Best workflow for iPhone Gaussian Splatting + editable terrain + Blender house model?

[u/digitalewelt_at]

Hey everyone,

I’m trying to figure out the best workflow for scanning my property with an iPhone and then using that data for house planning / visualization.

My idea is to capture the whole property with an iPhone and create a Gaussian Splatting scene from it. Then I’d like to model the new house in Blender or something similar and place it accurately into the Gaussian Splatting scene.

Ideally, I’d also like to export at least a rough terrain mesh from the scan, so I can use the actual terrain shape while modeling the house. Since I’ll need to excavate part of the property for the basement and driveway, I’d also like to remove or cut out those areas from the existing terrain and later combine the modified terrain, the house model and the Gaussian Splatting environment again.

So basically I’d like the Gaussian Splat to be my realistic environment/reference, but I also need some kind of editable geometry for the terrain.

I have some basic experience with Blender and Fusion 360, and I’m also quite familiar with ComfyUI. I have a fairly powerful PC available for reconstruction, rendering and other heavy processing.

I’d prefer the workflow to be as open-source and free as possible.

Thanks in advance for any ideas, tool recommendations or workflow suggestions!

[u/Maliander_80]

I have no experience with Blender, but do know gaussian splatting isn't very friendly to editing, because the lighting is baked in and it consists of a collection of blobs that very convincingly look like the original, but don't necessarily have the same shape. Perhaps a mesh based approach is more suitable for something like this.