When you want to incorporate more innovative ways to promote your business, you have to make sure that you have the best equipment possible. 3D virtual tours have become more popular recently as they have showcased how marketing has become more innovative and immersive. If you want to make sure that your own 3D virtual tours are successful, you will need to know all about Matterport. This article will cover everything you need to know about Matterport and 3D virtual tours.
Table of contents
What are 3D Virtual Tours?
3D virtual tours are three-dimensional property tours that allow customers to remotely visit and inspect a virtual model of a physical space. This includes homes, rooms, apartments, stores, schools, malls, event venues etc.
The virtual tour process brings any built environment directly to all types of people from any place, and on any type of device.
Customers that experience these tours can navigate the space just by simply tapping or clicking their screen. It also simulates real life movements like looking up, down, and side to side.
What is Matterport?
Matterport is an all-in-one platform that has become the standard for 3D space capture. This tool enables anyone to turn a physical space into an immersive and accurate digital model. This digital model can be used to promote, operate, design, build, and understand any type of space.
Matterport is much more than panoramic scans as it empowers everyone to capture and connect rooms so that they can create authentic interactive 3D models of the spaces that they want.
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5 Benefits of 3D Virtual Tours Using Matterport
1. Potential customers can view a 3D virtual tour to save their time
3D virtual tours are a great way for potential customers to save their valuable time.
Before, they would have to travel and visit the physical space before having any idea of what it looks like and that does not even make them sure buyers yet at this point.
Nowadays, when you use Matterport, customers can simply take a look at your 3D virtual tours on your website instead of having to spend their time and money to travel.
2. A 3D virtual tour provides an abundance of visual information about the physical space
A 3D virtual tour created by Matterport lets customers know all about your property. The depth of these tours allow customers to obtain all of the visual information they will need before making a purchase.
Providing this 3D virtual experience gives you the opportunity to inform customers in a more immersive and authentic way that is not possible when you just rely on static photos and text descriptions.
This approach lets you have more direct contacts with customers regarding purchases instead of just addressing queries and answering questions.
3. Consumers can easily access 3D virtual tours on all types of devices
Nowadays, almost everyone can access the internet using desktops, laptops, smartphones, or tablets. This development has made it a lot easier for anyone to experience 3D virtual tours that are posted online.
No matter what device is being used, customers can experience different types of 3D virtual tours as long as they are connected to the internet.
No matter where they are, they can be able to easily purchase or book any property from the convenience of their own devices.
4. 3D virtual tours allow your business to cut costs
Offering 3D virtual tours does not just make it convenient for your customers, but it also makes it more convenient for your company and your employees.
When more customers experience 3D virtual tours, your sales team will not always have to travel back and forth to your properties and meet people who are not guaranteed buyers.
5. You will have an increase in sales when you efficiently make use of 3D virtual tours
When you get to create 3D virtual tours with Matterport, you will be able to establish an important stronghold for attracting more sales for your company.
This is because most customers that would look for your virtual tours usually know what they are looking for. When you get to provide the information that they want with your virtual tours, they can immediately contact you about a purchase.
As long as your tours continue to be accurate, authentic, and immersive representations of what you are offering, you will increase your overall sales.
How Does Matterport Work?
Matterport is the standard when it comes to 3D space capture. Their all-in-one platform is able to reconstruct real-life spaces into immersive digital twin models.
What Matterport creates is much more than panoramic scans, they empower people to capture and connect rooms to create authentic 3D models of physical spaces.
A Matterport digital twin is a digital copy of a place or an object in the real-world. Its creation is powered by artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies.
These 3D digital models are dimensionally accurate and can be updated quickly and easily to reflect any changes with its physical counterpart.
5 Ways to Make the Most Out of Your 3D Virtual Tours
1. Make use of bright and consistent lighting
Lighting will have a large impact on how you present your properties and physical spaces. It can dramatically alter our impression of the shape, size, and overall feel of various things in an area.
When preparing your 3D virtual tour, you will have to find the sweet spot for your lighting. This is because dim lighting makes a space look smaller or less inviting and inconsistent lighting can irritate customers and spoil their immersion.
You have to make sure that all of the light levels are consistent across all shots and that each specific area is well-lit.
2. Choose viewpoints that accurately reflect a human perspective
To make sure that everyone will be fully immersed in your 3D virtual tour experience, you should make sure that you choose viewpoints that will accurately reflect a human perspective.
This means that you must avoid positioning viewpoints in the exact centre of an area or room and focus on choosing more natural positions which reflect usual stopping points during a real tour.
You can use hallways and different corners of a room as the best viewpoints. It is also important to have a lot of different viewpoint options so that customers can have a better idea of your space.
3. Isolate unique features of the area
Each physical area has its own special and unique features and a 3D virtual tour is a great way for you to be able to isolate and showcase all of these features.
Some of these features may not always be important in terms of its function, but they can have a huge help in revealing its own unique and interesting personality.
Showcasing these features allow customers to learn more about what makes a certain property feel different from another. This allows you to tap into their emotions which is an important factor in their purchase.
4. Double check for any continuity errors before finalising
When shooting your 3D virtual tours using Matterport, you should make sure not to move or adjust any objects. Having any movement during shooting will not show up well in the tour and will end up as blurs in panoramic shots.
It can also be challenging to shoot in the outdoors as you might experience difficulty with high winds or even animals in the area.
You should remember to double check all of your tours for any continuity errors before you finalise them just in case you may have to perform any reshoots.
5. Invest in Matterport equipment and software for 3D virtual tours
The best 3D virtual tours require the best software and equipment so that you can shoot them easily and effectively.
It is important that you invest in Matterport as it can accommodate the size, scale, and complexity of any type of property. There are different devices and software to use which can be compatible with almost all types of devices.
Matterport Pricing
At fewStones, we offer Matterport services that come in the most competitive pricing. Our team has all of the equipment and expertise needed to help you create the best 3D virtual tours. You can take a look at the pricing of our Matterport services here:
How Matterport Creates Digital Twin Models
At the centre of Matterport’s software which creates digital twin models is Cortex AI. It is a deep learning neural network that creates 3D digital twins and automates a lot of the 3D customisation steps.
When you perform a scan of your property with your camera or phone using the Matterport capture app, Cortex takes all the spatial and visual data you have captured and converts it into a 3D model. Cortex delivers a perfect digital twin of the space that you just scanned.
Cortex AI is a deep learning neural network trained on millions of different scans of different types of real-world spaces. This ensures that every Matterport 3D model will be an accurate, consistent, and high-quality digital twin.
Cortex can automate a lot of steps in the model creation process. This includes blurring faces, choosing the best images from the scans, creating accurate measurements, and even identifying specific objects within your scans.
Standard Matterport Features That Businesses Can Use
1. Mattertags
Mattertags are pop-up windows that show up on your 3D models. These windows enrich the digital twin experience because it provides additional information on the features of the physical space.
This is a great way to highlight unique and specific points of interest in your property tour. You can embed notations, text descriptions, website links, videos, and even e-commerce workflows directly into the 3D model.
You can use these to highlight important features, document any repairs, label certain equipment, add photos, and provide training information. Mattertags are attached to objects within the model allowing them to display the pop-up from any vantage point.
2. Measurement Mode
Measurement mode allows you to save valuable time by eliminating multiple visits to the physical space. With this feature, you can accurately measure anything within the 3D model including room sizes, doorways, and smaller elements in the space itself.
Once you open a 3D model, you can easily accurately measure any element within the spice by just using your device. You can check how large a specific piece of furniture or equipment is and if it will fit in a particular spot.
Measurement mode is a valuable tool for sharing information about the space and unlocks the potential for easier and smarter space planning, utilisation, and collaboration.
3. Blur Brush
Blur Brush is an important privacy feature in Matterport. It allows you to protect the privacy and identity of people who may appear in your Matterport 3D models by blurring their faces and other personal information.
Blur Brush is enabled by a machine learning algorithm when a scan of your 3D model is uploaded. It is designed to blur human faces automatically as an extra level of protection when scanning public areas like a mall or a museum.
4. Dollhouse Views
Dollhouse Views from Matterport provide a photorealistic 3D floor plan perspective of your physical space that is fully interactive.
This is a more immersive and realistic perspective which makes it easier for customers to visualise room flow and the spatial relationship between spaces. It also lets them navigate quickly to any space that they are interested in.
These 3D Dollhouse Views are automatically created when your property is uploaded into the Matterport Cloud. You can zoom out and have an in-depth look of your digital twin model from all types of perspectives.
This view provides a clearer sense of size and space that is not easily understandable through 2D photos, videos, and text descriptions alone.
5. Guided Tours
Matterport will simplify the process of creating the best tours for your 3D model. You can quickly and easily choose specific highlights from your 3D model to turn them into a guided tour.
Whether your tour is for guiding contractors through repairs or for promoting key features of a property, you can immediately create a great tour in a few minutes.
6. 4K Photos
You can immediately get 4K print-ready photos from your 3D model when you scan a space with a Matterport Pro2 3D camera. Matterport will automatically create high-quality 4K images of the scan and you can even select your own images.
Advanced Matterport Features for Businesses
1. BIM
A Matterport BIM file offers customers a single source of truth. When you capture photorealistic 3D as-built data, Matterport can convert it to BIM files to help you design, manage, and build within Autodesk or other chosen BIM applications.
With Matterport, BIM files are created at a fraction of the usual cost of surveying and documentation. This lets your team focus on securing more jobs instead of having to worry about documenting site survey notes.
2. Matterport Notes
Matterport Notes gives you the opportunity to keep you connected with an integrated workflow for project planning and discussion of your spaces.
This is an easy-to-use tool and makes teamwork and file sharing in Matterport fast and convenient. Reviewers can start conversation, mention team members, use hashtags, and link attachments directly in Matterport spaces.
You will be able to do all of your work in one place with full spatial context. With Matterport Notes, you can track progress and get notified when files have been opened or comments have been added.
3. Schematic Floor Plans
Schematic Floor Plans are available as an add-on for Professional and Business Plans. They are professional black-and-white floor plans that can be immediately generated from almost any Matterport space.
These floor plans are a 2D representation of the physical space you want to promote. It is complete with room measurements and illustrations of property features.
4. MatterPak
The MatterPak bundle is a set of digital assets that customers can download, edit, and import from the Matterport Cloud when they have the Professional and Business Plans.
This bundle enables engineers, architects, and construction professionals to easily import point cloud, high-resolution floor plans, and reflected ceiling plan images into other third-party programs.
5. Matterport TruePlan
The Matterport TruePlan add-on is a first-of-its-kind service which generates SKX files in both 3D and floor plan views from Matterport models. These models can be easily imported into Xactimate software.
The TruePlan service delivers an accurate SKX file within two business days after placing your order. This makes it easier for restoration contractors and insurance adjusters as they will not need to manually measure and sketch to estimate any rebuild or repair costs.
6. Google Street View
You can place your business on the map by publishing your Matterport tour onto Google Street View (GSV). You can easily do this by selecting the GSV add-on in the Matterport Cloud to publish your space onto the street view.
Publishing on Google Street View is a great way for you to provide an inside look into your business or property so that customers can learn more about it.
This will not only help your customers but will also help your business rank higher on Google’s search results since your link will have media rich content.
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