FAQ
For what types of projects is EdgeWise™ suitable?
What makes EdgeWise different from other automated LIDAR modeling applications?
How does EdgeWise capture “design intent”?
What types of surfaces can EdgeWise extract?
What types of file formats can EdgeWise read?
What formats can EdgeWise export?
How fast is EdgeWise?
Can EdgeWise process data from mobile laser scanners?
It appears that EdgeWise automatically creates partial models. How hard is it to complete those models?
Can EdgeWise work with pre-registered scans?
Will EdgeWise change my workflow?
Why does EdgeWise require a scanner location for every scan?
How hard is it to learn EdgeWise?
For what types of projects is EdgeWise suitable?
EdgeWise was designed with architectural features (buildings) in mind. Therefore, EdgeWise has immediate applicability for BIM (Building Information Modeling) projects. It excels at modeling both building exteriors as well as interiors. In addition to buildings, EdgeWise is a great candidate for modeling any other engineered structures comprised of planar surfaces (bridges, plant facilities, etc.). Finally, EdgeWise has a powerful automated ground extraction algorithm that can make topographic projects a snap.
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What makes EdgeWise different from other automated LIDAR modeling applications?
Other software applications take one of two approaches to modeling: either 1) the “automation” is extremely laborious and time-consuming, requiring manual extraction of each surface, or 2) the software simply creates a mesh or a decimated mesh (see EdgeWise Polygons for a comparison), which is NOT editable and can NOT be readily used for most CAD applications.
EdgeWise, on the other hand, actually more closely resembles approach 1 in that it painstakingly extracts each feature separately, but it truly is automatic and hands-off. The resulting model resembles what a good technician would have manually created, but it actually takes it one step farther in that it corrects the results for “design intent”.
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How does EdgeWise capture “design intent”?
EdgeWise extracts features according to “design intent” rather than “as built”. This means that two surfaces that are supposed to be parallel, but in reality are slightly askew, will be “corrected” in the EdgeWise model. The resulting surfaces extracted by EdgeWise will be exactly parallel if they are within the user-specified tolerances. This is true of edges as well as surfaces. Additionally, EdgeWise enforces orthogonality in the same fashion for features that are close to 90-degrees off from each other.
There are numerous advantages to capturing design intent (ideal) vs. as-built features. 1) First and foremost, it makes a much more convenient model for editing and subsequent analysis. Parallel features snap nicely with each other and with orthogonal features in a CAD environment, so the modeling and extrusion process becomes a breeze. If you’ve ever tried snapping features together when they’re even a mere arc-second out of parallel, you understand the importance! 2) Secondly, the design intent provides the most compact (fewest vertices) representation of the original dataset. 3) Finally, most projects ultimately require an ideal model rather than a model where the surfaces are all slightly askew. Even when the goal is to measure imperfections, the design intent is required to compare against the as-built data in order to determine the error.
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What types of surfaces can EdgeWise extract?
The current version of EdgeWise only extracts planar features. Cylinders and other parabolic shapes are in the works….
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What types of file formats can EdgeWise read?
The file formats that EdgeWise can read, listed in order of preference, are:
1. .fls or .ptg (very fast binary files)
2. .ptx (best ascii format – includes required scanner location information)
3. .pts (next best ascii format)
4. .xyz, .txt, .asc, .3dv
The .ptx files must be in the following format:
38 (Number of columns)
38 (Number of rows)
-32.171832 -9.185806 -1.646285 (scanner location)
0.999995 0.001997 0.002520 (3X3 rotation matrix)
-0.001954 0.999859 -0.016691 (3X3 rotation matrix)
-0.002553 0.016686 0.999857 (3X3 rotation matrix)
0.999995 0.001997 0.002520 0 (4X4 rotation matrix)
-0.001954 0.999859 -0.016691 0 (4X4 rotation matrix)
-0.002553 0.016686 0.999858 0 (4X4 rotation matrix)
-32.171832 -9.185806 -1.646285 1 (4X4 rotation matrix)
5.611984 -10.023880 -2.536453 1 254 244 216 (x y z i r g b)
5.613358 -10.026352 -2.535812 1 254 244 215 (x y z i r g b)
…
EdgeWise can read standard space-delimited (not comma or tab) .xyz, .txt, and .asc files in the following formats:
5.611984 -10.023880 -2.536453 1 (x y z i)
5.613358 -10.026352 -2.535812 1 (x y z i)
…
5.611984 -10.023880 -2.536453 (x y z)
5.613358 -10.026352 -2.535812 (x y z)
…
5.611984 -10.023880 -2.536453 254 244 216 (x y z r g b)
5.613358 -10.026352 -2.535812 254 244 215 (x y z r g b)
…
5.611984 -10.023880 -2.536453 1 254 244 216 (x y z i r g b)
5.613358 -10.026352 -2.535812 1 254 244 215 (x y z i r g b)
…
EdgeWise can also read .pts files in the following space-delimited formats:
139152 (number of points)
-16.331 -24.924 -4.144 (x y z)
-14.804 -25.601 -5.790 (x y z)
…
139152 (number of points)
-16.331 -24.924 -4.144 9 (x y z i)
-14.804 -25.601 -5.790 6 (x y z i)
…
139152 (number of points)
-16.331 -24.924 -4.144 9 24 8 24 (x y z i r g b)
-14.804 -25.601 -5.790 6 49 24 8 (x y z i r g b)
…
In the future we will support additional binary formats as well.
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What formats can EdgeWise export?
It currently exports models in dxf format. Additionally, it can export ground models in xyz and pts format.
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How fast is EdgeWise?
The speed of the automated routines within EdgeWise depend on a number of factors, including processor speed, size of scan, and the complexity of the scene. However, a typical scan can be processed in 5-10 minutes, and even the most complex scans can generally be processed in around half an hour on a mid-budget laptop. Compared to the time that you would typically spend modeling a scene, the processing time for EdgeWise is really negligible.
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Can EdgeWise process data from mobile laser scanners?
At the present, it can only work with data from stationary laser scanners. In the near future we will create a version that will be capable of handling the unique geometry associated with mobile scanners. Stay tuned!
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It appears that EdgeWise automatically creates partial models. How hard is it to complete those models?
Because laser scanning is a line-of-sight technology, portions of your scan are typically hidden (or ‘occluded’) by other objects. These occluded objects are only partially modeled by the current version of EdgeWise (we’re working on this!). At present, to create a complete model, you have to manually edit the resulting polygons. The good news is that, in general, this is a relatively easy process using the visible polygons that were captured by EdgeWise. Those incomplete polygons provide a very accurate “template” against which to extrude and snap your final CAD model. Because the edges and surfaces are parallel when they’re supposed to be parallel and orthogonal when they’re supposed to be orthogonal, the extruding and snapping process is a breeze, allowing you to complete models in no time. For an idea of how quick this process can be, watch the SketchUp segment at the end of the video on this page or download a high-res version here.
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Can EdgeWise work with pre-registered scans?
Yes! In fact, this is now the preferred method for working with multiple scans. As each scan is processed, EdgeWise exports the resulting dxf model to its registered location, but with a tiny, miniscule tweak to ensure that its edges remain exactly parallel to the edges in the “master” model.
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Will EdgeWise change my workflow?
Slightly. EdgeWise processes point clouds on a scan-by-scan basis, rather than working with a merged scan. Therefore, even if you pre-register your scans together, you must not “merge” then into a solitary point cloud and lose track of which points belong to which scans. In addition, EdgeWise requires knowledge of the scanner location for each scan. For these reasons, the fls, ptg, and ptx file formats are ideal candidates for saving point clouds for use in EdgeWise, since these formats can store multiple registered scans in one file and also store the scanner location for each separate scan. On reading an fls, ptg, or ptx file, EdgeWise is able to break out the individual scans and process them accordingly.
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Why does EdgeWise require a scanner location for every scan?
Laser scanning is a line-of-sight technology, and so there is a wealth of information to be had in knowing where the scan was taken from. EdgeWise uses ray-tracing algorithms to determine which objects occlude other objects, as well as which objects should be more densely sampled due to closer distances. All of these calculations require a scanner location.
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How hard is it to learn EdgeWise?
Well, an automated tool OUGHT to be pretty easy to learn, right? It only takes an hour or two to learn how to use EdgeWise. It can take a couple of weeks, though, to really get a feel for how to tune the adjustable parameters to achieve the highest quality extraction results.