Project Team: Max Jarosz, Architect
Isha Patel, Research Assistant

Overview: The advancement and availability of reality capture equipment such as drones or 360 cameras are continually decreasing in cost and increasing their capacity to capture physical construction realities. These advances paired with increasingly accurate photogrammetry algorithms provide an opportunity for construction companies to leverage these technologies to improve the efficiency of their workflows while also increasing the accuracy of construction. 

Construction progress tracking is a tedious and cost consuming requirement of the construction process that could be greatly reduced through the use of automated digitization of the construction site into a digital twin. Using technology such as 360 cameras and drones to record site progress and transform the photos of the site into 3D point clouds via photogrammetry can be used to reduce the need for in-field verification, coordination for design changes, and ultimately the production of as builts which should increase the profitability of construction companies that invest in this equipment. 

Implementing these technologies, while initially challenging, offers a vast realm of possibilities to reduce coordination across multiple trades and teams within a construction project. Furthermore, much of this process can be automated through drone flight paths or robotic site walkthroughs. Areas of impact range from coordinating the location of items embedded within slabs, locations of rough-ins, reduction in reworks, improved design change coordination, etc. These impacts culminate in a digital model of the existing conditions that can be converted into an as-built drawing set for the finalized construction. These benefits offer the potential to greatly reduce the hours required and costs associated with these parts of the construction process.