Million Dollar Fish - Part 1 - Photogrammetry
This project involved scanning and digitally recreating a Northern Territory barramundi that was caught in 2024 as part of the Million Dollar Fish competition in the Northern Territory, Australia. Standard photogrammetry techniques were used to capture the fish's unique features before it was placed in a museum for archival purposes.
A number of challenges arose when scanning reflective surfaces, so a cross-polarized handheld setup was utilized to overcome these issues. Additionally, the final model needed to meet 3D printing requirements, meaning it had to have physical geometry. Any missing parts from the scan were sculpted in ZBrush to complete the model.
Since the model was also going to be animated, a manual retopology process was carried out in Blender to create animation-ready topology.
I’ll post a second part to this detailing the animation process.
Realtime final render.
Result of manual sculpting cleanup recreating missing features and parts not captured in the scan
Initial Site scan capture
Camera positions from the PG scan
Original raw scan data before cleanup.
Close up of the fin to show how poorly thin surfaces scan from photogrammetry.
Manual cleanup was completed in Zbrush
UV mapped to single UV
Manual retopology result
Manural retopology. Model has been subdivided x 1 for production use.
Roughness Map
Normal Map
Matcap
The final result