IMAGINiT Civil Solutions Blog

Points from Cyclone

Recently I was asked how to create a Civil 3D surface from a point cloud that was provided in LAS format.  Now I know what you might be thinking, easy enough, just create a point cloud in Civil 3D from the LAS and then create the surface from there.  Here is the problem, the LAS file provided to me was not a classified point cloud.  that means if I try to create a surface from point cloud in Civil 3D, I am going to get all the vegetation, building, cars and whatever other undesirable points that might be in an LAS file included in the surface.  Of course, that would create all kinds of spikes and/or valleys in my surface.  I started wondering how I could utilize the point cloud without haven't to go through and classify it.

 

Solution

Since I have access to Cyclone, I decided to play around with importing the LAS files into a new Cyclone database.  I ran into a bit of trouble because there were 10 LAS files and technically, no way to register the clouds using targets, visual registration or even GPS points.  Since each cloud was created in a coordinate system, I could easily register them together using their coordinates.  This provided me with one big point cloud.  

With the individual clouds all registered together, we can now think about creating a surface.  If you are an experienced Cyclone user, you know that it is possible to create a mesh from the point cloud in Cyclone and XML that mesh out to be imported as a surface in Civil 3D.  Since my cloud has a ton of vegetation and large trees, I have found that  process to be a little too time consuming.  So the workflow I have been using is to create ground points in Cyclone and export those points to Civil 3D as a text file.   To do this, I used the workflow below:

First, start by making sure you have the reference plan and coordinate system set properly. I find it helpful to set my coordinate labels to display N, E, El as shown below.

 

Next, I am sure to set the coordinate system by selecting View>Coordinate System>Reset Scanworld Coordinate System.  Select Yes reset it to the home ScanWorld.

 

 

Once this is done, I move on to setting the reference plane to the point cloud.  Usually it is enough to select Tools>Reference Plane>Set to Easting Northing Plane.  If for some reason this doesn't work, select a pick point on the cloud itself and go to Tools>Reference Plane>Set Plane Origin on Pick Point.

Set to Easting Northing Plane:

Set Plane Origin on Pick Point:

 

NOTE: The above steps aren't always needed, I do them as a precaution to prevent getting warning messages that my reference plane is not in a viewable area.

 

Now that the setup is complete, all that needs to be done is to create the points.  In this case, I don't need to create specific points like EP or CL, I am just interested in creating a surface in Civil 3D as a comparison to traditional survey.  Cyclone has a command to create points on a grid.  The command can be found under Tools>Points on Grid.

 

The resulting dialog box has settings to set up the rotation, grid spacing, COGO starting point number and description.  Some of these settings will depend on the type of data the cloud has collected so you may need to vary your input from what I am showing in the dialogs below.  On the Reference Plane tab, I will often rotate the grid to 0 deg and the Grid Size will depend on how large of an area I need to cover and how detailed I need the data to be. 

The Points on Grid tab is where I want to be sure I look at my settings carefully.  In this example, I am using the SmartPick Method of Ground Point.  This means that a point is created based on the surrounding area of the grid.  It also means that the point created may not be a point on the cloud and may be interpolated.

Place a fence around the area where you would like to create a surface (or the whole thing).  I can select Place Points to create the points in the Modelspace.  I now want to export my points from the modelspace to a text file.  To export points, click File>Export and choose the file format (XYZ or TXT work well).

 

Civil 3D

Create a surface in the normal way and use the point file to add directly to the surface.  

 

Turn off Data Shortcut Node in the Prospector Tab

Nichols Edwin | Solutions Consultant

Civil designers are balancing many types of projects and project sources within Civil 3D. If you are working with a sub-consultant or you are the sub-consultant on a particular project, the odds that each group is using the same data management solutions are slim.

One firm might use Data Shortcuts while another might use the Autodesk Vault Professional for managing civil projects. Having the option to turn on or off the Data Shortcuts node within the Civil 3D Prospector might benefit certain users that deal with different project types.

To turn off the Data Shortcuts node, type the command “shortcutnode”. Change the value to “0” and the Data Shortcuts option disappears from the Prospector panel of the Toolspace. Conversely, to make the Data Shortcuts node visible again, change the variable to “1”.

Shortcutnode = 1

Shortcutnode = 0

Swap Multiple Gravity Pipe Parts with IMAGINiT Utilities for Civil 3D 2016

Nicholas Edwin | Solutions Consultant

The ability to swap gravity part sizes and types has been around in Civil 3D for a while, but there has not been a stock method to swap multiple parts at the same time. IMAGINiT Utilities for Civil 3D 2016 provides the user the ability to swap multiple gravity parts at the same time.

The user first needs to download and install the utility from the site IMAGINiT Portal (https://portal.imaginit.com/Getting-Started?returnurl=/) a log-in is required.

After installation there will be a new IMAGINiT ribbon tab that appears within Civil 3D 2016. Within the IMAGINiT ribbon tab, select the “Swap Multi Parts” command.

The user will be prompted to pick the elements they wish to change and press Enter. The “Swap Multiple Parts” Dialog box will be displayed where the user gets to pick the new sizes or part type for the selected elements they wish to change.

This utility proved used with a quick and simple means to edit gravity pipe networks very quickly and easily.

 

Grading Challenges in Infraworks

Hello everyone!!

Recently I have had several people ask me about the Land Area tools in Infraworks.  Their questions almost always revolve around the fact that they either don't like the radius used to create the land area or they simply don't want to see a radius at all.   While there is not a dialog or setting inside the software that I am aware of, there is a way to accomplish the task using files that exist in the background.  Please keep in mind that it is not recommended that inexperienced users edit program files.  

The first step in accomplishing this task is to decide whether we want to make this change per project or make it a universal change for every project going forward.  This example will based on us deciding on a per project basis. 

We start by navigating our way to the location of a particular Infraworks model we would like to change.  In this case, mine is stored at the location below.

 

Look for the Land Area.json and open it in Notepad (or Notepad++ as I have done here).  Looking at the file we see data that doesn't make too much sense to us.  Taking a closer look, there is a setting for "SmoothParam".  This is the parameter that controls the radius of the fillet on the land areas command.  Depending on what you are trying to accomplish, you can make this number higher or lower.  If you set the number to a number that is very small or to 0, the corners will no longer be rounded.

After the area is raised or lowered, we need will see the rounded corners for the grading.

Hope this helps those of you looking to accomplish this task.
 

 

Targets? We Don't Need Targets!

Last year when Leica introduced Cyclone 9.0, they created what I believe to be an amazing feature that allows users to quickly and accurately register their point clouds.  In the past, registering point clouds accurately without the use of targets proved to be long and difficult process.  Often the time spent during the registration process became a task that would have to be repeated over and over because the registration was out of the allowable tolerances.  Leica introduced Visual Registration in the 9.0 version and I believe this is still a ground breaking feature that no other scanning software has been able to match.  

Let's take a look deeper inside this feature to see how it works.  We start by importing our scans from the scanner in the usual manner.  The process for creating a registration is also no different than it was in past versions.  However, when creating constraints, instead of using the targets or the old cloud to cloud method with the wizard, we can create constraints by placing the clouds on top of each other.  Using the registration window, users need to select two ScanWorlds by clicking and holding the CTRL key on each.

 

After the ScanWorlds are created, select Visual Registration from the menu at the top of the screen.  We then select Visual Alignment to see the following picture.

 

The default tool in this window permits us to align the two different clouds in a plan or XY view.  We are able to move and rotate the cloud as necessary.  After they are aligned in plan view, simply use the vertical alignment tool to align the vertical.

Plan View Aligned

Elevation View Aligned

Notice the top right corners of each view.  They show the tools used to align the clouds.  Once the clouds are aligned, select the tools menu and select Constrain.  After the clouds are registered we can look at possible error across the cloud.  In this case, we are outdoors with lots of trees (which are blowing around) so the max allowable error will be a bit higher (showing as 1.2").  

  

The next time you go to the field, scan a project and don't realize until your return to the office that you forgot to acquire your targets, don't plan a return trip to do so. Visual registration is a reliable and accurate tool available.