2D Drawing To 3D Object Tool

legoburner writes, "Takeo Igarashi from the University of Tokyo has a very impressive java applet/program, called Teddy, which he describes as 'A Sketching Interface for 3D Freeform Design', and basically allows you to sketch in simple 2D and have it automatically converted to full 3D. The tool is certainly very impressive and there is a demonstration video available. The end product looks like a hand-drawn object instead of the usual clinical, perfect 3D objects that are designed using standard rendering tools." This impressive technology was presented at SigGraph 1999 (PDF); a commercial product based on it is available in Japan.

It's still 2006, right?

[Clipper]

As the headline points out, this was demoed at SIGGRAPH 1999. Umm, maybe someone could tell me why Slashdot is featuring news from 7 years ago on the front page. Igarashi's work was novel at the time (in fact, he won the Significant New Researcher Award at this year's SIGGRAPH partly because of it), but let's remember that it's 2006 and a lot has been done in the world of sketch based interfaces. SmoothSketch3D [brown.edu] is just one example from this year alone.

Re:Resulting format...

[hattig]

You can click on the 'style' button to get a wireframe mesh rather than the rather abysmal 'sketch' front end.

Then again it is only a prototype, hopefully the in-application rendering will improve vastly because it isn't helping the application do its thing.

I expect that in-game potatoes, gourds, melons, coconuts and snowmen will look great in the future.

Re:It's still 2006, right?

[Ai Olor-Wile]

Because it was just on Digg, that's why. [digg.com]

Re:It's still 2006, right?

[CTho9305]

It was actually on digg a month ago [digg.com], but whoever submitted the latest digg version linked to his blog instead of the actual page to get around their dupe detection.

Re:Wow...

[egjertse]

Well YMMV, but for quick 3D sketching you may have better luck with Google Sketchup [google.com].

What about Archipelis?

[rubberbando]

This program has been out for some time now and looks to be much more advanced than Teddy/Smooth Teddy/Magical Sketch.

http://archipelis.dnsalias.com/~archipel/index.htm l [dnsalias.com]

Mid 80's

[Tablizer]

In the mid-late 80's I took a 3D graphics course in college where we built a 3D rendering engine from scratch (with Pascal). Our primary rendering technique was to first draw a 2D shape. It was then "extended" in 3D to produce a 3D shape. Think of it as making 2 copies of a 2D shape and then putting toothpicks on the outside between each "slice". One then puts a paper skin around the toothpicks to make a solid object. (The toothpicks were automatic, they were simply extended points from the original shape polygon.)

One could make a lot of interesting and recognizable shapes with this technique alone. It would make a cool product for kids with a more polished interface. My final project was a dog wizzing on a fire hydrant, rendered with shading. (I was one of the few who finished the shading part, most only got to wire-frame stage. This was partly because I sacrifaced other classes to gain time and because I bothered to learn the Pascal debugger while others skipped it.)

Another technique discussed (but not implimented in the class) was "lathing" whereby you draw a curve around a center line. The software would then rotate this curve to create a rounded shape.

These techniques would probably not be sufficent for heavy commercial use, but for recreation and drafts they were quite effective.

I don't know if this tool has it, I only saw part of the demo before the server froze. But the "blob" rendering like this tool has would make a nice addition to extending and lathing. Thus, we have:

1. Extending
2. Lathing
3. Blobbing (this tool)

Any more that anyone knows about?
     

Re:So...

[ConceptJunkie]

"Edgy shapes" are still topologically equivalent to a sphere.

There's no why to put a hole all the way through an object, so you couldn't make a doughnut or the Utah teapot.

Nevertheless, it's an amazing little tool.

Re:So...

[jeffy210]

On a side note, you can reinstall the Office XP version of Photo Editor without it messing up 2K3. Had a couple users who complained about 2K3 removing photo editor, did some research and reinstalled it no problem. Barring that little snafu, Office 2003 is really quite a bit better than the previous versions, especially Outlook.

Now, on the other hand, i completely agree with you about Vista.