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MagicPlan app magically creates interactive floor plans

by Steven Sande Apr 13th 2011 at 2:00PM

Many years ago when my wife and I were looking for the perfect house, I used to pore over the floor plans that home builders would create. While it was often difficult to translate the lines that designated the walls and doors of the house into a three-dimensional representation of what the interior actually looked like, the floor plans were helpful in at least getting an idea of how foot traffic would flow and where we could place furniture when we could afford it.

A French-Canadian development company, Sensopia, has just released an app that takes the work out of creating floor plans. Sensopia's MagicPlan works with the iPhone 4 and fourth-generation iPod touch. To build a floor plan, you go into each room and take a picture of each corner of the room. By doing that, MagicPlan measures the walls and doors in the room, and it creates a floor plan of each room. You then slide the rooms into their proper location by dragging them on the screen, and MagicPlan aligns the rooms and manages the thickness of the walls. Finally, furniture and photos can be added to show what the actual house or apartment looks like, and geotagging information is attached.

The app is free for download, and the free version provides you with a watermarked non-commercial use JPEG, PDF or a version that is uploaded to a website for viewing. For US$4.99, the watermark is removed and the floor plan is available for commercial use. For US$9.99, Sensopia throws in six months of web hosting -- the latter is useful for real estate agents who want to show off floor plans and photographs to potential home buyers.

There's a video on the next page showing how this innovative app works.



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Many years ago when my wife and I were looking for the perfect house, I used to pore over the floor plans that home builders would...
 

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17 Comments

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elliotjlamb

I have to say, that is a seriously clever idea. Nice work!

We're moving soon so this'll be helpful, and free? wow

April 14 2011 at 3:42 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
nicleT

Four rooms of my house have rounded walls, i.e. no corner. Will MagicPlan still work?

April 14 2011 at 1:10 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to nicleT's comment
tony.walker

No. But at least you're keeping shipping safe

April 14 2011 at 1:51 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
nicleT

Ok, it works but I can't modify the corners to be rounded on the plan. It could be useful to have a tool for that: a sort of Bezier handles for walls and corners curves. Just saying.

April 14 2011 at 8:45 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Gillan

Had me sold, then I watched the video.

Amazing what bad marketing can do.

April 13 2011 at 6:07 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
seamless

If you could specify ceiling height then you could use the corners on the ceiling. Far more likely to be visible.

April 13 2011 at 4:52 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
A A

Why does the application collect usage data? And why can I not review and make sure that no personal information is being collected?

April 13 2011 at 4:35 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to A A's comment
Cy Starkman

Name apps within the vast array that have usage tracking that let you review what they send back.

April 13 2011 at 7:15 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Eric

I just downloaded, and will be trying it out as soon as my sync is done.

I have an app on my computer that lets me arrange furniture, but I've never gotten around to designing the floorplan, since measuring is so inconvenient.

April 13 2011 at 4:30 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
mills

i just tried this out in a very cramped pair of rooms with lots of furniture and it worked Great! very easy to use, and if you've ever done this another way, enormously faster. this is really a Killer App -- i am usually underwhelmed by apps, and find all kinds of things to criticize. not this one; a Very well thought out app.

April 13 2011 at 4:06 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Emil

Just what kind of liquid were you pouring over those floor plans?

Perhaps you meant to say that you used to "pore" over them?

April 13 2011 at 4:01 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Rembert

Tried it with a room full of furniture. Capturing the corners wasn't as easy as shown in the video. The result didn't match reality. I'll definately need to experiment more with the app before getting proper results I'm afraid.

I'm wondering about the furniture placing option: how does this work?

April 13 2011 at 3:59 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Dan

I just tried it out since I'm starting a remodeling project. Works much better than I expected, especially for rectangular rooms. Haven't figured out how to add stairs yet, though.

April 13 2011 at 3:44 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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