74 | The Future of 3D Visualization

74 | The Future of 3D Visualization

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In this episode I share a presentation I gave at a local APWA luncheon where I discuss the future of 3D visualization and how Civil FX has been pushing the boundaries into the future.

TRANSCRIPT:

we appreciate this opportunity to talk
to you guys today just I know some of
you have heard about what we’ve done a
project me on to talk a little bit about
about that and I’ve got some the other
projects that we’ve been working on
since then a little more background in
2015
late 2015 when we found out that we were
part of the winning team unfriended me
on my my older brother the reason
they’re making video games for most of
his life and there was a firm here in
town a company in town called
petroglyphs videos they’re basically the
only company that made video games in
Las Vegas and right right that same time
in late 2015 when we got privately on
patroclus Studios basically went out of
business and let everyone off so
suddenly there was this influx of talent
for video game artists and programmers
and part of the vision that I had for 3d
visualization all along was to was to
make it interactive making more like
video games so that project neon was an
opportunity to take some of these guys
that well it works for a while including
my brother
that was a bucket this thing I got a
higher and so we hired these guys for a
period of time and developed project
neon into this interactive application
and we could also do the image and video
renders which were required us for the
contract and that set the stage for the
future of what we’ve done which is a lot
of visualization firms so use a specific
program like infraworks or civil
beautiful 3dsmax
or Sketchup or lumion and you know kind
of just keep doing that that same
process I’ll take the files know the
modeling of text room the great the
video in the next project but because of
our history of doing doing 3d doing
working with video game developers we
processes they are like a video game
studio that just works on transportation
projects and that’s that’s really
important as I kind of talk about our
process and the projects that we work
because each project we get not only do
we want to do it right and make our
clients happy and fulfill the contract
but we also try and push the technology
a little bit and add new features each
time we have we have an office here in
Las Vegas now we have several artists we
have a programmer we have weights all
vanity zero this
yards yeah we committee of you guys have
seen when presenter or talk to the point
before this version for many years I
find it
so so when I was an Alamos it’s like how
two miles away and Wayne runs the office
day-to-day and he’s much better at it
than I and the guys really look up to me
was a really good job and he does such a
good job that they immortalized him one
day he showed up and had a 3d printed
action figure that’s my son’s helper
today I still had my so anyways waiting
came on two years ago and we started
really building a team building an
office before that it was it was a
dispersed team everyone working from
home we’re gonna move to an office
environment where we actually have
full-time artists and developers and
credit to end up and others really
amazing engineering firms and agencies
that we work with because we’ve been
able to work on a lot of projects and
help build the company and build our
process and our futures along the way so
today I’m going to talk about kind of
the way things were done in
visualization the way they’re being done
now and possibly what the future could
look like and we’re not the only ones
doing visualization you know there are
many of the engineering firms have
and there are many pioneers in this
space and I get to be one of those
because I talk about these things
there are many that that are doing a lot
of these things so just a brief outline
I’m going to talk about the
interactivity of visualization the
accessibility quality facing traffic and
then kind of the overall purpose of why
we do visualization so when it’s talk
about interactivity this guy’s mentioned
this was a big thing for me when we when
I started this company in probably 2012
when I was in and up my son he was about
2 years old at the time you wanted to
play a game sorry I found it online it
was a who’s wreck-it Ralph and I let him
you know play with this game you just
use the arrow keys and he just raced
through this thing and I was looking at
that doesn’t man why can’t we do that
same thing in visualization in the
engineering industry you know it’s it’s
just polygons it’s just texturing
it’s just powers it’s a growth why can’t
we do that same thing and that’s where
the wheels started turning you know
before that in the past that we work
with visualization it would be something
that was wireframe if you wanted it
a long time to render out that video if
you make changes you have to render it
out again because of the advancements in
both the software and the hardware it’s
much better now
now if you if you’ve seen anything that
we’ve done in a bunch of neon or others
doing similar things you can navigate it
using a mouse and kind of move around
the project but it requires removing
people of semi-realistic that’s kind of
how things have started to be over the
last couple of years the future
hopefully it will be more multi-touch
real-time navigation on any advice with
photorealistic graphics and I’m going to
show you some demos how in a lot of
these slides that you see we’re trying
to dip our toes into the future one
thing that yes so the multi-touch is
very important for us because our
project neon it was really clunky it was
hard to if you wanted to get from one
part of the project to another we had
that menu and you could click on
different cameras there’s really slow
moving moving the camera when I talk
about short demo
so this is this is the Reno spaghetti
bowl this is an end up project and if
you went to the public meeting that’s
that’s usually when this is utilized the
most so we take this to a public meeting
and this project is massive it’s
basically the whole City of Reno and so
we would have someone that wanted to
talk to us about the the Nugget and so
we would have to you know what hurry and
zoom over here to the Nugget so we
talked about that for a while or we
could use a we have some cameras set up
that we could set up for that and then
someone would talk about to talk about
downtown so we’d have to hurry and
remove the camera all the way across the
city over to downtown
so so being able to do pinch to zoom and
rotate and all these things has been
very valuable as far as navigation
especially for the big touch touchscreen
part of the problem that I was talking
about in a second is not everybody has a
big touch people and we don’t have
public meetings every week so we’re
still trying to to improve in that way
so hopefully in the future when I say
you need advice that really mean anybody
likes your phone your laptop your
computer anything that you have you’ll
be able to see these projects in real
time in the future all right so
accessibility and this kind of dovetails
into what I was talking about with
interactivity this kind of rotates you
start here at the top and then it
rotates around to this other side so in
the past we talked about you have the
image or video rammers which are very
easy to this day they’re so very
valuable you can use them on social
media you can use a project you can with
the news but you know and as we’ve
advanced and we’ve gone it’s more
interactive interactive applications we
can use them on the PC we can navigate
the project we can have a kiosk one
thing that we’re trying to do is when we
build these projects we roll them all in
3d we have the mini and everything make
sure that our project manager
but it has a laptop that you’re on the
project the challenge is this is a
basically a gaming computer and you have
to have something like this especially a
big project like we know spaghetti goal
if that is a really fast expensive
powerful computer to run this stuff ok
so I hope as we move into the future
that we’re able to optimize more we’re
able to run it where we can run it on
any device any laptop and especially on
web application just wanted to it so you
would quick demo with that
so this is a this is a web application
that we just build they still new it’s
still under development but we’re going
to continue to add features to it but
you this is the only one I think
everything at these the mouse works it’s
built for a mouse but you can look
around this basically if you’ve seen
Google Street View so we did the project
and then we render these 360 views and
then you can click the move around the
project
so you know as we move forward we hope
to have more features at AZ maybe you
can click on a bridge and we give you
information about the bridge and this is
an actual application that you can bend
and you bend into the website so that
all of the public can see it do we know
what public media they’re very important
they’re very valuable but you’re going
to get one or two hundred people if
you’re lucky you know it’s the website
it’s gonna get thousands of views over
time it’s Facebook it’s the news and
that’s where this accessibility is is
really important you know I’m talking
the past about virtual reality how we’ve
done seen demonstrations and said that’s
a valuable way as well especially for
public meetings and you can make it so
that someone on your phone can also look
around and have that same helicopter
tour or driving experience through to
virtual reality but as I mentioned
moving forward something that we work on
all the time is optimization how can we
make sure that this runs on more devices
than just this this expensive setup that
I hear this is probably more of analysis
get this set up for about $5,000
it weighs about 300 pounds it’s been
half an hour setting it out I hope in
five years this is just a panel where we
carry around and that’s all built into
the technology something that I can
something that I didn’t carry around in
the back okay now I’ve lugged this thing
around a lot alright so quality in the
past if you saw visualization back in
the 90s early 2000s you receive the
roadway
they’ve been modeled by the engineers we
might have some shapes of buildings but
maybe they were in a lot of context the
texturing may or may not have been there
now thanks for adding buildings trees
terrain and again this is the technology
and the hardware continues to improve
we’re able to to show more fill more
polygons were able to show more trees
whose network powerful computers and the
texturing as well and that’s something
that does we hire artists that have been
trained in these things they’re able to
find more realistic asphalt concrete
textures I want to give a demonstration
on there in a second but in the future
you know I hope that it will be the
buildings there will be a lot of them
and they’ll be high detail that’s a lot
of times when you’re working with a
project and you’re doing the public
outreach which is essentially what this
is the the biggest stakeholders are
often the businesses right along the
border they said Jeff right here Jeff
knows what I’m talking about
Emily chocolate roof so that the
business has come in and if you show
them this project and it you got the
striking right and got the sign Greg you
got all this stuff right but the
building looks kind of shoddy it’s gonna
seem to start the community not their
own way so we trying to do better with
our own buildings and in the future
as this progresses he’ll be more
realistic and something that I hope you
know what I look to in the standard is a
lot of the latest
if you look at the the triple-a titles
that come out that Dead Redemption two
of their gamers out there they don’t
play it but I go on youtube and watch
them to see how they make them and they
just look so Ganic you know it looks so
real and I hope that we can get away
from the straight hard lines that we use
Engineers can play more into something
more natural especially if we show a lot
of existing conditions and we want to
show that kind the way it is so then do
another demonstration here this is this
is the Boulder City apartment project
we’ve recently just wrapped up and this
one was important like I was something
about the stakeholders the biggest
staples was on this project where all
the businesses along the corner I’m sure
most of you know this area and these
businesses have just been kind of had a
shellacking with the the I eleven
because now all the traffic is going
around and so now older citizens we’re
gonna loop this we’re gonna improve your
thing they’re like over you know we just
had to drop the business because not as
many people come through they already
have a bad relationship with engineers
with with the agency and and so now
they’re coming in trying to sell this
other project which is you know up to a
year of construction and it’s going to
change access for some of them and so we
work with them to develop it the one
thing that we did is we went out in the
field and we took we took pictures of
every single every single business and
every single sign and then we actually
just put the pictures right on the 3d
model so that we can make it as
realistic as possible
see
and this this was really helpful and
they turn into public meetings and all
the public they about how reach that
they’ve done in the into a much more
positive experience because they they
can see what what this will do they can
see the complete streets will hopefully
beautify the area one thing that we’ve
we’ve added to this and many of our
project is existing to propose so they
can see exactly how it will change
change their access so we had several
kiosks at the public money they have a
laptop that they’re able to go to all
these these stakeholders and have
meetings about how it will how it will
change their image now I hope to wrap up
there’s enough time if anyone else has
questions and wants to comply with this
afterwards you will be able to leave
this up for a little bit alright so
phasing phasing is something that we’ve
found to be very effective because when
you’re showing a project people don’t
like the way this today and then you’re
trying to communicate the way it’s going
to be but to show that contracts
contrast is very valuable you know I
just show that in on the Boulder City
let me pull the other project
[Music]
this is a project we just sit up over
being last before and phasing isn’t
especially important on this because
right now they’re doing 3a where they
finished create they’re working on 3c
and then 3d is kind of the elements all
become to come together and so we worked
to to not just show the existing you
proposed but at some new features if you
can see here over here on the right we
have it on the left as well but in the
past we would just show that the
proposed condition but what we do is
usually the first thing we do on the
project is we get theta scenarios in
training we get them into our model we
start cleaning them up and Photoshop out
all the parts maybe that would work
realistic
replace the image cars with treating
cars trees everything like that and then
we start modeling the bridges best we
can get as both plants yes for those
sorts of things and it also helps us
because sometimes projects not finished
in the design phase so this allows us to
get involved in the project but we’re
still waiting for those files once we
have the files we start working on the
the proposed for the various phases and
we can start to add those as we go on
and so the existing is proposed is
something that we’ve been doing that’s
kind of the current current stink of
visualization but in the future I think
will be the give doing more phases
construction phases and also a motif
it’s a little bit of that project beyond
so that we get from unity when you come
here you can show how the traffic
closures will affect someone one thing I
read it on this one was we actually
developed a system where you can show by
by color which phases are going on so
these colors match up with the marketing
materials that HTR through using it over
the years and they’re able to show those
phases and one thing that you can do for
these applications you can render out an
image or video whatever you’re seeing so
if we want to show something specific
you can get the camera there can render
it with or without the flashy colors so
hopefully phasing will continue to be a
weird rear part of visualization moving
forward right so traffic this is the one
that I think I’m going to spend the most
time on because I think it there’s the
most potential the most untapped
potential in traffic so I go to a lot of
conferences me there’s a lot of people
and the first thing they asked when they
see these things they see is that
missing child it’s the first thing that
they say it’s okay if I go back to this
project
people are always asking if it’s
actually similar simulated job it’s
important because that’s that just
affects the project sometimes you’re
showing that we’re spending all this
money in this traffic’s backed up now
and as we improve it
traffic will improve so we’re working to
add this in the past sometimes you
didn’t have traffic or v6 and stationary
vehicles sometimes would be keyframe
animated which works the keyframe
doesn’t work for real-time because let’s
say you animate two minutes of traffic
paths what happens in your public
meetings an hour the cars are all
stopped because you keep rings faster so
we developed this system with project
neon where it’s basically random
free-flowing traffic we just set up the
pass when the cars just keep going
forever
mister run we’ve run these things all
over night and wake up these ones are
still running I’ll show you another
demonstration where sometimes they
aren’t ready but so this is kind of the
way things have been most recently which
is effective you’re showing the project
one thing that’s that’s cool about this
does the other thing I get especially in
public meetings is he saying that that’s
not how the traffic’s actually in the
people it’s it’s gonna be jammed it’s
gonna be rushed our people are gonna be
there or the conative manager we like it
we just fix all the traffic then you’re
making it look like there’s a ton of
cars
either way it’s never the right so we
have this developer the worst person is
amazing things really cool things I was
like okay yeah can you make it so we can
just adjust the traffic if someone wants
us to and he always comes back he solves
a problem so he has a slider right here
where we could just
once we can get the right traffic level
right there as usual
we show the transfer segment which is
like the performance and this is like
10,000 bars and it’s running 10 frames
per second so sometimes we’ll just turn
it down just a computer will overheat so
we’ve had this system for a couple years
and we keep adding new features we added
merging lanes on this project we added
this adjustable traffic volume and then
we’ve we’ve continued push kind of that
boundary because what if you have an
intersection the way we’ve done it here
is you have parts that are stopped at
stoplights in the air the other
direction of traffic where it’s just
moving through because again these were
built and applications that are running
all the time the net that’s kind of
worked but a lot of things we want cars
to stuff in intersections you want to do
this stuff and so that’s kind of the
next phase for us was to develop this
system where the traffic would actually
be somewhat smart let me do this
so in this sustainable project we
developed a smart traffic system so we
can not simulated this isn’t an
algorithm this isn’t showing based on
traffic counts and all that stuff but
but it is smart enough that if you watch
these cars they’re gonna stop at this
stuff like when it’s red and then when
it turns green they’re going to move
through so I’ll just leave that here for
a second so they they just went through
the intersection we have as your drive
up here and this intersection affects
this one so when these guys are gonna
come stop stop over here it’s open again
it’s kind of the next level now it’s now
what you’re seeing is something a little
bit more accurate they’re going through
this through lane and and that’s a
really good step for us but the future
is fully simulated traffic where we can
agree on the visum reports him and so
we’re working on that we’re working on
this with an n dot project right now and
we’re gonna be working on it with a
couple other projects too so we’re
working on this end up project it’s just
project I hope it’s okay that I talked a
little bit about this throw something at
me if it’s not so
so in the past the way that you would
work with this and data and
visualization is there is a plugin
called simple view in 3ds max 3ds max is
like a really old and kind of standard
error for 3d modeling so simple view is
they bought a company they integrated
into the the 3ds Max and you can bring
in those XMP files into 3ds Max and a
lot of a lot of firms that do what we do
that’s where it stays they render
straight from 3ds Max and then when
we’re trying to get it into unity 3d
which is the interactive application the
game engine that we use then you have to
take that other step so it goes from
from this in two simple view into 3ds
max in the mid to unity and so we need
we’ve done some tests with that we did
that on the first course you’ll agree
disputable either they’re not xpx it
didn’t it didn’t work perfectly but our
goal is to get it so that we can take
that FCU the fzp file and bring it
directly into unity natively it will
also give us more control so that we can
if we want to throw out the number of
cars of the number of frames or if we
want to change things we can do it with
our application beginning back to the
point when I started this presentation
we we kind of ended up a affirm that a
video game development firm that focuses
on transportation project and that there
are challenges to that because sometimes
we have this down money doing research
and development solving these problems
but it also gives us the ability to
solve these problems so
so this was just from from yesterday so
this is this is the Tropicana project
this is existing traffic and so this is
so what we’re doing in mutate that CP
file there’s just a bunch of data for
each part to show their position every
tenth of a second and so we take that we
parse it and bring it into unity and
there we go so we’re not there yet we’re
still he’s the optimum represent actual
cars here pretty soon when we get that
data obviously it’s in two mentions so
we have to track them on the z axis so
there’s basically say four challenges
one it’s getting the data in two is
geo-located the data so that it matches
our 3d model 3 is the z axis then fourth
is having these actually represent cars
we want if you have two cars as far as
this image interested but then we have
two trucks in our model or a car in a
truck and then they’ll run through each
other Jim to think about these sorts of
problems that the vehicle the z-axis all
these things so by next week or the week
after we’ll have this but this is really
important because when you’re working
with the public in your you’re talking
about this multi-million under two
hundred million dollar project showing
them hey look right now this is the this
is the metering that you guys deal with
every day on the uranium from traffic
and then you switch it to that the close
button and suddenly it’s moving much
more smoothly and it’s not just it’s not
just are funny graphics and visuals it’s
actually simulated traffic you know it’s
the chest we know how they sent traffic
based on Japanese engineers then it’s a
it’s really powerful way to show to show
why the project is needed
all right so any so this is my last
slide so the purpose of visualization
I’ve been in this industry for a little
while I know that not every project
needs visualization some projects need
it and not everyone’s kind of bought
into the idea cuz you can build a
project without ever coming in this
fancy graphics totally understand that
but and in the past it was the purpose
was we were communicating the design to
the part whatever that whatever that was
with whether that was a public meeting
whether that was a news broadcast you
know in the past service exhibits or it
was roll pots on the walls is that
you’ve actually got in the render images
and videos now we’re still doing the
communication but it’s more accurate we
have the designs you see here actually
cosine K the traffic hopefully is actual
traffic simulate each other
the bridges are International Bridge
files of rage engineers so it’s much
more accurate but we’re also doing some
reviewing
yes we did Rogers here we did this on
the elevated expressway project with the
county they had for outbound
alternatives and to inbound alternatives
they’re all color-coded kind of like
what I was showing you before so that we
could turn this all on and on we would
do more of them except we have usually
won’t be involved in the project that
are that usually they wait until at
least have one or two preferred
alternative identifiers but was there
another question sure yeah well I can
give you some examples this intangible
we started in December we wrapped up
last week so a little under three months
so Reno’s being going on and off for
over a year
some of them the Boulder City Park for
this three or four months so some of
them we can get out these are all of
these are major system the system things
if it’s like a Complete Streets project
some of them we do quickly these are
interactive sometimes we just do simple
renders that will do them two or three
days so I also didn’t if you guys want
some really good Girl Scout cookies
yes we definitely can so if you didn’t
hear her questions she’s saying end up
has been using these were more for the
review like we were talking about but do
we do sub service visualization the
first one that I ever did I don’t know
if you ever saw it was for Nick Johnson
I did not it was the Centennial Bowl
that bridge piers were in conflict with
the creditor gas line that was the
famous 3 B that got tossed out and and
so I did an underground like but the
camera underneath the ground and it was
very rudimentary and so yes definitely
I actually I want to show one thing if I
can so like I said this synthetic oh we
were in Alaska but I was a rotating
engineer and I would just cut my teeth
on this side I’m not a trained artist
this way these guys they actually know
what they’re doing I don’t and so this
is like seven years ago and I was just
messing around with things and I did
some simple visualization for Centennial
well I found that stuff last week when I
was wrapping up some table so again with
our in our theme of past versus future
this is the same the West Brown movement
on CC 215 on Centennial so yes you can
see that the difference of
well this is going is are there more
questions right
like all
we’re not people here
well I don’t know but they do in company
with one our assets because they’re not
optimized the same way I mean when you
spend money to build a building for a
video game it’s a lot different they’re
spending a lot more money because it
needs to be super efficient we don’t
have those sorts of budgets we just for
a frame of reference Pixar movie maybe
two or three million man-hours you know
Centennial wall was like twelve hundred
so it’s just a whole different scale
where they wouldn’t want a lot of these
things we just built in-house where
these projects I think if there if
anyone came to us and wanted something
we would just give it to him I mean
so a lot of the favorites probably
sherry bill will send them ourselves
any other questions yeah what’s that
does it calibrate the traffic no show up
in weeds
it doesn’t know and they’re glad about
that are you saying does it calibrate
the traveler so is it doing kind of what
Vista more seat bro or doujins doesn’t
do that it doesn’t but I showed the
smart traffic where we have the traffic
signals and the cars moving through
slowing down speeding up our developer
he just was new out of you know these
computer science background and he’d
figured that stuff on myself he’s never
taken the traffic engineering class but
my goal would be that someday we can
have the same level of accuracy in our
own algorithm so when we placed the cars
in the lanes it’s not taking visitors up
it’s just you know putting out through
traffic based on counts and all that
stuff right into it so we came back to
the future that’s right we are
[Applause]