Case Study - Running rings around Kuwait
Rapid visualisation is key to project success for Parsons Brinckerhoff
In 2003 the highway and infrastructure design team at Parsons Brinckerhoff became aware of the growing business opportunities for visualisation; they realised that if they could take their design proposals and cost-effectively turn them into high quality visualisations for presentation to the client, they would at the same time be providing the perfect means of communication for planning and public meetings. Paul Brown, engineer and project manager took the initiative and set about finding the best technology solution to achieve just that.
Established more than 120 years ago, Parsons Brinckerhoff is one of the world's leading planning, engineering, and
programme and construction management organisations with 9,500 employees across five continents. At about the time
that their Cardiff office was casting its net for a way to improve its visualisation capabilities, they were
introduced to Dynamite VSP.
Featuring direct links to leading civil design applications such as MX and InRoads, Dynamite VSP is today recognised as the world's leading 3D visualisation solution for civil engineering. Its user base spans ten countries and includes many of the world's leading engineering consultants. Fully integrated with Autodesk 3ds Max and VIZ, it is specifically geared to the needs of civil designers. With little prior training or experience, it is possible to develop highly realistic and accurate rendered images and animations, in a fraction of the time normally required.
Paul Brown was quick to see the potential of Dynamite VSP. Not only would this product make translating their MX design models a direct and uncomplicated process, but the extra civil engineering specific functionality would allow them to further develop their visualisation models quickly and easily - and to a very high standard. As a result, in the autumn of 2003 Dynamite VSP became an integral part of their offering.
Paul's team initially had only two day's training in 3ds Max when they set to work on the real project. Paul is quick to give credit to Dynamite VSP's interactive tutorials: "We had no specific training in the use of Dynamite VSP - the tutorials proved an excellent way to get to grips with the new functionality and we forged ahead on real projects almost straightaway. It wasn't until we'd successfully completed several that we took more advanced Dynamite VSP training from 3am Solutions, to further streamline and really consolidate our knowledge.
"Our first visualisation was for the Dobwalls bypass in Cornwall, completed in 2004, for which we received a letter of commendation from the UK Highways Agency. Since then we've expanded the team to cope with the extra visualisation projects we're now being asked to handle as a direct result of our success. To date we've completed six projects with several more in progress or in the pipeline. For a small team, that's an incredible output with a new system, and just goes to show how quickly and easily Dynamite VSP gets the job done."
A recent project goes to prove the point. Parsons Brinckerhoff were invited to tender for the design and build of the upgrade of the second and third ring roads in Kuwait - a contract worth a total of some £150 million, and involving upgrading 19 at-grade junctions and about 25 km of dual carriageway.
The bid would involve preliminary design and visualisation of three of these intersections. Paul Brown and his team were immediately despatched to Kuwait City to carry out the work; they had just three weeks.
The situation on site could not have been worse; there was no survey and no design model for the existing highway.
Luckily the terrain is very flat and Paul's team were able to use existing 2D mapping data as the basis for the
visualisation model in Dynamite VSP.
Paul explained the process: "MX was used to convert the 2D data into a 3D ground/existing model which could then be 'draped' with aerial photography using Dynamite VSP. Our signature style has been to incorporate a much larger ground model in the visualisation than is normally done. The buildings were then simply extruded from the 2D data, which provides a very realistic vista with natural horizons and plenty of background detail.
"The highway design itself was developed in MX based purely on some sketches from the client. After transferring this 3D model to 3ds Max using Dynamite VSP's genio import functionality, we were very easily able to add all the elements needed to make the visualisation highly realistic.
"Localised libraries of materials and parametric objects such as street furniture, signs and trees are provided as standard in Dynamite VSP. We simply placed these into the visualisation - and it's just as easy to generate road markings, structures, walls, guard rails and other swept civil engineering elements.
"The client was so impressed with our work that he asked us to tackle a further project and the most complicated by
far - the redesign of a fourth intersection involving five major routes. Fortunately, Dynamite VSP enabled us to get
this additional work completed before the original deadline expired. All four visualisations completed within three weeks!"
Though the tender has not yet been awarded, Parsons Brinckerhoff's proposal was rated the highest for quality and the pictures bear this out. But what next?
Paul is excited about the potential for further business. "We've already expanded our visualisation team as a result of our new capabilities and more expansion is inevitable. The team's territory has been extended to cover the whole of Europe, Africa and the Middle East and we're collaborating internationally with our visualisation teams in the US and in Australia, who also use Dynamite VSP.
"Other divisions within the company have shown interest in using our skills in the environmental, power and rail sectors. In fact, across the board we're seeing the potential for expanding our current offering in a highly cost-competitive fashion, and extending our business, perhaps into more diverse markets, thanks to Dynamite VSP."
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