We had a trial of the BLK360 last week when returning to an ongoing project which has been scanned primarily with P40 (all externals, larger buildings etc) and the Faro X330 for the smaller buildings (small ish family home size).
My first thoughts on the BLK is that its an excellent little bit of kit but it does have quite a few flaws which stop it from working smoothly and efficiently. I was doing around 2x the amount of set ups to the BLK per hour with P40 (no imagery / iStar only adds 30 seconds per set-up) and there were around 30 scan positions the BLK could not do due to range.
I know there is a massive difference in price from P40 to BLK but here are some issues i found with it:
- Using the iPad to change the settings is a pain and i couldn't find a way to put the HDR imagery on via the app?
- Wifi downloading of the scans is so slow - cant even leave it on over night as the battery needs replaced to get a days work off it.
- Its too slow even with the images off - if your only scanning the odd smaller building / house then you probably wont notice but on larger projects it would really start to show.
- Outdoor use is very limited, you wont get any roof coverage if its more than 2 levels high.
- But the data that is captured, within its short range at medium/high is fairly good and it loads up in Cyclone really well.
- Didnt even attempt Re-Cap register, straight in to Cyclone
- A bit bigger and heavier
- Faster scanning when not taking photos
- Slightly longer range (50m to 100m) with data quality improvements
- Android support
- Download via cable
- Full control of all settings via app but ideally be able to do this on the scanner
Job well done to Leica on creating something so small at a reasonable price that will appeal to many smaller building surveying and architect practices.