Last week someone in the Scan Dimension office treated us with ‘romkugler’, or ‘rum balls’, and being in the 3D business, we scanned it.
3D scanning challenge: Dark surface
The technology in SOL scanners rely on the laser being reflected back to a sensor. However, if the object’s surface is very dark, it may absorb too much of the laser energies and, as a result, the sensor may not get enough information to adequately 3D model the shape it is scanning. This is a typical issue for all 3D scanners.
In this case, we were excited to see how the dark surface of the cake would scan.
Read more about scanning various surfaces and shapes
The rum ball was approx. 5 cm (2 in) in diameter, a size that fits perfectly with the SOL 3D scanner set in near position, and to get as much detail as possible, we chose the normal scanning mode.
Also, we challenged ourselves to see if we could get the whole cake captured in only two scanning passes.
- Near scanner position
- Normal scanning mode
- 2 scanning passes
The cake was also a little soft and may have shifted its shape slightly during the repositioning to the second orientation, but SOL 3D scanner managed to scan it just perfectly. Even after someone took a bite.
Download the rum ball from Sketchfab
Inspect the rum ball and all our other uploads on Sketchfab. If you make a free account you’ll also be able to download them.
Sketchfab 3D model: Rum ball with a bite
Bonus information
The ‘romkugle’ (rum ball) is a Danish invention where bakers take yesterday’s un-sold leftover chocolate cake and pastry, mix them with jam and rum essence, and roll the little balls in chocolate sprinkles. Initially created to reduce cake waste, the bakers were essentially ahead of their time in sustainability-thinking.
It is very common in Danish workplaces to have a day a week where cake is served. Last week the Thursday cake in our office was rum ball and being in the 3D business we needed to immortalize the delicious cake.
The average rum ball weighs around 80 gr (2.8 oz), and to burn off the calories you would have to either swim 35 minutes, run 31 minutes, bike 43 minutes or walk 100 minutes.
However, it is worth it.
Source (Danish only): https://romkugleconnoisseur.dk/fun-facts/
More cake?
See how our scanning of another traditional cake turned out: Valentine’s day semla