Point Cloud Viewer

This tool allows viewing huge point clouds and export a flight through (as used in this video).

Beta version, not recommended for usage in commercial productions!!

Build on Ubuntu

Install dependencies

sudo apt install build-essential cmake
sudo apt install qt5-default libqt5opengl5-dev libboost-all-dev

Clone with

git clone [email protected]:cgtuebingen/pointcloud-viewer.git
cd pointcloud-viewer/
git submodule update --init

Compile with

mkdir build
cd build
cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ../src
make -j8

Run with

pointcloud_viewer/pointcloud_viewer

Usage: Basics

Load a Point Cloud with the menu bar:

Project > Import Pointcloud

There are two available navigation schemes for navigating the 3d view:

• Blender
  View > Navigation > Blender
• MeshLab
  View > Navigation > MeshLab

Blender Inspired Navigation Scheme

In the Blender Navigation scheme, you will see a grid:

You have three different ways to navigate:

• First Person Navigation
  This Navigation resembles the movement of a first person shooter game.

  1. Enter the first person navigation by pressing +
  2. Move around
     • Look around by moving your mouse
     • Move forward/backward by holding /
     • Move left/right by holding /
     • Move up/down by holding /
     • You can roll the camera by scrolling with
       • To reset the rolling, just press while holding .
  3. Leave the first person navigation
     • Keeping the new position by pressing or
     • Undo the position and reset to the old one by pressing or

• Turntable Navigation
  This Navigation allows a quickly switching the perspective on the point cloud.

  • For turning the view around the object, hold and move your mouse.
  • For shifting the view orthogonal to the view direction, hold and and move your mouse.
  • For changing the distance to the object, scroll with or hold and and move your mouse.

• Selecting Points
  You can quickly select a point and move towards it.

  • To select a single point, right click it .
  • To center the view around the selected point, press (the comma key).

MeshLab Inspired Navigation Scheme

In the Blender Navigation scheme, you will see a trackball:

You have three different ways to navigate:

• First Person Navigation

  • Usage is the same as in the Blender Navigation Scheme

• Trackball Navigation
  This Navigation allows a quickly switching the perspective on the point cloud.

  • For turning the view around the object, rotate the trackball by moving it with the mouse while holding .
  • For shifting the view orthogonal to the view direction, move the trackball with the mouse while holding and .
  • For changing the distance to the object, scroll with or move the trackball with the mouse while holding and .

• Selecting Points
  You can quickly select a point and move towards it.

  • To select a single point, right click it .
  • To center the view around a point, double click it with or

Additionally, you can change the render properties:

• To change the point rendering size, hold and scroll with

Usage: Animation

You can animate the camera by defining a camera path. The path consists out of multiple key-points.

If you have already a ready to use camera path, you can import it with the menu bar:

Flythrough > Import Path

Alternatively, you can create your own path by navigating the camera and add a new key-point by pressing .

More options for changing the flythrough camera animation can be found in the Flythrough-Tab (red):

• With the Flythrough Menu (yellow), you can
  • export the current flythrough path
  • import an already created flythrough path
• In the Keypoints List (blue), you can reorder keypoints and remove unwanted keypoints.
• In the Playback Area (green), you can modify the
  • duration of the whole flythrough
  • velocity of the camera
  • interpolation between points

Usage: Render

You can render the frames of the animation to single png files. To do this, go the the Render-Tab (red):

• With the Render Button (blue), you start the Rendering Process and start the rendering process. If this button is grayed out, you need to create a key-point for the animation (you can press for creating a single key-point at the current camera location).
• You can customize the style
  • Change the brightness of the background (0 is black, 255 is white and 54 the default brightness)
  • Change the point size

Typical usage: Data Inspection

You can render the frames of the animation to single png files. To do this, go the the Data-Inspection-Tab (red):

Here, you can

• Build the KD-Tree (blue)
• See information of the selected point (green)

In order to be able to pick single points, you need to build the KD-Tree first. You can to this with the bug Unlock Point Picker button. In order to automatically build the KD-Tree every time you load a point-cloud, check the Automatically Unlock after loading checkbox.

If you try to pick a point (by clicking ) without building the KD-Tree first, a remonder dialog will open and allow you to immediately build the KD-Tree:

Known Issues

Currently, no optimization technique is applied. When the pointcloud size exceeds the available video memory, the application will probably crash.