Ai3D Pty Ltd is a 3D visualisation company with Studios in Brisbane and Melbourne, Australia. The company was founded by Steve Brodie, an Engineer, and Nat Harrold, a Landscape Architect, who together with their expert team are one of the leading providers of 3D realtime visualisation globally. Official website: ai3d.com.au

We started working with UNIGINE back in 2007 when it was still quite basic. At the time, our primary visualisation tool was Vray, which produced great renders but was slow, and clients wanted faster turnarounds and models that could be explored in greater depth to aid communication. We projected that "game based" simulation and visualisation was the path to take in a competitive market. We investigated numerous real-time engines for their potential to be adapted to our purposes.

Over the last 4 years this Engine has grown in features, and has harnessed the latest hardware and software tech, such as tessellation, HDR, DirectX 11. This power has enabled Ai3D to become one of the most capable real-time visualisation companies worldwide having completed over 60 architectural, landscape, engineering and infrastructure projects, using UNIGINE as an interactive tool for design review, presentation, construction scheduling, and public consultation.

The workflow in visualisation is quite different than in games development. Time budgets for creation of assets and environment would be around a third of the time available in games development, therefore we needed an Engine that could handle very large “raw” datasets and importing of assets with minimal preparation. We have established workflows that enable us to turn projects around very rapidly, and generate a large number of still images and video in 10% of the time it would take using the old render farm approach.

Over the years out coder Danni, using uniginescript has created a feature rich GUI and toolset specifically designed for Architectural and Engineering projects, including time of day/year sliders, camera control and video capture interface, measuring and spot height tools, mass planting tools, and tools to control speed,density, and distribution of moving items on splines. We also have a module that live links to construction scheduling software such as Primavera.

This light rail (tram) project is a full detailed 14km long stretch of tram lines through full Urban landscape on a terrain background of about 100km by 100km. There is approximately 2000 unique buildings, 14 articulated trams timed and moving along the circuit. We captured around 1 hour of HD footage from the model and hundreds of high resolution still images.

A substantial architectural project that combined heritage elements with complex architectural design. The client, was able to interrogate the design, communicate it to stakeholder s efficiently and get an updated realtime model and videos with minimal effort.

A bridge project in Central Brisbane, Ai3D created a highly detailed model with hundreds of a moving cars, people, cyclists and ferries. Ai3D was involved through the whole design cycle from concept to design and construction. The real-time 3D model was used to review and resolve many aspects of the design.

Ai3D were proud to provide design and visualisation support for the amazing Public art project for King Abdullah University of Science and Technology located on the Red sea in Saudi Arabia. Troy and Nat (Ai3D) worked with closely with Daniel Tobin (UAP) to realise Daniel’s concept into a procedural 3D model. Our procedural modelling techniques allowed a very complex structure to be manipulated without requiring a complete remodel.

Ai3D has completed many other complex projects with UNIGINE, but as they are still under confidentiality agreements, we are unable to display them at this time.

Steve Brodie.