Help With Audio System “Documentation” / Diagram Etc

[fas42]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I think it’s high time for a change. I’d like to use something better to document or diagram the systems. In my mind I have this VR / AR walkthrough where people can see details down to following a cable to a port, but that’s likely a bit far off. 

 

 

Actually that's here, right now. If you are not concerned about people being able to observe what's in the room to a photographic standard, you can employ a photogrammetry tool. That is, you take a large number of photos, with your smartphone, of all the relevant stuff, from as many angles as possible; feed them to a software app, and it does all the hard stuff - the more photos you take, to the best resolution, the more accurate will be the 3D model of it. You can then upload it to something like the Sketchfab site, to make it easily accessible.

 

A starting point, https://www.aniwaa.com/buyers-guide/3d-scanners/best-3d-scanning-apps-smartphones/

[fas42]

Persist. The quality of what you get is almost totally dependent on how well you photograph the space, or object. Taking numerous photos only tiny distances apart will give poor results; best outcomes are if you take shots of what's important from every possible angle you can think of.

 

Like many things in life, there is an Art to this ... there are huge numbers of discussions on photogrammetry, 3D scanning forums complaining about poor results - and the answers are always, acquire more, and better images. The software has to get as many clues as possible as to what it's looking at - an experienced user will take 1/10 of the number of shots as a novice, and get results 10 times better than his.

[fas42]

11 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

So far, just disappointment with this style. Perhaps I'll just create a video style document. 

 

 

 

Sorry it hasn't worked out better ... something to note, everywhere you see obvious distortion, and complete loss of detail, that's because you need to take more images in those areas, closer and from more angles. If the software has insufficient data, then it has to make guesses; which you probably won't like ... sound vaguely familiar, ?

[fas42]

I would say that if you're trying to document something that is a bit complex, then any tool that makes it "gee whiz!" to follow the paths within the object being documented, for an interested party, is currently going to have a solid learning curve - we're not at a stage yet where we can throw something that is convoluted at a piece of software, or mechanism, which will magically sort it all out, without solid effort by the person trying to do the job.

 

So, find an example of something that was documented in an appealing way, where you know what the tool was that was used, and decide to put the effort into learning to use that tool ... would be how I would do it, .

[fas42]

7 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

OK, more results using Scaniverse. Interesting. 

 

 

 

Glad you persisted, . The more you go into this, the better it can become ... in case you haven't come across them, the company at the top of the technology tree in this field is CapturingReality, and they're bringing out a mobile app version - it's in beta now, https://www.capturingreality.com/introducing-realityscan

 

This most likely will be the most accurate, and capable package when it's fully released.

[fas42]

5 hours ago, ShawnC said:

Everything you touch gives product information, even your carpeting if you want. 

 

This is most certainly possible - I'm sure there will be a method available, with some products to DIY; I haven't investigated this, myself.