BRICKS & CLICKS: BUILDING DESIGN GOES HIGH TECH

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BRICKS & CLICKS: BUILDING DESIGN GOES HIGH TECH
12 October 2006 - CSIRO

Soon, planners, designers and builders will be able to work together using the same 'virtual environment'. Planners, designers and builders will soon be able to work together using the same 'virtual environment' in which internet gamers compete against each other in cyberspace.

Researchers are combining game and computer-aided design technology to create three-dimensional environments in which professionals, working in real time, will be able to explore and test ideas for new buildings.

This 'Virtual Worlds' project is being undertaken by the Cooperative Research Centre for Construction Innovation, involving CSIRO's Division for Manufacturing and Infrastructure Technology.

The CRC for Construction Innovation is a national research, development and implementation centre focused on the needs of the Australian property, design, construction and facility management industry. It undertakes applied research on behalf of its partners and the whole industry.

‘Collaboratively, they can us the latest software to optimise the quality and functionality of the development, or the sustainability and its lifecycle performance.’'The goal of the Virtual Worlds project is to use game technology to visualise construction projects in the form of an interactive 3D environment,' says Professor Keith Hampson, chief executive officer of the CRC for Construction Innovation.

CMIT's Stephen Egan says many scenarios would benefit from this novel approach, such as urban planners being able to visualise every aspect of an entire development:

'The associated plans could be studied interactively by planners, builders, suppliers, residents, even traffic authorities or environmentalists,' he says
'Collaboratively, they can use the latest software to optimise the quality and functionality of the development, or the sustainability and its lifecycle performance.'
Normally, concepts such as meshing CAD tools and construction assessment software with virtual environment technology and collaborative theory would be considered far-fetched, or at least something for the distant future.

To realise the scenarios sketched out by Stephen Egan, researchers only need to develop a way to import existing software models as IFC files into the Virtual Worlds format. Then the whole suite of applications, such as ArchiCAD and the CRC's LCADesign, will come on line in 3D splendour.

Objects that mean different things to the architect, builder, supplier, resident, neighbour and city planner can be visualised within the same easily accessed space.

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