Reality Computing

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 7

In previous posts we’ve covered high level concepts of Reality Computing and its constituent components, we’ve explored its value, and we’ve looked at how it’s being used within different industries. Now it’s time to wrap up our introduction to Reality Computing.

Future scenarios for Reality Computing

Reality Computing represents a huge potential across multiple industries and as technology evolves, so will uses within and across industries. For example, consumers can already customize their Nike Flyknit shoes by choosing different color combinations for various parts of the shoes (upper, sole, laces, even the Nike swoosh). But in the near future, one can imagine a completely customized shoe that is contoured to an athlete’s foot. You visit your local Nike store, have your feet laser scanned, and get a custom-sized custom-made pair of shoes printed for you while you wait. Longer term, maybe consumers will have their own household 3D printer to fabricate items such as custom clothing, toys, even replacement parts for household appliances.

Within the construction industry, the production use of augmented reality is just on the horizon—where utility workers and excavators will have ground-penetrating scanner devices hooked into equipment monitors (or even Google Glasses) displaying georeferenced 3D models of the underground utilities superimposed over live images of the construction area.

The use of Reality Computing to support augmented reality will enable municipal and utility workers to visualize underground utilities superimposed over real images of a street.
Image courtesy of VTN.

The use of Reality Computing to produce medical solutions customized to individual patients is already happening—from orthodontic braces to custom hearing aids to replicated body parts used for surgical planning. Currently, medical researchers are investigating ways to 3D print actual soft-tissue organs—a finger or a kidney for example—that will not be rejected by a patient’s body.

For industrial manufacturing, military personnel in combat zones or technicians in remote areas are already scanning equipment and machinery parts to digitally repair and fabricate a new part. In the near future, these groups could carry small portable 3D printers to produce the part on the spot and repair technicians using Google Glasses could view information related to the equipment (such as animated repair instructions) to quickly get the equipment back in service within days or even hours.

Reality Computing may even be destined for space one day. A professor at the University of Southern California has developed a layered fabrication technology for automating the construction of whole structures as well as sub-components. Single or multiple houses can be 3D printed, complete with conduits for utilities. ‘Contour Crafting’ was initially seen as a way to quickly construct emergency concrete housing or to build concrete structures in locations like Hawaii where concrete must be imported. But NASA is considering the technology to robotically print an airport on the moon or habitats on Mars.

“Most AEC firms laser scan existing conditions for use for design development on a renovation project. But we’re doing it during the course of construction—creating as-builts as we go, and using that as a component within our change-management process. This has allowed us to mitigate the impacts of changes, and has helped to keep us on schedule and within budget.”

—Chris Pechacek
Virtual Design and Construction Director
McCarthy Building Companies

Conclusion

Reality Computing—from capturing reality data and using software tools for computing reality data, to the physical or visual creation of digital information in the physical world—represents an information platform shift for the design, production, and management of physical things.

While the constituent technologies of Reality Computing have developed independently, they are increasingly being integrated into new workflows by organizations and teams across a range of industries to improve performance and better serve customers and clients.

This concludes our Introduction to Reality Computing blog series. Click here to download these posts, combined into a printable paper for easy viewing, printing, and distribution. And check back often for new posts about Reality Computing trends, technologies, and projects!

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An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 1

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 4

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 6

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 6

If you’ve been keeping up with our previous posts, you now know what Reality Computing is all about, including its constituent components and the value it can bring to companies and organizations. But how are forward-thinking organizations across industries actually using Reality Computing?

Industry ramifications of Reality Computing

The answer, of course, varies by industry and company—based on their existing tools, processes, and business relationships. Below are a few examples of how organizations are capturing physical information digitally using a variety of different technologies. How they are working directly with this captured reality data using digital tools that do not require them to turn the scanned data into modeled geometry. And how they are putting that data back to work in the physical world through 3D printing or other numerically controlled production or visualization technologies.

Automotive factory design and manufacturing
Volvo Cars no longer tries to maintain as-built geometrical models of the manual assembly cells for their plants because the models are expensive to develop, immediately out of date, and lose the rich detail captured with the reality data. Instead, they scan existing assembly cells and the resulting point cloud is their digital plant. Rather than interrupting production to move physical mockups through an assembly line, Volvo Cars uses a combination of reality-captured and modeled data (of new assembly components and car bodies) to simulate and verify production processes for new models.

Automotive manufacturers use reality scanned data to capture
existing conditions of factories and assembly lines.
Image courtesy of Volvo Car Group.

 

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 5

In the last several posts, we examined how Reality Computing turns things into data (capture), data into things (create), and what goes on in between (compute). Now let’s look at how businesses and organizations can benefit from Reality Computing.

The Value of Reality Computing

Knowledge
Reality Computing allows analyses and simulations to be performed digitally rather than on the actual object or system. Industrial designers use 3D-printed components to test a product’s form, usability, and ergonomics. Engineers use models derived from scanned buildings to perform energy analyses and determine a facility’s carbon footprint. Civil engineers create cinematic-quality project animations to support project approval and public outreach efforts for large (sometimes contentious) infrastructure projects.

Reality Computing enables engineers to use digital project models
derived from scanned buildings to perform energy analyses.

 

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 4

In the last several blog posts, we been looking at how Reality Computing integrates the digital and physical worlds, bringing together many products and technologies to:

1. Capture -- digitally capture existing conditions,
2. Compute -- use that information to digitally create simulations, designs, and so on,
3. Create -- then realize the results back in the physical world.

Today’s post focuses on how digital information is delivered back into the physical world.

“Turning data into things” (aka create)

The last leg of Reality Computing is the presentation of captured and modified reality data back in the physical world. This can be accomplished digitally (using project visualizations or augmented reality) or physically (using 3D printing, machine-controlled earthworks, and other digital fabrication techniques).

Digital realization

The ability to produce and present high quality images or animations of a new building or a consumer product can sometimes serve as a replacement for product prototypes or scaled-down physical project models. Project visualizations can be particularly important on large projects where sheer size and complexity make it difficult to fully convey designs using traditional engineering drawings. Model-based project visualizations that include reality data help project teams depict the project in the context of actual surroundings, making it easier for clients, project stakeholders, and the public to understand the project.

Model-based project visualizations help project teams depict their projects in the context of actual surroundings, such as this rendering of the Shanghai Tower. Image courtesy of Shanghai Tower Construction and Development Co., Ltd. Rendering by Gensler.

 

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 3

Reality Computing is a high-level concept that integrates the digital and physical worlds, bringing together many products and technologies to:

1. Capture -- digitally capture existing conditions
2. Compute -- use that information to digitally create simulations, designs, and so on,
3. Create -- then realize the results back in the physical world.

The last blog post examined ways information about the physical world can be digitally captured. Today’s post looks at how software tools are used to manipulate and analyze that information—connecting the digital capture of the physical world and the physical creation of the digital world.

“And what goes on in between” (aka compute)

Once ‘reality’ is captured and processed, the next step of Reality Computing is the ability to operate on the digital, real-world information. This may involve editing it to filter erroneous or unwanted data, manipulating it into new designs, adding new model information around it, analyzing it for new information, or using it to simulate real-world behavior or perform clash detection. Depending on the application, some teams may take the optional step of creating surface meshes or 3D solids from some or all of the scanned or surveyed data.

3D design software can be used to manipulate and directly interact with the reality-captured data. For example, a civil engineer can import 3D laser scans of a congested roadway intersection into road design software as a real-world reference for early planning efforts to redesign the intersection. A damaged bracket on a military aircraft in a combat zone can be scanned and the reality-captured data uploaded to a manufacturing facility across the world where the data is imported into mechanical design software, the damaged portion is digitally repaired, manufactured, and replacement part is shipped back to repair the aircraft.

Moreover, enabling technology for segmentation and feature recognition of reality data allow designers to interact with point clouds and high density meshes in more intuitive, object-like ways. Manufacturers can use metrology technology—both laser scanning and contact-based coordinate measuring machines (CMM)—combined with feature recognition software to convert point cloud and contact-probe data of manufactured components into 3D solid models. These models can then be used for a variety of purposes such as quality inspection during the manufacturing process or for reverse engineering.

Reality Computing enables manufacturers to use metrology technology combined with feature recognition software to create 3D solid models for quality inspection, reverse engineering, and so forth.

Similarly, feature recognition software helps civil engineers manipulate point clouds of existing terrain or infrastructure as an object rather than a collection of points. For example, specialized feature recognition software can automatically identify relevant features from point clouds, such as bridges, signs, and streetlights in scans of highways corridors.

The ability to import, visualize, and edit reality-captured data can also help streamline ‘scan to BIM’ processes. Scanned data of a building can serve as a reference to create or validate a building model used as a starting point for the building’s renovation. Scans of a newly poured concrete slab can be imported into a 3D design model of a new building (that contains the digital design of the slab) to perform deviation analysis—highlighting high and low areas that need adjustment. Scanned point cloud data of an existing facility can be combined with digital models representing new equipment or renovated spaces for project coordination and clash detection.

Our next post will focus on the third component of Reality Computing: using digital information to create something new back in the physical world.

Related articles

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 1

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 2

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 3

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 5

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 2

The last blog post introduced Reality Computing as a high-level concept that integrates the digital and physical worlds, bringing together many products and technologies to:

1. Capture -- digitally capture existing conditions,
2. Compute -- use that information to digitally develop simulations, designs, and so on,
3. Create -- then realize the results back in the physical world.

Today’s post will look at the first of these three components of Reality Computing more closely: 'capture'. The next posts will examine ‘compute’, followed by ‘create’.

“Turning things into data” (aka capture)

The ways information can be captured digitally from the physical world are increasing every day. Capture technologies—from laser scanning and point survey to photogrammetry and ground-penetrating radar—coupled with plummeting prices are promoting both ease of use and accessibility. For example, the chart below illustrates the development of 3D scanning, including the introduction of the first commercial 3D laser scanning systems for the AEC industry. 

The first commercial 3D laser scanning systems for the AEC industry were
complicated and expensive, limiting their market penetration. Today, the
value and cost of laser scanning has made its use commonplace.

However, the systems were complicated and very expensive, limiting their market penetration, whereas today laser scanning is a staple of infrastructure and land development projects. Intel’s announcement at the 2014 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that it will start building RealSense 3D camera technology into its product lines is another example of how 3D scanning technology is becoming commonplace.

An Introduction to Reality Computing - Part 1

With this post we are starting a 7-part series on "An Introduction to Reality Computing":

1. Reality Computing 101
2. Turning things into data
3. Creating new things with the data
4. Turning data back into things
5. The value of Reality Computing
6. What Reality Computing means for you
7. Future scenarios

Please join us regularly as we bring these to you over the coming weeks!

Reality Computing 101

Reality Computing enables the direct capture of spatial information about the real world, use of that data in design processes, and delivery back to the physical world. Reality Computing technologies were used to carry out the I-95 New Haven (Connecticut) Harbor Crossing Corridor Improvement Program, pictured here in a digital rendering of the proposed infrastructure improvements. Image courtesy of Parsons Brinckerhoff

The use of digital models, information, and workflows to develop and produce products and projects is a well-established, expected practice in many industries. Technologies for computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), digital prototyping, and Building Information Modeling (BIM) have already changed how many professionals design and deliver their products and projects.