Cirri unveils Cirri and Cirri Lite photogrammetry software
It sometimes seems that you can’t go on a crowdfunding site these days without tripping over a new campaign for an affordable, versatile, hardware-based 3D scanner.
Canadian start-up Cirri bucks that trend: its new Indiegogo campaign may be for an affordable, versatile 3D scanning product, but it isn’t hardware-based. Both its products, Cirri and Cirri Lite, will be software.
A USP in a crowded market?
As a solution based on passive image stereo matching, Cirri doesn’t suffer from the same limitations of portability or capture volume as laser scanning hardware.
The software also works with images captured on any digital camera with a minimum resolution of 2 Megapixels – which includes most smartphones – and automatically generates textures as well as geometry.
However, this is a crowded market sector, with existing software products ranging from Eos Systems’ $2,495 PhotoModeler Scanner down to Autodesk’s free 123D Catch.
Cirri’s proposed USP is its balance of accuracy, ease of use, and cost – at $899, it’s roughly half the price of the product on which its scanning engine is based: technology partner Gary Robertson’s ShapeScan_SM.
It’s harder to assess accuracy or ease of use, but Cirri has made models created using Cirri 3D on its site – along with suitably approving quotes from industry figures like Allegorithmic CEO Sébastien Deguy and 3D-Coat creator Andrew Shpagin.
Pricing and release schedule
The Indiegogo campaign currently has some way to go to reach its CAD $55,000 target, but being a flexible funding campaign, development will proceed whether it hits that figure or not.
The entry-level Cirri Lite will sell for $399, though you can get it for $199 if you back now ($79 if you’re a student).
The full Cirri, which adds support for ground-based measurements, will be sold for $899, but you can get it for $489 if you sign up to beta test. Both releases will initially be Windows-only.
Read more about Cirri and Cirri Lite on the Indiegogo campaign page