Re: "Age of the Cybersaur"

[John Foust <jfoust@threedee.com>]

>Sound familiar?
>Seems like we've found the solution to Dinogeorge's
>(and everyone else's) problem: fossils on disk!

See <http://www.metacreations.com/products/rtgeom/hardware.html> 
and <http://www.real3d.com/products/realscan/realscan.html>
and <http://www.cyberware.com> and other spots on the Web for 
examples of 3D scanners.  As everything else, they're dropping 
in price and are arguably quite affordable.  

Scanning to 3D models is also available as a service.  My company, 
Viewpoint DataLabs, <http://www.viewpoint.com>, does it on a regular 
basis for the computer graphics market.  You might've seen the 
scanning we did of Alan Alda on the Scientific American PBS show 
this year.  We made Godzilla, too.  The process of making the 
creature for the movie included digitizing large, desk-sized 
foam rubber models and assembling them in the computer.

Rapid prototyping equipment is proliferating and dropping in price, too.
See <http://www.3dsystems.com/> and <http://www.zcorp.com/> for examples.  
I own several examples of each, including a four-inch triceratops.

Viewpoint DataLabs already sells 3D models of dino bodies and skeletons.
Go to <http://www.viewpoint.com/> and click on the "Browse catalog"
button under "Content", then click on the horse button (third from left),
and "dinosaurs" is a category under that.

Admittedly, Viewpoint's models are aimed at animators in the computer
graphics market, from Hollywood movies and TV to game developers, and
the prices reflect that.  On the other hand, even the most inexpensive
sub-$100 3D software today would be able to manipulate a skeleton-full
of low-res bones of your favorite dinosaur, if a source of the scanned
bones were available.  With this, anyone on this list could perform
their own reconstructions with their "own" set of bones.

- John