69 ms·

Show HN: 3D sensing SDK for iOS – Produces point cloud and 6DOF device motion

42 points by benhirashima 13y ago

chrisdevereux 13y ago
Looks very cool, but it feels like there's a big gap between Evaluation (online only, low API call limit) and Enterprise ("contact us") pricing models. Not sure what market you're ultimately going for, but right now it seems to defeat the point of providing a nice simple API if it's only usable for either throwaway projects or by very large customers.
- eaglej 13y ago
  You make a great point, and we certainly don't want to exclude the in-between cases. We're still figuring out what those pricing tiers might look like, so if you've got an application that you're excited about, just let us know and we'll figure out a way to make it work!
  - jeremyflores 13y ago
    Really amazing product! Is the form on your site the most expedient way to get in touch/get access to the SDK? Also, is the error accumulation small enough so that you could use the product continuously for extended periods of time?
    - eaglej 13y ago
      Thanks! Yes, please use the form on the site. We're pretty busy today with our launch, but we promise to get it to you ASAP. And yes, usage over longer periods of time is possible.
  - chrisdevereux 13y ago
    Good to hear! Hope I can find some time to play with the evaluation version!
dharma1 13y ago
looks cool. You could probably use this for stabilising video footage
feniv 13y ago
Very cool! Can you give a brief overview of the underlying technology you use to extract the distance data back out from a 2D image?
- woah 13y ago
  My guess is they store a point cloud, whith each point mapped to a pair of coordinates on the image.
- yetanotherphd 13y ago
  I'm fairly sure that the tech is based around "structure from motion". The API simultaneously estimates the position of the camera at each point in time, and the location of some reference points (blue circles in the vid). Because the device has an accelerometer, it is even able to extract distances, not just relative distances. I'm actually surprised by this as I always assumed the accelerometer was too noisy to be of use for this. I tried to do a similar thing myself, but the problem is technically very difficult. While a lot of research has been done on structure from motion, actually packaging it into a usable API is a big task
  - sytelus 13y ago
    Accelerators are worthless to measure distances even if they were super precise. This is because you have to do double integration to get distance and the errors only accumulates. My guess is that they have used algorithms like SIFT to track points in space and estimate only small relative distances from sensors (gyro + accelerators). This is however is very cool. They should make this as an app that can construct 3D model (i.e. turning iPhone in to 3D scanner) and ability to send the model for printing.
    - yetanotherphd 13y ago
      >Accelerators are worthless to measure distances even if they were super precise. This is because you have to do double integration to get distance and the errors only accumulates. I never said that a distance scale was obtained by applying double integration to the accelerometer output. I only said that in order to measure absolute distances, as opposed to relative distances, it is necessary to have an accelerometer, since no other data provides an absolute scale. See the other reply by one of the founders for the details.
rmah 13y ago
This technology is awesome! If it's half as impressive in real life as the demo suggests you have done a fantastic job creating some really innovative technology. I wish you the best of luck in turning it into a real business!
z-e-r-o 13y ago
Really impressive! Nice name, video, website! However I would strongly recommend picking only one of your "features", the indoor navigation. If I were you, I'd definitely try to build a business by concentrating only on indoor navigation! Indoor navigation is a huge new area where all the big players are looking for possible partners/acquisitions right now! Overlay-based AR, and the measuring tape demo is a joke compared what you've shown in indoor navigation! You really have a chance of making a successful company based only on the indoor navigation feature. Forget the pricing for now, just offer it as a free beta on both iOS and Android and try to get the word out as much as you can. Good luck!
- junto 13y ago
  I know of several large companies that would be seriously interested in the measurement feature. Manually measuring the rooms in a house is seriously time consuming.
cookingrobot 13y ago
I would love to see this combined with object extraction to make 3d models from the measurements. Here's an amazing demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oie1ZXWceqM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oie1ZXWceqM

42 points by benhirashima 13y ago

Looks very cool, but it feels like there's a big gap between Evaluation (online only, low API call limit) and Enterprise ("contact us") pricing models. Not sure what market you're ultimately going for, but right now it seems to defeat the point of providing a nice simple API if it's only usable for either throwaway projects or by very large customers.

eaglej 13y ago
You make a great point, and we certainly don't want to exclude the in-between cases. We're still figuring out what those pricing tiers might look like, so if you've got an application that you're excited about, just let us know and we'll figure out a way to make it work!
- jeremyflores 13y ago
  Really amazing product! Is the form on your site the most expedient way to get in touch/get access to the SDK? Also, is the error accumulation small enough so that you could use the product continuously for extended periods of time?
  - eaglej 13y ago
    Thanks! Yes, please use the form on the site. We're pretty busy today with our launch, but we promise to get it to you ASAP. And yes, usage over longer periods of time is possible.
- chrisdevereux 13y ago
  Good to hear! Hope I can find some time to play with the evaluation version!

dharma1 13y ago

looks cool. You could probably use this for stabilising video footage

feniv 13y ago

Very cool! Can you give a brief overview of the underlying technology you use to extract the distance data back out from a 2D image?

woah 13y ago
My guess is they store a point cloud, whith each point mapped to a pair of coordinates on the image.
yetanotherphd 13y ago
I'm fairly sure that the tech is based around "structure from motion". The API simultaneously estimates the position of the camera at each point in time, and the location of some reference points (blue circles in the vid). Because the device has an accelerometer, it is even able to extract distances, not just relative distances. I'm actually surprised by this as I always assumed the accelerometer was too noisy to be of use for this. I tried to do a similar thing myself, but the problem is technically very difficult. While a lot of research has been done on structure from motion, actually packaging it into a usable API is a big task
- sytelus 13y ago
  Accelerators are worthless to measure distances even if they were super precise. This is because you have to do double integration to get distance and the errors only accumulates. My guess is that they have used algorithms like SIFT to track points in space and estimate only small relative distances from sensors (gyro + accelerators). This is however is very cool. They should make this as an app that can construct 3D model (i.e. turning iPhone in to 3D scanner) and ability to send the model for printing.
  - yetanotherphd 13y ago
    >Accelerators are worthless to measure distances even if they were super precise. This is because you have to do double integration to get distance and the errors only accumulates. I never said that a distance scale was obtained by applying double integration to the accelerometer output. I only said that in order to measure absolute distances, as opposed to relative distances, it is necessary to have an accelerometer, since no other data provides an absolute scale. See the other reply by one of the founders for the details.

rmah 13y ago

This technology is awesome! If it's half as impressive in real life as the demo suggests you have done a fantastic job creating some really innovative technology. I wish you the best of luck in turning it into a real business!

z-e-r-o 13y ago

Really impressive! Nice name, video, website! However I would strongly recommend picking only one of your "features", the indoor navigation. If I were you, I'd definitely try to build a business by concentrating only on indoor navigation! Indoor navigation is a huge new area where all the big players are looking for possible partners/acquisitions right now! Overlay-based AR, and the measuring tape demo is a joke compared what you've shown in indoor navigation! You really have a chance of making a successful company based only on the indoor navigation feature. Forget the pricing for now, just offer it as a free beta on both iOS and Android and try to get the word out as much as you can. Good luck!

junto 13y ago
I know of several large companies that would be seriously interested in the measurement feature. Manually measuring the rooms in a house is seriously time consuming.

cookingrobot 13y ago

I would love to see this combined with object extraction to make 3d models from the measurements. Here's an amazing demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oie1ZXWceqM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oie1ZXWceqM