Leica Geosystems announced the industry’s first commercially available wearable reality-capture technology with the Pegasus:Backpack at HxGN LIVE.
Combining five high-dynamic cameras, which work in a variety of light conditions, and a LiDAR profiler with an ultra-light and ergonomic carbon fiber chassis, this mobile mapping solution creates a 3D view indoors or outdoors for engineering or professional documentation creation at the highest level of authority yet.
For BIM or simply for capturing 2D square foot updates to a large building, the Leica Pegasus:Backpack creates the most realistic view by capturing synchronized imagery and point cloud data. Accurate positioning is achieved in GNSS-restricted areas using Simultaneous Localization and Mapping, or SLAM, technology. Together with a high precision inertial measurement unit, the Leica Pegasus:Backpack is the first position-agnostic solution.
This new technology is designed to enable weekly data capture efficiently and cost effectively for changing building construction sites. For the first time, this enables the creation of a full starting document for authoritative 6D management of a building or simply to provide an authoritative hand-off dataset to a new building owner. By capturing weekly during a building’s construction, an “x-ray” view of the building is created. As the Backpack clearly logs position and time with the advanced measurement of LiDAR, change orders in the construction process can now offer a complete new level of authority for quality construction while scheduled milestones are achieved.
With full 360-spherical views and LiDAR together plus a hardware light sensor, all images are usable while other functions are verifiable and adjustable over the operator’s tablet device. The system uses multiple hot-swappable batteries, making even long captures possible.
“With the Leica Pegasus:Backpack, limited-access outdoor areas or underground infrastructures are no longer limited in professional data collection,” said Stuart Woods, Geospatial Solutions Division vice-president. “Users will never again forget any aspect of any job nor need to return to a project site. They can capture everything by simply arriving on site wearing the technology, capture and leave, rest assured they have everything they need to complete the job on time and on budget.”
Working with images and point clouds together, data is captured into a single platform and workflow – from the operator interface to a single-click post-processing to feature Meta tagging. Leveraging Leica’s Mapfactory extension, features can be extracted and datasets can be exported to CAD or BIM specific software solutions. More effective decision making is finally achieved with 3D spatial models that allow for true life cycle building planning, enabling 6D BIM.
Related Stories
| Nov 2, 2010
Energy Analysis No Longer a Luxury
Back in the halcyon days of 2006, energy analysis of building design and performance was a luxury. Sure, many forward-thinking AEC firms ran their designs through services such as Autodesk’s Green Building Studio and IES’s Virtual Environment, and some facility managers used Honeywell’s Energy Manager and other monitoring software. Today, however, knowing exactly how much energy your building will produce and use is survival of the fittest as energy costs and green design requirements demand precision.
| Oct 13, 2010
Test run on the HP Z200 SFF Good Value in a Small Package
Contributing Editor Jeff Yoders tests a new small-form factor, workstation-class desktop in Hewlett-Packard’s line that combines performance of its minitower machine with a smaller chassis and a lower price.
| Oct 13, 2010
Prefab Trailblazer
The $137 million, 12-story, 500,000-sf Miami Valley Hospital cardiac center, Dayton, Ohio, is the first major hospital project in the U.S. to have made extensive use of prefabricated components in its design and construction.
| Sep 22, 2010
Satellier, Potential + Semac close investment deal
Satellier, a world leader in providing CAD and Building Information Modeling (BIM) outsourced services to the architecture, engineering and construction industry, announces a strategic minority investment from India-based top engineering firm Potential + Semac, ushering in the next evolution of the global architecture support industry.
| Sep 13, 2010
Data Centers Keeping Energy, Security in Check
Power consumption for data centers doubled from 2000 and 2006, and it is anticipated to double again by 2011, making these mission-critical facilities the nation's largest commercial user of electric power. With major technology companies investing heavily in new data centers, it's no wonder Building Teams see these mission-critical facilities as a golden opportunity, and why they are working hard to keep energy costs at data centers in check.
| Sep 13, 2010
3D Prototyping Goes Low-cost
Today’s less costly 3D color printers are attracting the attention of AEC firms looking to rapidly prototype designs and communicate design intent to clients.
| Aug 11, 2010
Nemetschek North America Announces New U.S. Partnership with Apple
Nemetschek North America (NNA) has entered a new partnership with Apple in the United States. Under the terms of this partnership, three of NNA's Vectorworks software products can now be purchased through the U.S. online Apple Store. Vectorworks and ArchiCAD, another Nemetschek product, are the only BIM programs available for the Mac platform.
| Aug 11, 2010
Turner edges out Perkins+Will for the top spot on BD+C's Top 200 Building Team LEED APs ranking
With 1,006 LEED Accredited Professionals on staff, Turner Construction took the top spot on Building Design+Construction’s 2009 ranking of AEC firms with the most LEED APs, published as part of the Giants 300 report. Turner added more than 580 LEED APs during the past year to surpass Perkins+Will, which held the top spot four years running.
