No abstract

During the last two decades we have witnessed great improvements in ICT hardware and software technologies. Three-dimensional content is starting to become commonplace now in many applications. Although for many years 3D technologies have been used in the generation of assets by researchers and experts, nowadays these tools are starting to become commercially available to every citizen. This is especially the case for smartphones, that are powerful enough and sufficiently widespread to perform a huge variety of activities (e.g. paying, calling, communication, photography, navigation, localization, etc.), including just very recently the possibility of running 3D reconstruction pipelines. The REPLICATE project is tackling this particular issue, and it has an ambitious vision to enable ubiquitous 3D creativity via the development of tools for mobile 3D-assets generation on smartphones/tablets. This article presents the REPLICATE project’s concept and some of the ongoing activities, with particular attention being paid to advances made in the first year of work. Thus the article focuses on the system architecture definition, selection of optimal frames for 3D cloud reconstruction, automated generation of sparse and dense point clouds, mesh modelling techniques and post-processing actions. Experiments so far were concentrated on indoor objects and some simple heritage artefacts, however, in the long term we will be targeting a larger variety of scenarios and communities.

ABSTRACT:3D digitization of heritage artefacts, reverse engineering of industrial components or rapid prototyping-driven design are key topics today. Indeed, millions of archaeological finds all over the world need to be surveyed in 3D either to allow convenient investigations by researchers or because they are inaccessible to visitors and scientists or, unfortunately, because they are seriously endangered by wars and terrorist attacks. On the other hand, in case of industrial and design components there is often the need of deformation analyses or physical replicas starting from reality-based 3D digitisations. The paper is aligned with these needs and presents the realization of the ORION (arduinO Raspberry pI rOtating table for image based 3D recostructioN) prototype system, with its hardware and software components, providing critical insights about its modular design. ORION is an image-based 3D reconstruction system based on automated photogrammetric acquisitions and processing. The system is being developed under a collaborative educational project between FBK Trento, the University of Trento and internship programs with high school in the Trentino province (Italy).

In recent years many activities were conducted to commemorate the 100th Anniversary of the First World War (WWI) outbreak. Among these, the VAST (valorisation of history and landscape) project (http://vast.fbk.eu) was part of the initiatives promoted by the Autonomous Province of Trento (Italy) as a tribute to WWI events in the region. The project was primarily aimed to document and promote, through 3D digitization approaches, ICT technologies and communication material, the memory of sites, theatre of the world conflict. The Trento's area was under the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the end of WWI and on the border with the Italian Kingdom. The area represented a crucial and bloody war front between the Austrian and Italian territories. It was thus constellated of military fortresses, trenches and tunnels, most of them now ruined and at risk to slowly disappear. 3D surveying and modelling techniques were exploited to produce 3D digital models of structures and objects, along with virtual tours, dissemination material and a WebGIS of the area. All the products are now used for restoration, valorisation, educational and communication purposes.