Polycam vs Unique3D

Polycam is AI reality capture software for professionals who document, measure and design. It uses AI-assisted photogrammetry and LiDAR to capture spaces, construction sites, facilities, products and materials in 3D, and it can create shareable 3D object models. Users can generate customizable 2D floor plans; paid plans also list instant 3D and editable 2D floor plans. Drone footage can be processed into expansive 3D models. Polycam is available on Android, iOS and web browsers, though Space Mode scanning is limited to compatible iOS devices. Listed exports include GLTF, OBJ, FBX, DAE, STL, USDZ, point cloud formats and DXF; named workflows include Blender, Unity, SketchUp and Xactimate. Free access has limited space, object and AI captures, with GLTF exports and public link sharing. Basic costs $150 a year, equivalent to $12.50 per month when billed yearly. Seven-day trials are offered with annual Basic and Business plans, but not monthly plans or Enterprise. Business is listed at $400 a year and Enterprise at $1,200 a year.

Unique3D generates textured 3D meshes from a single image. Its method derives four orthographic views from the input and progressively increases their resolution, then generates matching normal maps with a normal diffusion model. The project's ISOMER reconstruction algorithm combines color and geometric priors and can produce meshes with millions of faces. The project describes generation from a single-view image in 30 seconds and says a high-fidelity textured mesh from one orthogonal RGB image can be generated in under 30 seconds. Image-to-3D and AI texturing are listed capabilities, and GLB is the listed export format. The repository links to a ComfyUI implementation and provides instructions for an interactive local Gradio demo after model weights are downloaded. An online demo is free to try with a registration invitation code; it is described as slower but more stable than the Gradio demo. The Linux setup targets Ubuntu 22.04.4 LTS and CUDA 12.1, while Windows installation may require Visual Studio Build Tools.