CloudCompare

[SAV]

Hi PhotoScan Users,

In many posts of this forum people talk about CloudCompare and how they use it to analyse, edit and compare point clouds (and meshes) they exported from PhotoScan. CloudCompare is a great piece of software which has been developed by one man: Daniel Girardeau-Montaut (except from some plugins).
I was able to meet him in Norway last year during a workshop/conference. He is a great guy and very passionate about his 'baby' CloudCompare and how it developed since he started it as a PhD project. Over the years many more features were added and today it can easily compete (or even outperform) expensive commercial software. It is like QGIS for point clouds ;-). Therefore, I think it is very important to keep supporting people like Daniel who develop and share such great software.

This is something you should read. Copied from www.cloudcompare.org:

CloudCompare is a Free software. Free as in "Free speech", not as in "free beer".
Developing and maintaining a software is never free (no magic in this world).

If CloudCompare helps you make (or save) a lot of money, then please contribute or donate.
P.S.: if you really can't, at least send us an email to say thanks ;-)
P.P.S.: we are also in need of equipment (scanners, computers, graphic cards, hard drives, etc.)
P.P.P.S.: we also like nice datasets!

If CloudCompare has been advertised to you as a "free software" (as in "you already paid several thousand $$$ for our scanner/UAV but you can use this software for nothing") then don't hesitate to remind your provider to donate a few bucks on your behalf!

Last but not least, if you are working in a company that sells scanners/UAVs and you advertise CC as a "free software", then please choose one of the following:
stop
explain your customers what "Free" actually means (be insistent)
contribute to the project
include a few bucks in your retail price for us :-)
(Manufacturers that are already contributing or supporting us: DotProduct, 2G Robotics, Riegl)

I fully agree with Daniel's statement. Our society is used to get things for free without thinking about how it is paid for. Free cloud storage, free email accounts, free software.... the list goes on.

Anyway, I just wanted to remind everyone who uses CloudCompare to consider to donate some money to Daniel so he can continue developing/improving CloudCompare. Alternatively, you can also contribute to the project in other ways, as outlined above (e.g., develop new plugins and share them with the public). I would hate to see CloudCompare development ceasing or CloudCompare getting commercialized (bought by another company) due to the lack of support from the community who uses it.

If you feel like you want to donate some money to Daniel right now, here is the link 
http://www.pledgie.com/campaigns/19052
New URL: https://donorbox.org/support-cloudcompare

Regards
SAV

NOTE. I was not encouraged by Daniel to write this post. I just think that great people should be supported in what they do.

[menco]

Very well said.

Bravo