Reality Capture Customer Case
Reality Capture customer case: MP-Map Oy Surveying company using FARO laser scanners MP-Map Oy is a construction surveying company with over 30 years of surveying experience and its head office in Tampere, Finland. Over the years the company has been adapting lots new measuring techniques with the latest addition of FARO Focus S150 laser scanner that made them the first user of that scanner model in Finland. The initial reason for using laser scanning in construction project came from several recent building projects, where additional floor have been added to existing buildings as a part of a larger renovation projects. Adding floors to existing buildings means that a lots of new measurements are needed to make sure that all new designs match the existing building structures. This is especially challenging and time consuming in buildings, where people are still living in and not all design requirement are not always know just by looking many decades old drawings. 1
Any additional survey visits to site to check additional information for design means also more annoyance to the people living in the buildings. With traditional measuring methods only way to get new measurements is to go back on the site and collect those in all the needed areas with total station or other measuring systems, which is time consuming and also requires more resources than just one visit. To solve this problem MP-Map decided to get their first laser scanner in 2016. With the FARO Focus S150 laser scanner they are now able to scan the whole design building in one visit. For additional measurement needs now, they only need to visit the point clouds to check for example additional ventilation locations or to measure water equipment that were not yet needed in earlier design phase. Laser scanning is also less disruptive, when visiting people s homes and, the measurement data can be collected faster than with traditional measurements. Overall this saves time and money as well as gives a better customer experience to people living in the buildings that MP-Map is measuring for as-built modelling. 2
Reality Capture is a process that requires planning and attention to details Reality Capture in Symetri means laser scanning and any other means to collect as-built information from any building or structure. Laser scanning itself is measurement technique that uses laser light to measure millions of points around any location that the scanner is set on a tripod. Result of the measurement is a 3D point cloud model that resembles the real design site with real coordinates. A digital copy of the real thing. Laser scanning itself is very easy and requires basically a setting up a tripod, turning on the laser scanner and then pushing a start button on the laser scanner. Then moving the scanner to next scanner location every few minutes. Before starting the actual scanning it is still good to think about 3 things first; 1. A good definition of the design requirements What is needed in the data? 2. A good definition of the design area What is the actual area of interest? 3. A good definition of the used standards or other specifications How many points we need and in what format? These 3 little things are sometimes forgotten, but should be always considered in start of any laser scanning project as different countries, industries and organizations have their own standards. 3
In AEC projects for example architects, structural engineers and HVAC designers all have different needs for what they want to see in BIM model for example (one of the end results of laser scanning projects). One is interested on how surfaces look, another about, which structure keep the building in standing position, and the last one about, where is enough room to fit new pipe routes and make the installation process as easy as possible. By knowing which standard and point density setting to use, it is very easy to plan the rest of the laser scanning project and have the right amount of points on right objects in the end of the laser scanning. Good planning also saves time in the actual scanning phase as opening of doors and other additional work can be scheduled to match the laser scanning work progress. Basically laser scanning today can be used in many different types of industries and by many different types of designers as almost all design software support use of laser scanned point clouds as the design reference. One example user of laser scanning in their daily activities is MP-Map Oy, a construction survey company from Finland. With the laser scanning they have been able to collect more detail information about building in the construction sites they work as a surveying partner for several different construction and design offices. As laser scanning collects measurements about everything around the scanner in many cases also unknown design information needs have been met even, before those are raised in the design process. In Essi Lassila s own words laser scanning has made the as-built data collection a lot easier and faster than it was with old style of measurement. It has also improved our surveying quality and customer satisfaction has improved as all details of the buildings are collected on only one visit. This saves time from designers and also minimizes any annoyance caused to the people living in the buildings we measure as all data can be collected on one quick visit. Typically we only spend 20-30 minutes in one apartment. 4
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