US Patent 11928832 Intraoral scanning system that removes excessive materials from intraoral scans

An intraoral scanning system comprises an intraoral scanner and a computing device. The computing device receives intraoral scans of a dental site from the intraoral scanner, the intraoral scans comprising at least a first intraoral scan and a second intraoral scan. The computing device determines, for each point in the second intraoral scan based on a first comparison of the first intraoral scan to the second intraoral scan, whether the point is a back-face point or an uncovered point. The computing device determines a region comprising a plurality of points in the second intraoral scan that are uncovered points, determines whether the region satisfies one or more removal criteria, and removes the region from the second intraoral scan responsive to determining that the region satisfies the one or more removal criteria.