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Comment by samvher | Hacker News Reader

Why do you think it has so little use?

One thing that comes to my mind is portrait background blur - so far computational implementations on smartphones that I’ve seen were not very good, I suspect this can improve effects like that a lot which seems relevant to consumers.

On the forward looking side I think app developers can also get a lot of value out of this. Eg (just a thought) changing the way clothes or shoes are bought by letting you scan body parts to determine fit.

And this can generate a lot of data feeding into their vision models + what you already mention about AR/VR.

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Well, it doesn't seem to me that Apple has backed this new technology with any significant app that makes use of it. And I don't see any serious app in the apple store that makes use of lidar either.

I think you dismissed the portrait mode thing, which I think is by far the biggest use. Two other things I love -- "measure". It's very accurate. Also, there are several apps that allow you to scan an area and then send that to people. I've used it to show people an area (my office, a cool brewery I went to, etc). "3d scanner app" is one that I've used. Interestingly, I also used it to scan a piece of furniture I liked, which let me get precise measurements at a later date.

Edit: I forgot one super cool use of measure. Let's say you have a basement with an open ceiling. You can use the measure app to, say, measure a pipe. Then, when you walk upstairs, you can still see the pipe in 3D. So you can then understand just exactly under the floor where the pipe is. Very useful for things like pipes and electric wires.

The last one is pretty cool indeed. Still, I feel like Apple has still some "one more thing" for lidar in the future

> Edit: I forgot one super cool use of measure. Let's say you have a basement with an open ceiling. You can use the measure app to, say, measure a pipe. Then, when you walk upstairs, you can still see the pipe in 3D. So you can then understand just exactly under the floor where the pipe is. Very useful for things like pipes and electric wires.

That is really interesting. What app/service did you use to do this?

Measure, like he said. It's built in.

Wow, I completely missed that. I reread the comment about 3 times before I recognized it. Need more coffee, I guess.

Just "Measure" on the iPhone. For instance, just measured the back wall of a closet. Then went to the next room and could see where the back wall of the closet was in AR.

Samsung, at least ultra line, has Lidar too and exactly same type of measure app (on top of some AR doodling). Just tried it and its actually pretty precise (on S22 ultra). I wouldn't build a shelf based on just that data but otherwise nice little addition to the toolset.

Polycam is used in the 3D modeling / VFX space to phonoscan assets--there are some others like it too that all use LiDAR. Another use could be to preserve historical artifacts similar to how it's used in this video: https://youtu.be/k1uXppV6TeA?t=225

I bought an Apple device specifically because of LIDAR. I've found easy, convenient, "good enough" 3D scanning to be very useful both for recreational and professsional purposes.

Other uses of LIDAR (measurement/data collection, AR, photography) are also likely to become more popular over time.

Can I ask, what sort of things are you 3D scanning, and for what purpose? I have an iPhone 12 Pro that I'd like to utilize for similar uses, but I can't think of a practical output for them.

I'm not always entirely sure why I'm scanning things. I occasionally upload things to Sketchfab. I have vague plans to make a diorama out of pieces to view in VR.

Turning the question round - why take photos of things? A 3D scan isn't that different. It's a way to capture a memory and to show things to other people. It's so quick to capture something that sometimes I just do it on a whim when I find something interesting.

I'd like to make an art piece out of them at some point but I'm still waiting for the right inspiration to come along.

They specifically called out the Camera app in all of the promos. It’s the reason I bought the Pro over the “base” model. It’s used for range-finding in the camera, both for portrait and low-light. It’s actually really neat and low-light performance has been drastically improved. (Which was one of my biggest gripes moving from flagship Google phones)

Any app used on half their billboards (Shot on iPhone 13 pro) and featured on the Lock Screen seems “significant” to me. :)

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