Assisting Crisis Response Teams with 3D Visualisation

Can we harness the potential that point clouds have, to effectively convey the visual contents of an indoor environment to first responders? In a paper co-authored by UCT alumna Xenia Una Mainelli, game engines are used to visualise point cloud data, mapping indoor environments for crisis scenarios.


Alumna and past colleague at University College Twente, Xenia Una Mainelli, recently co-authored a paper which describes an exciting piece of research conducted at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at TU Delft. This paper was presented at the 16th International Conference on Location Based Services, which was held online on 24-25 November 2021. 


In the paper, Una Mainelli and colleagues describe how game-oriented visualisation was integrated with cartography techniques to render ceilings, floors, furniture and architecture components and map them in an easy-to-use interface. The team tested their system using real-world data captured from inside a building in Rotterdam. The virtual environments that they can create from this data are immersive, allowing users to switch between first-person, third-person, and bird’s eye views. 


“Compared with the other 3D data, point clouds are very suitable for visualizing crisis indoor environments as they can retain accurate details, and can be easily captured and updated.” 


The team tested their system using real-world data captured from inside a building in Rotterdam. The virtual environments that they can create from this data are immersive, allowing users to switch between first-person, third-person, and bird’s eye views. They imagine this technique being applied to a multi-floor model, even integrating with outdoor models, and supporting virtual reality or augmented reality devices. The paper is a great achievement and an inspiration for many UCT students, who look forward to seeing what comes next from this project.

Chat offline (info)
To use this functionality you first need to:
Accept cookies