This video shows you how you can make a simple 3D scanner using a webcam, laser pointer and some free software.
David-laserscanner software: http://www.david-laserscanner.com
Blender: http://www.blender.org
Blender Basic Tutorial: http://www.tinkernut.com/archives/164
Examples: http://www.david-laserscanner.com/?section=Gallery
That’s so cool
If you care about the text of your object, you can use my linear scan technique to produce the UV map. Here is an example with my face. http://www.ctyeung.com/flex/swift/cup.html
Just put your object on a turn table and record a video with your existing web camera.
My video2panorama will merge all the center slices to produce a panorama photo which can then be used as a UV map. OK, you will need to do some processing for triangles that are not normal to the camera.
http://www.ctyeung.com/flex/VideoPanorama/gallery.html
Maybe Soon you can tell us how to make a more portable 3-D Scanner using a Smartphone cam or Sony Handy Cam and a Laser Pointer and the Free Software. This would be extremely useful and handy for those on the go. Thanks this is very impressive and helpful/useful .