The MakerBot Digitizer is, essentially, a webcam, motorized turntable and some lasers. Of course it’s a lot more sophisticated than that, right? Well, sort of. Maker Will Forfang was curious how closely he could replicate the scanning results from the Digitizer with some low cost alternatives that he could actually afford and he managed to get pretty close.
Yes, of course the MakerBot Digitizer is more sophisticated than a webcam and some cheap lasers. The Digitizer has been reviewed and given pretty high marks for doing exactly what it says that it will do and doing it pretty well. It isn’t just about the hardware after all, the software that captures the data and converts it into a point cloud is rather sophisticated and is often praised for being very good at removing digital noise and capturing a relatively true scan.
But ultimately the Digitizer does cost $800, a price that makes it a little hard to justify when you just want to use it as a toy. So when Forfang saw it, wanted it, but ultimately was told by his wallet that he can’t have it, he decided to do what any maker would do, build it himself. And to even his surprise he managed to do a better job of it than you might imagine.
Using his computer and some custom written software in Python, he was able to capture the data from a Black & Decker “sure grip” line laser level and Logitech c920 webcam and turn it into a pretty respectable 3D object. Forfang manually rotated his object 360 times – one degree at a time – while his webcam grabbed some snapshots of the laser hitting the object he was scanning.
He then wrote another script in Python that combined each snapshot into a complete point cloud for the model. Then all the data was put into Meshlab and while a bit of a mess, you can almost see the object in there. Forfang admits that he isn’t very proficient with Meshlab, but after some patience he was eventually able to pull a rather respectable model from the data noise.
This is only his first attempt, so it’s a little rough, but only two days after completing his first try he’s already planning out his second. He intends to buy a stepper motor to control the rotation, configure the webcam to capture the image in 1080p and use a more powerful laser. Oh, and he plans on actually learning how to use Meshlab, which is probably wise.
Like most maker projects, Forfang is just having a bit of fun and seeing if he can figure out how the Digitizer works. Unless you’re very patient, bored or a super genius it is probably a wiser investment to just buy the turntable scanner. But if you really want to try to make one yourself you can read Forfang’s build log on his website.
