3-D Scanning of Nonopaque Objects by Means of Imaging Emitted Structured Infrared Patterns

Three-dimensional surface acquisition is a subject that has been studied to a large extent; a significant number of techniques for acquiring shapes have been proposed, and a wide range of commercial solutions is available. Nevertheless, today's systems still have difficulties when digitizing objects that are transparent or semitransparent in the visible range. In this paper, some of the issues of traditional scanning systems are addressed by considering the radiative properties of materials. As a result, an infrared laser light-based scanner is presented for successfully acquiring the shape of complex surfaces by analyzing heat patterns that are emitted by the object.