I have some laser scans off of a ROMER arm of my cell phone and 2 tablets (including a Nexus 7). They are saved in .IGS, .XYZ and .PSL formats.
How can I convert these into a .stl I can use for my RepRap?
I'd rather keep my few favors for the scanning and not the conversions in Polyworks or Reshaper.
I couldn't figure out how to get more than all the points in a line in Meshlab.
Suggestions?
There are numerous programs for converting between one file format and another. One example is 3D exploration but I can't find the demo on their website which seems to have gone all enterprisey flash and no substance (i.e. downloadable demos).
Okino imports igs http://www.okino.com/conv/filefrmt_3dimport.htm and exports STL but it costs. Here's a bigger list of converter tools:
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/convert-3d-software.html
Blender could be your best bet – that can export STL (if you go to file->user-preferences->add_ons select import-export on the menu to the left and click all the options) but I can't see import for either of the three formats you mention. (list here:http://code.blender.org/index.php/2011/01/importers-and-exporters/)
However, writing an import plugin is hurdle free (you can write them in python which is doable once you've set up a decent workflow) so I imagine somebody could well have written support for at least one of the formats.
I found file format specifications here:
http://www.3dmodelzone.com/iges-format.html
and:
http://www.wotsit.org/list.asp?search=xyz&button=GO!
but couldn't find any references to the PSL format, who makes the software that exports those?
Importing XYZ formats looks to be fairly simple but appears to be more of a very basic palette based image format. Perhaps there's been some naming collision and I've got the wrong format. What program exports those files?
The scans where done on a ROMER arm. PC-DMIS is what comes with them. It could also have been scanned with Polyworks, I am not sure.
I was told that the file formats I was given are common, and about anything can open them.
Just nothing in my budget it seems.
Can you give me one of the xyz format files so that I can see if they're as simple as I think they are? Writing a iges importer looks to be non-trivial but perhaps the xyz format is doable – at least to get a point cloud in to blender.
if it's a standard .XYZ then it's litterally
x.x y.y z.z
ignoring any lines that start with # or are blank.
so it should be amazingly simple to point cloud that file time, reconstructing the face geometry is something entirely different.
MeshLab is free and processing point clouds into surfaces and exporting as STL is doable in it, there are tutorials for such online with reference to the pointclouds from Autocad's service, or my3dscanner.com.
I tried meshlab, it's what actually worked the best. By working, I mean it opened the file and stretched all the points out into a line.
I think I will try the viewers and see http://my3dscanner.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=3:free-point-cloud-viewers&Itemid=73
I will also get my pointcloud up into dropbox or something to share it.
All the points in a line (I missed that line about already trying MeshLab, sorry) does sound like it is simply missing one or two of the axes in the data (depends on whether it stays a single line as you rotate it). If so, it should be fairly simple, given the file, to write a quick parser to grab the X/Y/Z and put them into a format that MeshLab is happier with – as an aside, have you looked at the file in any viewer that did show it as a 3d image? You might look at the files and make sure that the problem is not in the raw data, i.e. make sure that you see different values on all three axes.
Another possibility would be if the scanner recorded the different axes in different units, or the file has a unit measure for one axis and not the others.
It's all over my head at the moment, trying to get it figured out.
The pointcloud looked really good as it was captured.
I just can't seem to do anything with it afterwords. I will try the viewers and see if they love me.
I will chase down the suggestions given here and followup with a file.
+ mention me when you have a file – I have a little experience with going from point cloud to STL in MeshLab from a my3dscanner scan I did, and I can do the programming necessary if it turns out to be needed to revamp the file to make MeshLab happy with it.
I have some laser scans off of a ROMER arm of my cell phone and 2 tablets (including… http://t.co/DYGtS2lPfL