Increase laser scanning range for testing purposes on MetroX

Currently the scanning range for the laser mode is limited to 400mm probably due to the sweet spot of focal distance.
Would it be possible to extend this range in a beta version for testing to something like 500 or even 600mm?
The bigger FOV and range for scanning and marker tracking would outweight a worse scan quality in my opinion.

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It would be enough if you increased the distance for the markers (without scan data). This has been mentioned several times in the forum, but unfortunately the last thread was set to “hidden”.

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That’s the problem , how bigger the distance how lower the accuracy and 40 cm is a lot , structured light scanners sadly lose the accuracy at bigger distances .
On top the laser line will increase in size resulting in capturing less details and have issues with metalic and dark materials as it becomes less powerful at greater distance.

Also greater scanning distance requires the markers to be at a greater distance from each other.

You would need a switch between far and near mode like on MIRACO to pull it off the proper way to avoid confusion .
It would also require to calibrate separately the 2 set of distances with different calibration boards.

So scanning fine details at a greater distance would affect its resolution /accuracy because of the wide of the laser lines increasing with the distance.

the dev.team is looking into it to see what is can be done regarding the wider capture of the markers area for track it in laser mode .

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It is clear there will be a tradeoff between quality and range. But in some scenarios I wholeheartedly tade accuracy and resolution for more range and bitter capture are.

Last week I scanned bodypanels of a Porsche with the MetroX and bigger scan area would have been immensely more helpful since i reduce the scan in the end and won’t profit from the accuracy.

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Yes I understand , but the calibration works only at maximum 40 cm distance , so for capture greater area at bigger distances it would need to be calibrated with bigger board or you get a very bad results with a very bumpy surfaces.

It is the same for all structured light scanners .
That why Range need huge calibration boards as well and can’t be calibrated with small boards.

Regarding the marker detection area the team is looking into it already so hopefully they get good solution .

But changing distance will require change in firmware , calibration boards and software . So not as easy task for already released product.

Of the record : in the past I had access to the software to increase the distances with my beta Range but the results was very bad and totally not usable other than for fun trying.

Remember MetroX laser mode has only 800K points per frame vs 7 milion in Full Field that why the results would be simple a blob at bigger distances and you still need to capture all the frames .

The only solution for you right now is to capture the surface with laser mode and set the preview point distance in the viewport to 2.0 to faster capture the area and fuse it at 2.0

Once the dev.team find a good solution for bigger marker area detection it would be ideal for what the hardware can offer.

But changing the distance will be too complicated with less desired results that will not meet the quality .

You still have the option to use the Full Field with MetroX and capture faster and greater areas at once in less time but that have its pros and cons , one of my friends scanned a full car in sections , it took him over 12 hours to complete , slow and expensive service

But it sounds like it could be possible and the main hinderance is the marker board for calibration.
Make a product from it by selling the bigger marker board to fund so the dev time isn’t wasted without revenue.

Same benefits can be used by Revopoint for the Trackit.
The 2mm preview and fusion are no problem, when making it explicitly as a large mode :thinking:

Trackit has large objects settings and double the numbers of points it can capture per frame so it get really fast in no time even at the 35 cm distance.

If the quality reach the expectation then yes but that would be to the Boss to decide on that. Redesigning already released product will consume as much time as making a new one, not overnight solution.

The only thing what worrying me in in idea are the width of the laser lines at greater distance , how wider it get how less accurately details it can capture .
The laser lines has fixed width by design.

As always the idea is good to even try , now question if the team want to go this path.

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Would be great if they did :+1:
Never wrong to distinct yourself as a company from competitors

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The very small fov for marker detection by default setting is the culprit of lot of tracking issues with MetroX. Per default it is only 14cm which is extremely small. For scanning very small items it’s ok but for larger objects (>20cm) you already struggle with “need more markers” messages. The solution is somehow easy but RV has other opinion about this.