[M3C2] Missing plugin?

[zababa]

Hello everyone! :)

I just discovered CloudCompare and with this opportunity I'd like to thank you and congratulate you on the amazing work you have done!

I am trying to compare two point clouds and extract information about the displacement field between them, so I would need the signed distance in X-Y-Z form for each point. I have come across the plugin M3C2 in other threads of this forum, but unfortunately I have not been able to find said plugin anywhere...

I am working on Linux Mint 17.2 Rafaela, compiled everything from source (acquired via git) so I have the latest version (2.6.2 beta compiled with Qt 4.8.6).
I should probably say that I don't even see the option about installing M3C2 in the ccmake configuration page, and this is what seems so strange to me.

Thank you in advance for any indications!

[daniel]

Indeed, M3C2 is not yet a fully open plugin. It is kindly provided as a binary (on Windows) by Dimitri Lague's team.

The sources should be disclosed in a near future however. Meanwhile the only way to use it... is to use the Windows version.

[zababa]

Thank you very much for your quick reply!

I will try on a Windows machine and will keep on the lookout for when the code becomes available! :)

[zababa]

I'm sorry but I have another question...

I have been able to run the plugin on a Windows machine, but the distance calculated between two point clouds is still a scalar value. The only vectorial output I can see are the X-Y-Z normals, so I was thinking that perhaps the displacement field is the product of the distance and the normals, but I'm not quite sure if this is correct.

Am I missing something in the use of the plugin? Or is this the standard procedure (calculate the signed scalar distance and then multiply by the normals)?

Thanks again!

[daniel]

Indeed, the plugin outputs the (signed) distance along the normal direction. So you could deduce the 'displacement' vector by multiplying the normal by the distance.

[zababa]

Okay, thank you very much! Seems pretty good!

[ns9]

Is the M3C2 plugin still only available on windows?

[daniel]

Not sure. Maybe it's incorporated in the latest Linux releases?