I just found a lidar app and used it to make an importable background for a floor plan. The result is absolutely amazing. It does require a smart phone with lidar. I have an iPhone 12 Pro. The specific app I used is called Polycam. I'm sure there are others. That's the only one I've tried.
The mapping process is incredibly quick. You basically just hit the start button and then film the area you want to map. It shows you what's done by displaying the unmapped area with a blue tint and the mapped area as normal. A typical kitchen or dining room would take around 2 minutes to map. Maybe even less. It processes the data in a couple of minutes and voila.
There's no faster way I can think of that you could get a detailed floor plan of an area that has a perfect overhead vantage point even higher than the ceiling of a space allows. Shot Designer seems to make the animations just the right size, too. The combo is an incredibly powerful tool.
It's also quite accurate. I saw someone report they had only a 20cm variance over a 60m distance. I think that's astonishing. It will automatically show you all the measurements of the floor plan if you want, too. For my American friends you can easily switch to Imperial.
I've included a couple of quick samples that took me maybe 10 minutes total. I hope you find this useful.
Honestly, I'm 50% building this because I want it.
Oh my god I'm dying to see it!!! It sounds totally amazing. I'm sure it's been an epic journey to get it going. I'll try to stay patient but it's not easy.
I don't want to say an ETA yet only because it puts the wrong kind of pressure on it. But consider that I've been prototyping and building individual aspects of this for for a very long time, but it's only now that a few things are starting to come out of the ground, after working underground for years.
It's important to me to build something that can carry the load, and doesn't hit technical dead-ends like the current iteration of the app. The new app will have things like game-quality sets to shoot on, digital actors that know how to act, and real-time collaboration (<100ms), making it possible to do 3D filmmaking together in the same space.
Ok, Per, you can't just keep all of us in suspense forever. When are you hoping to launch it?
Hi,
Yes, this is actually planned! It won't be in 1.0 because we have our hands full, but it's a great idea if you can just scan a location and start shooting in it.
It just occurred to me that Per is working on 3D Shot Designer. I wonder if implementing lidar would be helpful with that.
I'd imagine at some point we'll be able to shoot a set with lidar and get a 3D render that can be imported into 3D Shot Designer. I can't wait for that!