Point Clouds in Revit 2014

The underlying engine for Point Clouds has been redesigned and implemented in Revit as well as in other Autodesk products. This effort is the result of integrating other technology acquisitions Autodesk has made (Alice Labs primarily and RealViz) in the past year or so. You’ll also want to check out Autodesk ReCap when you get a chance, image below.

The new point cloud engine uses RCP/RCS formats. The RCP format is a project file while an RCS file is a scan file. A RCP file is a group of multiple RCS scan files. If you have raw data in other acceptable formats Revit will index it in the background and let you know when the indexing is complete. It is also possible to run the indexing apart from Revit using Autodesk ReCap which is included as part of the Building Design Suites (image above).

There is a command line approach available too, using the “AdPointCloudIndexer.exe”. This application is stored along with other installation data in the Program folder. Ben Malone (BIMopedia) wrote about this shortly after 2014’s release. This is a link to Ben’s original post.

We can now control the colour mode for each point cloud import using Visibility/Graphics.

They enhanced Revit’s sensitivity to points and planes within the point cloud data. This should make it easier to sketch model elements using the underlying cloud data. Revit will detect planes that are perpendicular to the current work plane and very close to the cursor. Zooming in the view will cause Revit to reset the view and it will be necessary to detect a plane again. Snapping directly to point cloud data is a low priority in snapping order. Planar snaps are the initial focus for detection. You can use the TAB key to cycle through other possible snap options.

EdgeWise MEP for Revit

If you use Revit MEP and laser scan data then hopefully you've heard of ClearEdge3D and the new EdgeWise for Revit MEP? They recently announced that they're offering a software solution to bring 3D as-built models of pipes and other cylindrical MEP elements directly into Revit. It automatically extracts pipes, elbows and other features from point clouds and exports them to Revit as fully functional pipe objects. You begin by using their software to analyze point cloud data (the result of conducting laser/lidar scanning on-site). Once processed you can export this interpreted data to several software products including Revit MEP now.

If you are interested in a demo then check out when Beck Group’s Kelly Cone and Autodesk’s Kyle Bernhardt present it, via webinar, on Wednesday, September 26 at 1pm EDT. Beck Group was one of the early testers of the software and Kelly is quite fond of it. There will be a live demo of it too so you can see for yourself how much time it can save. Click here to sign up.

I received an email from them recently and I wrote back to ask a couple questions:

"Is the success of the export and functioning in Revit natively dependent on additional Revit families or based on the what is available in the stock content (US imperial for example)? I ask because I imagine there are elements that can be captured via a laser that your software can understand that might not have an equivalent Revit family element to use. What happens then?"

Christopher Scotton (President & CEO) responded with this:

"Thanks for Reaching out. The success of the import is not dependent on additional Revit families because Revit assigns the imported pipe objects to its stock pipe families, in this case Schedule 40 PVC along with the correct type diameter, elbow bend, etc. The centerlines come in as pipe placeholder. However, the accuracy and utility of the model is greatly enhanced by the use of custom families. In essence, EdgeWise imports cylindrical elements that are spatially accurate to the as-built conditions. Once in Revit, the elements need to be changed from the stock pipe family (if not Sch 40 PVC) to the correct pipe family.

Right now, EdgeWise MEP for Revit only extracts cylindrical features—pipes, round ducting, elbows and conduit—so we’ve not run across many elements that we extract that are not represented by a stock family type. But in those cases, Revit will place a PVC pipe and a placeholder that corresponds to the size, dimension and location of the unrecognized element."

If you are using point cloud data and Revit MEP (even if you use other software) you should check it out!

Point Cloud Feature Extraction

When I first saw this show up in the Labs blog post it was called "Scan to Bim". I wondered about the name conflict with the application already using that name, created by the folks at IMAGINiT. I thought at first maybe that Autodesk bought it. However barely a day later and it's called Point Cloud Feature Extraction.

[Added 1/26/2012: There are reports that some users experiencing difficulty getting this plug-in to work. Check out the follow up post at It is Alive in the Lab to see what's happening. One tester believes it is related to deployment vs. individual installations.]

[Added 1/27/2012: If you can't get it running, the latest development: "A user in the discussion forum installed a newer Visual Studio runtime and resolved the issue in his case." TRY NEWER RUNTIME ]

WHAT TOOLS DOES POINT CLOUD FEATURE EXTRACTION PLUG-IN FOR REVIT PROVIDE?

Point Cloud Feature Extraction for Autodesk Revit 2012 provides the following tools to facilitate the point cloud editing after it is inserted into Revit:

Crop/Uncrop: Temporarily hide the points outside a rectangle or polygon Hide Point Cloud: Temporarily hide the whole point cloud object to facilitate the inspection of the feature extraction result Adjust Axis: Transform the point cloud data so that floor can be aligned with XY plane and major walls are parallel to Z axis

Moreover, this plug-in includes some main features specifically for Revit so that the extracted features / geometry can be smoothly integrated into the BIM workflow:

Datum Extraction: Extract both level and orthogonal grid Site Extraction: Extract both terrain surface for ground surface creation and building footprint on terrain surface for building pad generation Wall Extraction: Extract both straight wall layout and arc wall Floor Extraction: Extract floor from selected points on the floor plan level

AVAILABILITY

The Point Cloud Feature Extraction for Autodesk Revit technology preview is licensed for a limited term and for a particular territory as referenced in the End User License Agreement. The technology preview will operate until August 1, 2012.

Want to watch some videos? (links to You Tube)

Crop and Uncrop Axis Adjustment Datum Extraction Site/Building Footprint Extraction Wall Extraction Floor Extraction Arc Wall Extraction

They'd like your feedback

See how well the Point Cloud Feature Extraction for Autodesk Revit technology preview works for you, and be sure to tell us how we can improve this technology by following the feedback links in the upper-right corner of this page. You can also post comments on the Between the Lines or It's Alive in the Lab blog.

Importing Point Cloud Data with Service Pack 2

Previous versions of Revit 2012 imported point cloud data (.pcg files) by placing the first data set using "center-to-center" alignment with Revit's origin. Subsequent imported point cloud data files could be imported using "Auto - Origin to Last Placed" so they all align with each other. That's okay if where the point cloud data ends up in your project file is arbitrary to begin with. It isn't so fine if you are trying to align it all with a real world survey coordinate.

I'm happy to write that the Service Pack 2 that was released yesterday has altered this condition for the better. In my testing, using the same data set I was using before, I find that Revit respects the actual origin of the point cloud file and subsequent files still work using the "Auto - Origin to Last Placed" option as expected.

When I drop in my little Laser family and move it into position it all lines up nicely! Too bad it was too late for this one...but the next one will be that much easier! Thanks to the team for getting it into this update!

Point Cloud Data into Navisworks

Navisworks supports Leica (.pts .ptx) and FARO (.fls .fws .iQscan, iQmod, iQwsp) scan data formats as well as ASCII text formats (.txt .asc). I received a tweeted message the other day asking about getting the point cloud information from a Photofly session that resulted in .las and .pcg files instead.

Navisworks hasn't caught up with the recent addition of the .pcg indexed file format that AutoCAD and Revit use. It's a case of unfortunate development timing. It means that we can use .pcg files in Revit but we can't use the same files appended to a Navisworks session, we have to use something else. I've been starting with .pts files, creating the .pcg for Revit and then using the .pts in Navisworks. Your head hurt yet?

My suggestion to the twitter member was to import the .pcg file into AutoCAD and then Append that file into Navisworks. Navisworks will index the point cloud data when it reads the .dwg so you get the data despite the "unfamiliar" format. A workaround at best, but workarounds that work, work for me!

Managing Point Cloud Files

I've been working with a bit more than 200 point cloud files lately. That means I've been negotiating with the Manage Links dialog a fair bit. It's fun...

First of all, there is no way to import multiple point cloud files once. I've already mentioned previously that Revit shifts the first point cloud import (index to .pcg format) so that the overall z,y,z extents are centered at the origin of the project file. This means you need to carefully sort that out before you go nuts modelling.

Next, the Manage Links dialog doesn't sort the files alpha/numerically, it keeps them in the order that you import them. That might be nice if I were concerned about "when" I imported something. This before that I suppose? Practically speaking it's a pain in the bottom to "find" a scan later. In the video I show five. Imagine scrolling a bit.

Which brings me to re-sizing the dialog. They've been diligently fixing these over the last few releases. The Manage Links dialog does re-size (stretch/contract) and all the tabs information within does too, except...you guessed it...the Point Clouds data frame. This just adds insult to injury when I'm hunting for a scan and they aren't "in order"...and the frame I'm hunting in is a fixed size.

I find that making sure I've got something is easier in the Visibility/Graphics dialog instead.

That's stretchy and the order is sorted!! Oh, Mr. application specialist or product designer, please don't take that as an opportunity to leave the Manage Dialog the way it is...PLEASE!

Last item of frustration...for now, the file location of a point cloud doesn't have the option for absolute OR relative. It's just absolute. So pass a file along to someone else and they've got to fix the path of every point cloud file. It was so much fun to do the first time, I've got to SHARE!!

Okay you know I'm frustrated if I bother to MAKE a VIDEO too right?

Yes, it occurs to me that they didn't expect me to load 200+ .pcg files into a project file. If you are working with a few files, no big deal. If Revit let me load and position the files reliably/repeatably I would have been willing to work with a smaller data set and load/unload as I needed things. As such, once I got a point cloud in place I was really reticent to risk it getting out of whack again.

From a performance standpoint Revit is rather ambivalent about it all surprisingly. Each scan (.pcg) file was created from a FARO .fls file that contained between 25-50 million points (ish) and weighed in at about 1 MB each. The .pcg files ended up about twice as large as the original .fls files (roughly). Fwiw, I did assemble them into a separate project file and linked it to help resolve the positioning issues I had. Also to keep them out of the main project file.

So if you are one of the few that noticed my tweet ten days ago about my personal outlook being cloudy, now you know.

FARO Point Cloud Indexing

Note to self: Remember to install the 32bit version of the FARO SDK (software developer kit) so that indexing a .fls point cloud source file will work.

When AutoCAD 2012 shipped (it ships a little earlier than Revit does each year) it apparently used a slightly older version of the FARO SDK so when I tried to use it to index some .fls files it failed with a somewhat useless message. Turns out that I installed the 64bit version of the SDK and it's the 32bit version that is needed and works. Once I installed that one it worked as expected. Revit supposedly doesn't suffer from this issue (the timing of the version used) but it too failed with an error message until I installed the 32bit SDK. If you see failure indexing in Revit, trying downloading and installing the 32bit version and see if it sets you right?

Download the SDK from FARO.
Download the SDK from Autodesk.

Btw, indexing in Revit "arbitrarily" places the cloud according to "center to center" (X,Y AND Zed), not origin. I believe this occurs because of the intention to keep the "model" near the Revit project origin. Once the first indexed file is loaded other files are supposed to use the same positioning so that they align properly (using the Import option: Same as Last Placed. The end result is point cloud data that is rather difficult to position correctly so that it will align with other software and data. Ugh...

Point Clouds and Worksets

From the Autodesk Wiki Help site for Revit, regarding using point cloud data and worksharing:

...snip (bold emphasis is mine)
Using point clouds in a worksharing environment: To improve performance and reduce network traffic, the recommended workflow for users who need to work with the same point cloud files is to copy the files locally. As long as the relative path to the local copies of the point cloud files is the same for each user, the link will remain valid when you synchronize with Central. The relative path is displayed as the Saved Path in the Manage Links dialog and is relative to the Point Cloud Root Path specified on the File Locations tab of the Options dialog.
...snip

Said another way, put copies of the point cloud files in the same place as your local files. Have each team member do the same thing, same "place", so they'll seem to be in the same location for each person's local file.

For example if you put your local files in a folder like this one:

C:\RevitProjects\ProjectName

Then put the point cloud files here too.

Scan to BIM

Beau Turner announced yesterday via Twitter and Joe Eichenseer did via the IMAGINit blog that they have just released a new product called Scan to BIM ($2495.00 with optional maintenance for $495/year).

Their press release includes this quote from Marc Dulude CEO, Rand Worldwide.

"Scan to BIM addresses an expanding market opportunity for 3D laser scanning and building information modeling," says Marc Dulude, CEO, Rand Worldwide. "The economic climate, coupled with sustainable focused legislation has ignited a dramatic increase in renovation and reuse of existing buildings around the globe. Cost effective as-built data acquisition is vital to planning and design for firms updating existing infrastructure. Scan to BIM makes acquiring and importing this critical information a great deal easier and faster."

From their product website:
...snip
Scan to BIM Key Features Include:

• Manage multiple projects
• Import industry-standard formats (PTS and PTX)
• View the point cloud inside Revit based on color, intensity or elevation
• Visualize faster slices of the point cloud based on your current Revit view or other options
• Assist with creation of Revit elements:
• Automated creation of Walls, Windows, Pipe, and Round Duct
• Construction geometry to assist with other element types
• Workflow-based tools to help set up and work on your model with the point cloud
• Measure points within your scan to quickly find true dimensions
• Visualize accuracy by comparing the Revit model against the point cloud
• Provide accurate as-built BIM documentation on renovation and retrofit projects

...snip

Read the Full Press Release
Visit the Scan to BIM site
Watch a Video about it (It wouldn't work for me unfortunately)

Check it out!