PhotoModeler is a piece of software capable of taking multiple images of an object and then reconstructing it in 3D. They’ve released a free whitepaper describing the technlology:
Do you need to create dense 3D point clouds and detailed surfacemodels of physical objects, and do you want to do it in a cost-effective and efficient manner? A new class of 3D scanning technologies, called photo-based scanning, may be the solution you are looking for.
This new technology uses a standard off-the-shelf digital camera in combination with specialized software that analyzes the digital images – there is no additional hardware required. The new technology is called photo-based scanning, or photogrammetric scanning.
In this white paper we define 3D scanning, review the current methods for 3D scanning, introduce photo-based scanning, plus examine strengths and weaknesses of the various technologies.
