I was having my usual browse around the labs and if you haven’t seen Project Momento I strongly urge you to have a look - http://labs.autodesk.com/utilities/memento I have been fascinated with this concept ever since Blaise Aguera y Arcas’s TED talk on PhotoSynth http://www.ted.com/talks/blaise_aguera.html. Since then I have played around with the Xbox 360’s Kinect and Scenect http://www.faro.com/scenect/ and really just toyed with all sorts of ideas to capture data for a fraction of what it costs us today for projects. Whilst toying with Momento I figured that in theory I could potentially use the software to clean up ‘dirty’ data within Civil 3D. I don’t really want to go into the in’s and out’s of why or if there would be an advantage to having this tool within Civil 3D – Just merely the fact that it can be achieved. I can think of some advantages however I can think of a lot more disadvantages – I’ll leave you to debate. Workthrough Open Civil 3D and convert your data into a surface. The contours do not lie – you have a problems. Spikes and Holes or as I call them at 5X Exaggeration - Pyramids and Craters Export the surface to Civil View for 3D Max Design in the Output ribbon
Import the VSP3D file into Civil View (3ds Max Design) – I’m sure you could also do the same thing with LandXML files.
Then simply export the surface to OBJ file format (File>Export)
Open Project Momento and select Open and change the file type to OBJ
Your surface will now import into Project Momento.
You can detect the surface for triangulation irregularities but as the mesh is not completely joined (think of a sphere) I suppose Momento struggles with a base for comparison (just my opinion) and in the instance above it shows the far extents of the surface as errors.
Ignore these errors and use the mesh tools to remove surface problems. I can only suggest experimenting. In the example below there seemed to only be 1 hole and 3 spikes as issues with the surface however there were more errors. This is not a reflection of the software – It was never meant to be used this way.
As you can see there is a depression shown below – The shading makes it reasonably easy to identify.
Plan View
Side View Experiment with the clean up tools and select the triangulation that is incorrect.
In the 2 screen shots below I selected the triangulation, removed it and then filled the gap. Essentially the gap is filled in by joining up the edges of the triangulation by using level information of neighbouring triangulation.
Selecting the problematic triangles.
Omitting the triangulation.
Result - Taa Dah! And you wouldn’t even now it was there!
Now export the surface into Civil 3D by hovering over Export the Save area and press the ALT key to get the option to Save As… and select Export to OBJ format or Shift+E
Open Civil View and File>Import the OBJ file Depending on your View you may need to play with the Z-Y Setting on within OBJ Import Options
Once in Civil View export the model as a DWG file. When you open this file in Civil 3D its entity type will be a Mesh. Explode the Mesh and it will explode as 3D Faces. Create a new surface and add the 3D Faces to its definition and there you have it. Quite cumbersome however achievable. Now I’m sure there may be other shortcuts to investigate but this method works. Ok so you may have issues with coordinates etc but its solvable. It’s important to stress that Project Momento isn’t meant for this type of workflow. I was trying to demonstrate that with a bit of bouncing between applications you could actually use it with Civil 3D. Merely see it as a way to visually amend a surface rather than editing surfaces by its definition elements and Drawing Objects i.e. omitting and adding Points, Lines, Blocks etc.
Perhaps an advancement on grading tools for the future –Potentially with a few additions a potential way to select individual triangulation and visually smooth, manipulate and sculpt 3D data. I’ll leave the debate to you to decide if it would be a useful tool within Civil 3D. Enjoy!