3D Modelling From a Sketch

hargettp writes "Happened to be skimming through the December BoingBoing and I noticed this link to research into 3D modelling by interpreting sketches. Basically, with a pen and tablet and a good Java applet, a user can start digitally modelling 3D structures about as easy as if they were molding clay with their bare hands. It was the demonstration video that made my jaw drop. Impressive!"

Comments

maybe a use for tablet pcs

[anthony_philipp]

maybe this will give some purpose to tablet pcs. sounds pretty sweet, but it was already /.ed so i couldnt read it. kinda dissapointing. either that or the link was bad.

I saw this at Siggraph

[spitzak]

He was also an excellent speaker, very entertaining. He had used his program to draw characters from the movies shown in the Electronic Theatre during the show.

The program I thought was brilliant. It is what user interface should be, not a thousand menus and "toolbars" but an empty window that you click on and it "does what you want". Too bad there is no sign of such interfaces showing up in real-world applications, either open or closed...

Re:I saw this at Siggraph

[Cthefuture]

It is what user interface should be, not a thousand menus and "toolbars" but an empty window that you click on and it "does what you want". Too bad there is no sign of such interfaces showing up in real-world applications, either open or closed...

Hmmm... There are several highly useful applications that sport exactly (well, close it it... they are more powerful than Teddy) that type of interface. They are the "secrets" of the 3D modelling world and once you use them you'll wish everything else worked like them.

Mirai and Nendo are two commercial offerings and Wings 3D is a free modeling app that has a similar interface. Dispite all the Maya press, Mirai was used for some critical parts of LOTR.

Izware (aka Winged Edge Technologies; aka Nichimen; aka Symbolics; aka ...) is the company that makes Mirai and Nendo. They have always been a strange company with very poor marketing and management skills so not many people know how great their stuff is. The company is always in a bizarre state of flux. For instance right now their main page says "We'll be right back" with no other links at all (it's been like this for ages; more than a year).

Wings 3D fits between Nendo and Mirai. It's better than Nendo but doesn't offer all that Mirai does. However, it's free and open-source.

The key to the useful UI is the context sensitive menus. All complex applications should work this way because it narrows down the possible actions to what you're working on. Instead of having hundreds or thousands of menus and buttons to push (*cough* 3DSMAX *cough*), you just have simple context menus based on what you have selected. It's a superb interface for managing complexity.

Plus the help system is built right into the interface.