laser light reflects off the scanned object, the system can discern what angle it is returning to the sensor at, and therefore the distance from the laser source to the object’s surface.

Structured Light

Structured light scanners also use trigonometric triangulation, but instead of looking at laser light, these systems project a series of linear patterns onto an object. Then, by examining the edges of each line in the pattern, they calculate the distance from the scanner to the object’s surface. Instead of the camera seeing a laser line, it sees the edge of the projected pattern.