Using a drone to create a 3D model of an original Dutch windmill

[wdejager]

Last week I have been experimenting with creating 3D models of a building, using photos made with my Phantom 3 Professional in POI intelligent flight mode and a piece of software called Agisoft PhotoScan. I decided to experiment on a traditional Dutch windmill ('Bovenmolen Nieuwe Driemanspolder', anno 1672), near the city of The Hague.

I took several dozens of pictures of the windmill in timelapse mode. Afterwards, these were processed in Photoscan, resulting in a point cloud and then a 3D mesh. This took a couple of hours on my MacBook. The resulting 3D model can be viewed on Sketchfab. On my website www.dronewatch.nl there is more info (in Dutch) on the whole process.

1. The series of photos (not all of them are shown here):

2. The resulting 3D mesh of the windmill in PhotoScan:

3. Still from the final 3D model on Sketchfab:

4. And finally, an ordinary video from the windmill, shot in P3P's POI mode:

 

[bbfpv]

cool

 

[kenjancef]

Holy moly... That is cool...

 

[steveeds]

Very interesting wdejager, well done.

 

[RedHotPoker]

I didn't know wind mills were wound up, like a large clock? ;-)
What are those 'cables' running up to it, do?

Very cool rendering.

RedHotPoker

 

[pb7424]

I believe that wheel on the ground is used to rotate the top of the windmill so that the blades can face into the wind.

 

[Bryce]

This is cool, I've been trying this on a few houses nearby

 

[RedHotPoker]

That would make a lot of sense, I never saw those before. All my views of Dutch windmills must have always been taken front and center. Interesting. Learned something new today... Thanks. ;-)

RedHotPoker

 

[wdejager]

I didn't know wind mills were wound up, like a large clock? ;-)
What are those 'cables' running up to it, do?

Very cool rendering.

RedHotPoker

Yes, those black bars are part of the steering mechanism. Very clever stuff indeed. Just one of these windmills were capable of lifting the water 1.35 meter up.

 

[fly_it]

Very cool.

Now I want to try