Plenoptics, the Edinburgh-based technology group, is planning to develop a new automatic photo-modelling tool that could save computer games developers millions of dollars a year.
Plenoptics specialises in services and technology for the creation of highly realistic 3D models from 2D digital photography sources. Photo realistic and extremely accurate interior and exterior scenes can be created from photographic material either provided by the client or produced by Plenoptics own technical team.
Chief executive Roy Middleton said the Edinburgh University spinout would use a recently-secured £50,000 SMART award from the Scottish Executive to help fund the development of an automatic texture mapping tool, which would help address difficulties faced by the computer games and special effects sectors in creating 3D computer graphic models.
Chief executive Roy Middleton said the Edinburgh University spinout would use a recently-secured £50,000 SMART award from the Scottish Executive to help fund the development of an automatic texture mapping tool, which would help address difficulties faced by the computer games and special effects sectors in creating 3D computer graphic models.
Research showed the company there was "huge" potential for new innovation in the area, not only from computer gaming and the film sectors but also for training simulations.
"Over the past decade the demand from the games and film sectors for computer generated real-world images has spawned a multi-billion dollar industry," said Mr Middleton.
"However, the creation of such images is still as costly and time-consuming as ever and consumes the bulk of the production budget.
"For example a large computer game project which involves driving around a city can take as much as 100 man-years to produce."
Creating 3D mappings is seen as a crucial but costly aspect of creating a computer game or training simulator, particularly as demand for ever-greater levels of realism increase.
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