Water Treatment Plant Visuals

I've been working on a small visualisation project recently using Infraworks. There are a series of existing water treatment plants where the client wishes to power the plant using renewable energy. The project requires the installation of a wind turbine and PV panels on site. Our end has been to create a visualisation to examine the visual impact of the turbine and PV panels, particularly in relation to the nearest dwellings. Some screen shots below. Not photorealistic but getting a good balance between time spent doing the modelling and quality achieved from Infraworks. The majority of videos, demonstrations and marketing material from Autodesk is aimed at larger scale projects but IW is well suited to smaller scale projects also.

 

Here's two additional images for anyone that recognises the area...!!

How to Hatch a Corridor

This is another one of those things that is easy to do in Civil 3D when you are shown how. From experience I know a lot of people aren't aware that it can be done or think that it is difficult to do. The result is that a lot of people are exporting Civil 3D models to AutoCAD and hatching manually (madness!).

The code set style is what is used to control the appearance of your corridor in Civil 3D. It is a pretty big style and can look intimidating at first (it controls display in plan, section and 3D views, as well as labelling). This has been the most common thing that I have been asked from users in relation to corridor appearance - how to hatch a corridor in plan. Here's my corridor before, not exactly jumping off the page:

Select your corridor and go to Corridor properties on the ribbon. On the codes tab you will see the current code set style in use (3D Render Basic Plan in this case), we want to create a new one as below:

Before you create the new code set style, take a minute to look at the some of the ones currently available. You will notice that the style itself is broken down into Links, Points and Shapes - see image above. These L, P & S come from the subassembly you are using. Without digging into that too much, basically the L,P & S are parts of your subassembly. Points are joined by links and shapes are bound by links in your subassemblies. See below:

When we want to style our corridor in a particular way it is these elements of the subassembly in the corridor that we are styling effectively. When you create a new code set style you will see that the L, P & S are empty:

The quickest way to populate these to suit what is in your subassembly/corridor is to click Import Codes at the bottom of the dialog box and browse to your subassembly in your drawing and select it. You can then assign styles to the L,P & S, see below:

To hatch to corridor in plan we are only interested in links, and only in the Material Area Fill Style section. I am using the UKIE drawing template and picking some of the styles from that and assigning them to particular links in my corridor. Note that the Top link is generally common to most subassemblies so applying a style to this will likely colour your corridor all the one colour so best not to use it. If you are having trouble figuring out which link you should be applying a style to then hover ('hoover' if you are Dutch! ;)) over that link in your corridor and you will find the name of it in the tooltip that appears.

If you are not showing links in your corridor you can find the code by selecting your subassembly, right click and select properties and find the Top Link Code name as below:

The end result of editing the code set style is below:

Visualisation for Landowner Query Pt2

This post follows on from something I was working on at the end of last year and I decided to create a video showing the workflow and final results.

http://youtu.be/_Z8XygN-6xo

The first five and half minutes of the video explain a bit about what was required for the visualisation and demonstrate the workflow to get from Civil 3D to Autodesk Infrastructure Modeller (AIM). The final results from the AIM model start at 5min 40 sec for those who want to skip...

If you would like more info on how to export from C3D to AIM then read the following posts:

http://civilintentions.blogspot.ie/2013/02/civil-3d-to-aim.html

http://civilintentions.blogspot.ie/2013/02/civil-3d-to-aim-part-2-its-all-in-code.html

Civil 3D to AIM part 2 - It's all in the (Code Set) Style

In the last post we looked at taking the topo survey and areas of interest from C3D into Autodesk Infratsructure Modeller (AIM). In this post we will look at taking the proposed design (C3D corridors) out to AIM.

While you can export surfaces to LandXML from C3D and import into AIM this does not work well for corridor (proposed) surfaces. The reason is that AIM treats LandXML surfaces as Terrain and will drape your aerial imagery onto them - in effect you will end up with a surface that takes on the shape of your proposed design but has the existing aerial imagery draped onto it as below:

The most efficient method of exporting your proposed design from C3D to AIM is to use the IMX file format. As usual there is a couple of things to look out for. The main thing I have learned is that setting a render material to elements of the corridor in C3D first through the corridor code set style will make life a lot easier when you import in AIM.

First we need to identify what elements of the corridor to attach materials to. Hover over the links in your corridor (these are the corridor lines running perpendicular to the baseline) and you will see in the tooltip what the link code is:

Do this for each of the links in your corridor and note the link code being used by each. There will be a different link between each of the corridor featurelines, see below:

Next select your corridor, go to Corridor Properties on the ribbon and on the Codes tab edit the code set style being used (or create a new one).

We need to make sure that the codes set style contains all of the codes being used in the corridor. In the code set style dialog box click on Import Codes...

...navigate to your assembly in the drawing and drag a selection box around it. This will bring in all the codes used in the assembly to your code set style for editing.

Back in the code set style dialog under the links section assign a render material to each of the link codes used in your corridor. Be careful here as the top code will be used by all links so assigning a material to that will be used for all links. It is better to assign separate materials to the codes such as Daylight_Cut, Daylight_Fill, Ditch etc.

Once you have done this select the corridor in your drawing and choose object viewer on the ribbon, set the view style to Realistic. How the corridor looks in realistic view will give a good indication of how it will look in AIM. If there appears to be any part of the corridor that does not have a material assigned then check your link codes and assigned materials before exporting to AIM.

Now in C3D you are ready to export. On the Output tab of the Ribbon click Export IMX:

You can connect direct to this file in AIM. It will bring in Roads and Surface as two separate connections under data sources. As in the previous post right click on each connection separately and select configure and make sure that the coordinates are set correct. Do not drape these connections as we want to use the design level information. The corridor should now appear in AIM using the materials assigned in C3D:

Looking South from T1

 T2 and Compound with T1 in background

T8

Civil 3D to AIM

The following couple of workflows demonstrate taking your design from Civil 3D to Autodesk Infrastructure Modeller (AIM) for visualisation. Next post will cover taking proposed design (corridors) from C3D out to Autodesk Infrastructure Modeller (AIM) for visualisation.

The first thing to be aware of is what format you export your data out of Civil 3D for use in AIM.

Existing Topo:

The best way to get your existing ground surface out of Civil 3D is to export it as a LandXML file and then connect to this in AIM. You can do this a number of ways - right click on your surface in the Toolspace and select Export to LandXML or access the command from thee Output tab of the ribbon - see below:

When you connect to this in AIM it will automatically treat it as terrain. Once connected to in AIM right click on the connection and select Configure to make sure the coordinates are set or you may not see anything in your model. Any aerial imagery will automatically be draped onto this surface.

Areas of Interest:

For any areas of interest on your site that you want to highlight in the AIM model the best format to export them out of Civil 3D is the SDF format. For example in the project (Windfarm site) I am working on there is a CAD drawing which contains all of the site constraints in AutoCAD format. you can isolate CAD objects for each type of constraint and export them as separate SDF files. You can then connect to and control the display of each of these constraints separately in your AIM model. This allows you greater flexibility in controlling the display of the constraints in your AIM model rather than importing them as a CAD drawing underlay or all at once.

One of the constraints in my CAD drawing highlights areas along the proposed internal roads where there is a high risk of peat instability. I want to be able to highlight these in my visualisation.

These are represented by closed polylines in the drawing. In Civil 3D select one of closed polylines, right click and select similar then right click again and Isolate Objects. Once isolated type MAPEXPORT, choose SDF as files of type and give the file a name. In the dialog box that appears choose 'Select Manually' and select the isolated objects from the drawing.

In AIM connect to this file as below:

After connecting to the file, right click on the connection in AIM and select configure. On the Common tab set the 'Type' as Coverage Areas, Set the style.

On the Geo Location tab set the coordinate zone. On the Source tab set the draping options to Drape (since they were just 2D polylines originally they have no level information) tick the box to convert to closed polygons also. Click close and refresh and you should see your areas draped on the 3D model as below:

In my model the red highlights areas along proposed routes where there is high risk of peat instability, blue represents areas of peat greater than 3m in depth and magenta are areas of blanket bog.

Windfarm Visuals from AIM

Have been busy using Infrastructure Modeller for visualisation... this one is for a windfarm in Northern Ireland...

Here's the rendered image...

Here are some snapshots of the model in AIM without rendering...

Visualisation for Landowner Query

I have been using Autodesk Infrastructure Modeller (AIM) to create visuals for part of a proposed road realignment.

As part of the works a hill on the existing road will be flattened out to improve visibility  There will be two landowners whose access will be directly affected by the works. On one side of the  road a retaining wall will be required and this landowner was having difficulty understanding how the new access and retaining wall will impact on their property.

The design was already completed in Civil 3D so I was working from a completed design back to get a visualisation in AIM (whereas the software is primarily a conceptual design/visualisation tool and you would normally use it before finalizing the design).

Here are some of the before and after visuals...

Looking North - Before

Looking North - After

Looking South - Before

Looking South - After

Landowners Proposed Entrance View

Looking North at Retaining Wall

Looking South at Retaining Wall

The visuals aren't photo-realistic but they don't need to be either. (The inclusion of the sun isn't realistic either given that it is in Donegal). The landowner can clearly see the impact of the new road layout on their property. The effort involved to create the above was small enough to make it feasible for a landowner query - it took about a day. If you are proficient with Civil 3D then you should pick this up quite quickly....

Civil 3D Usergroup Meeting Galway

At yesterdays Civil 3D Usergroup meeting in Galway we had a presentation from Reg Cowie from Mayo National Road Design Office. They have designed the new N5 Westport to Bohola road project using Civil 3D and have created visualisations of a number of sensitive areas for public consultation. This one involves an overbridge in a sensitive area where there are three historic structures in a triangular arrangement around the proposed new bridge. The visualisation helped with the public consultation process to alleviate concern over potential loss of visual connection between the structures. the visualisation can be viewed at the link below. A big thanks to Reg for an excellent presentation....

http://youtu.be/K-lYjNWrTHk

Prelim Visuals for Windfarm

Just starting to use Infrastructure Modeller(AIM) for creating some preliminary visuals for a windfarm project... Will be creating a more detailed model once I get CAD drawings, GIS and aerial photography...

Exported the topo surface from Civil 3D to LandXML format and brought this into AIM. Also exported internal road layout (polylines) and watercourse information (also polylines) to SDF format using the MAPEXPORT command. The SDF's and XML files are then easily imported and styled in AIM. It took more time tidying the linework in C3D than it did to import and style in AIM. It will be a good project to test the usefulness of conceptual design/visualisation software like AIM.

Ulster Canal Visualisation

See link below to part of a visualisation of the Ulster Canal made for Waterways Ireland. More clips to follow...

http://youtu.be/i71bxRnvQL8

Civil 3D modelling by Amicus Technology. Visualisation by Siscin.
If watching in full screen set the quality to the maximum...

The Ulster Canal – Upper Lough Erne to Clones is located in County Fermanagh, County Monaghan and County Cavan in Ireland and N. Ireland. From Upper Lough Erne to Clones the navigation begins at Quivvy Lough in County Fermanagh and then travels up the River Finn to Gortnacarrow, travelling along the County Cavan boundary at Castle Saunderson. From Gortnacarrow the canal travels north east to Clones, crossing the international border between Northern Ireland (County Fermanagh) and Ireland (County Monaghan) three times. The proposed navigation will be approximately 14km in total, with 5.5kms of river navigation from Quivvy Lough to Gortnacarrow and 8.5kms of canal from Gortnacarrow to a 36 birth marina at Clones. Over this section of canal there are 14 bridges that will have to be replaced, redesigned or restored.