Tgi3D SU Amorph and PhotoScan Update (v1.20)

[Rich O Brien]

Yes Amorph is included in tgi3D Photoscan. Photoscan is a standalone piece of software that exports to .skp. In fact when you choose export, SU will open with your Photoscan calibrated images loaded as scenes. It Photomatch on steroids

[bjornkn]

@unknownuser said:

Yes Amorph is included in tgi3D Photoscan. Photoscan is a standalone piece of software that exports to .skp. In fact when you choose export, SU will open with your Photoscan calibrated images loaded as scenes. It Photomatch on steroids

Thanks
Then I suppose that if you first buy Amorph and later want the full PhotoScan version then you could have those $150 deducted from the full price?
I asked support the same question, but they probably don't work at weekends (like the rest of us do
At the moment I cannot afford to spend $1000 on a tool that I currently don't really need, but Amorph I need/want right now..

[Rich O Brien]

I can't answer the upgrade to Photoscan part. But if you haven't availed of the 30 day trial yet then you'll survive the weekend playing with both.

But I do know the Tgi developers are hard at work with some user feedback suggestions been implemented. And the new UV addition looks pretty awesome.

[bjornkn]

@unknownuser said:

I can't answer the upgrade to Photoscan part. But if you haven't availed of the 30 day trial yet then you'll survive the weekend playing with both.

I just downloaded both, but had planned to start with Amorph. A bit short of time currently..
I hope that the PhotoScan trial period doesn't start counting until after installing?

@unknownuser said:

But I do know the Tgi developers are hard at work with some user feedback suggestions been implemented. And the new UV addition looks pretty awesome.

Looking forward to that too

[gulcanocali]

Hi bjornkn,

Sorry for the late reply. I do checkout SCF during the weekends and try to answer any questions as fast as I can but this weekend was a bit busy for me outside work.

@Rich, Thank you for answering with bjornkn's questions in the meantime.

@bjornkn said:

Sorry, but it isn't quite clear to me if Amorph is included when you buy PhotoScan?

Yes, Tgi3D SU PhotoScan includes ALL the capabilities of Tgi3D SU Amorph, and to answer your later question: If you want to buy PhotoScan after you have already purchased Tgi3D SU Amorph, the price of Tgi3D SU Amorph will be deducted from the purchase price of Tgi3D SU PhotoScan. However the price deduction process is not automated on our website. If and when they decide to upgrade their copies of Tgi3D SU Amorph to Tgi3D SU PhotoScan, we would appreciate our customers to contact our customer support so that their Amorph licenses can be invalidated and new PhotoScan licenses are issued to them together with the price deduction.

@unknownuser said:

Yes Amorph is included in tgi3D Photoscan. Photoscan is a standalone piece of software that exports to .skp. In fact when you choose export, SU will open with your Photoscan calibrated images loaded as scenes. It Photomatch on steroids

Tgi3D SU Photoscan "includes" a standalone executable "called the Tgi3D SU Calibration and Metrology Tool" which does exactly what Rich describes. The second part of Tgi3D SU PhotoScan is the plugin to Google SketchUp which includes ALL of what Amorph has PLUS the "automatic 3D surface fitting to photographs" feature. (BTW our team is working on some powerful improvements to this feature as well to improve the algorithm efficiency and quality of the match)

@bjornkn said:

They both seems to be able to make good models from photos.

That is correct but I would like to make a clarification at this point to avoid any misunderstanding. Tgi3D SU Amorph does not include the Tgi3D Calibration and Metrology Tool. So if you can get good calibrated image sets from another software into SketchUp all the tools Tgi3D SU Amorph has, together with its "view locking" feature, enables you to create 3D models from photographs. One other feature missing from Tgi3D SU Amorph is the "automatic 3D surface fitting to photographs". This feature makes it a lot easier to create surface meshes that match the surfaces accurately especially for complex, organic shapes.

@bjornkn said:

I've been using Imagemodeler and Photomodeler for many years now, combined with SketchUp. Since Autodesk bought RealViz and removed Imagemodeler from open/single sales (need to buy Max or similar), and Photomodeler is not quite so good at modelling (and also quite pricey and with a very expensive licensing policy for us that don't live in USA/Canada - being forced to buy from local dealers with bloated prices), the availabilty of easy-to-use and affordable photogrammetry software is very limitied. That LockView tool looks very promising!
It looks like PhotoScan (Amorph) will do the job fine?
There's no calibrated cameras, but I hope that they take into account lens parameters/distortions

Yes, Tgi3D SU Calibration and Metrology tool DOES take into account lens distortions and parameters. There are no calibrated cameras but we do in situ calibration for each set. This avoids errors due to environmental changes and aging.

[bjornkn]

Thanks a lot for your in-depth reply
This really looks like it is the "missing link" for me, after being abandoned by Realviz/Autodesk and MetaCreations/Canoma/Adobe.
I wonder why you're not using the work 'photogrammetry' on your product?
If you did I would have found it earlier, instead of bumping into it by accident, because that's what I've been searching for as a replacement for Imagemodeler.

Have you ever thought about running an upgrade campaign:
'Abandoned by Autodesk/Realviz? - upgrade to tgi3D PhotoScan for $??? now!' ?

[gulcanocali]

@bjornkn
Thank you for your kind remaks and suggestions. You are quite right about the word "photogrammetry", we do use it at certain places but not quite the "right" places, I guess, to generate search results.

BTW, we have released new versions of our plugins that include some of the most requested updates, see the announcement in the following thread:
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=323&t=36051

@pixero,
This new version loads much faster now, I hope you give Tgi3D another try

[Rich O Brien]

The Safeguard texture feature is amazing...

[flash=800,600:2bbhzgnd]http://www.youtube.com/v/QE0li5Cal80[/flash:2bbhzgnd]

[muddpuddle]

@unknownuser said:

Currently we do not have a way to edit the UV map. We do have plans for additional mapping methods, other than unwrap and spherical.

Very much looking forward to more mapping methods!

[publied]

hi all,
i'm very interested in this plugin. a direct and simply question: what percentage of representation accuracy do you can get from a series of photos? 100%, 95%, 80%? (please don't answers depends )
ciao
/paolo

[Bertier]

how many poly does the plugin handle at the same time ?

if I want to polyreduce a 65K model do I have to split it into sub-objects ?

[gulcanocali]

Hi Bertier,

@bertier said:

how many poly does the plugin handle at the same time ?

if I want to polyreduce a 65K model do I have to split it into sub-objects ?

If you are going to do a significant reduction, it may be able to handle 65K but in general it would be a good idea to limit to around 25K-35K polygons. The bottleneck is really the number of polygons after reduction.

[MikeG73]

Hello,

Any updates on this software, as everything is like is 10+ years, new features. etc...

Cheers!

[bjornkn]

@mikeg73 said:

Hello,

Any updates on this software, as everything is like is 10+ years, new features. etc...

Cheers!

According to their pages the last update was 2023-02-23. v.1.37. But afaik know it is mainly for allowing it to work with newer versions of SketchUp.
I have been retired for some years now, and rarely use it nowadays. But I'm still a big fan of both SketcUp and tgi3D's Photoscan.
When I occasionally use them I'm using the SU 2016 version, mainly because I have it set up with a lot of plugins.