Epic Games Creates Free Mobile App That Converts Photos Into 3D Assets At A Snap

Video screenshots via Capturing Reality

3D modeling is now as simple as taking photos from your phone. Fortnite owner Epic Games has created a mobile app that enables anyone with a smartphone to generate original 3D models at their fingertips.

The launch of the new RealityScan app follows Epic Games’ acquisition of the Capturing Reality company, whose RealityCapture software lets Windows users convert laser scans or images into 3D assets (a process called photogrammetry). With RealityScan, Epic is bringing these functionalities to mobile users for free so they can insert any real-world item that has caught their eye in their projects.

To create a 3D scan, users will need to capture at least 20 photos of the same object at multiple angles; and the more pictures they take, the more precise it will appear as a 3D asset. Engadget recommends holding your finger down on the shutter button to take burst shots.

After which, the images will be rendered as a high-fidelity 3D object.

Creators will then be able to sell the asset for use in games and other projects, on top of keeping them for personal use.

Whether or not cloning someone else’s real-world designs in 3D is fair game is another story, however. The simplicity of the technique would indeed make it much easier for copycats to claim other designers’ work as their own—and then get away with it, especially since the replicas exist in a different realm.

For now, RealityScan is only open for beta testing for up to 10,000 iOS users, ahead of a wider-scale iPhone launch this spring. Android users should expect to be able to access the tool later in the year.

[via DPReview and Engadget, video and cover image via Capturing Reality]