The Scanstead blog
Measure smarter, every day
A new post every day on LiDAR scanning, takeoffs, floor plans, and winning bids with better numbers.
The top 7 LiDAR measurement apps, compared (2026)
Seven serious LiDAR scanning apps, one honest question for each — what's the deliverable, and how fast do you hold it? Full disclosure, we make one of them.
Why parametric models beat point clouds for estimating
A point cloud is a million answers to a question nobody asked. A parametric model is forty answers to the questions on your estimate. The deeper why.
Pricing a trim package from a scan
Baseboard, casing, and crown are perimeter-and-count problems — exactly what a room scan measures best. A worked example, room by room.
Show, don't sketch: sharing scans with clients
A homeowner can't read a floor plan, but they can spin their own house on a phone. How to use shared models to win the job.
The 20-minute site survey, start to finish
A repeatable walkthrough routine that leaves the driveway with a full house model, voice-note punch list, photos, and the numbers for the bid.
Flooring takeoffs: area is half the number
Square footage prices the material. Perimeter, doorways, and direction price the job. A scan hands you all four in one pass.
How accurate is iPhone LiDAR, really?
The honest answer: about an inch on a typical room, better on short runs, and completely sufficient for the jobs a bid depends on. Here's the nuance.
Scanstead vs. tap-to-draw floor plan apps
Guided floor-plan apps like magicplan sped up sketching. LiDAR removes the sketching. The difference shows up in the corners you didn't tap.
Scanstead vs. Matterport-style capture: the right tool for the job size
Dedicated capture cameras and hosted digital twins are impressive — and often more than a remodeling bid needs. Where each approach earns its keep.
Scanstead vs. 3D capture apps: parametric models, not point clouds
Apps like Polycam produce beautiful 3D meshes. Scanstead produces walls with lengths. If your output is an estimate, that difference is everything.
Scanstead vs. tape measure and laser: what actually changes
A laser measurer made the tape obsolete. LiDAR scanning makes the notepad obsolete too — here's an honest comparison of all three on a real walkthrough.
When the model looks like the house — photo-realistic scanning
Measurements convince estimators. Photos convince clients. High Fidelity mode projects real photos onto the scanned model so one capture does both.
Talk while you scan — voice notes pinned to the model
The details you notice during a walkthrough evaporate by the truck. Scanstead pins your voice notes to the exact spot you were looking at.
Outdoor scanning: lots, ground, and building exteriors
Scanstead doesn't stop at the front door. Trace lot outlines for area and perimeter, and capture building exteriors as LiDAR meshes with wall-area estimates.
Five scanning mistakes (and the thirty-second fixes)
Most bad scans come from the same five habits. Every one of them has a fix you can apply mid-walkthrough.
From scan to design tools with USDZ
Every Scanstead scan exports as USDZ — the 3D format that drops into SketchUp, Blender, and AR viewers. Here's what to do with it.
Wall area for painters: stop guessing from floor area
Most paint bids estimate wall area from square footage and a rule of thumb. LiDAR measures it directly — including what the rule of thumb misses.
Bidding a kitchen remodel from one walkthrough
Kitchens are the densest rooms in the house — cabinets, counters, openings, appliances. Here's how a single scan feeds a complete kitchen bid.
Scanning a whole house: room by room, floor by floor
One room is easy. Here's the workflow for capturing an entire house as a single aligned 3D model, including stairs, and what to do when a room needs a rescan.
How LiDAR actually measures a room
The sensor in your iPhone fires thousands of invisible light pulses a second. Here's how those pulses become wall lengths you can put in a bid.
Why we built Scanstead
Every job starts with measuring, and measuring by hand is the slowest, most error-prone part of the walkthrough. So we replaced it with a walk.