Hello TBC’ers! When working with point clouds in TBC, there are a variety of useful settings available to change how your point cloud dataset is rendered. Each of these settings can be applied to a variety of workflows to make navigating the data more efficient and help generate deeper insights. This week’s tip will be a breakdown of all the settings in the “Rendering” section of the “Point Clouds” tab to help make these settings more accessible.
-
The first setting here is the “Color by” tool (1A) which allows the user to visualize their data based on the chosen parameter. These options are: scan color, region color, gray-scale intensity, color-coded intensity, true color, and color by elevation. Each of these settings enables the user to explore the data in a different way just on visualization alone. For example,e using the region color tool is a powerful tool when combined with feature extraction tools and “add to region” tools.
-
The next setting is the “Point Cloud Region Color” button (2A). This is a simple tool that lets you select a point cloud region and change its unselected visualization color directly instead of using the “Project Explorer” and “Properties” panes.
-
The next setting is the “Point Cloud Rendering Setting” button (3A). This button opens up a new pane that allows you to change settings such as the brightness, contrast, blending, and more (3B).
- The next setting is “Intensity Based Blending” (4A). This is a simple setting that adjusts the brightness of the visualization based on the scan intensity. It can be helpful for users the change the color intensity for viewing, or to get a better understanding of where strong and weak reflection points are in their dataset.
-
The “Colorize Scans” button is a useful tool for connecting RGB imagery to your LiDAR data (5A). While many datasets imported directly from Trimble hardware will automatically colorize themselves, this may not be the case for all situations. This function allows users to manually colorize their scans and enables 3rd party hardware to fully utilize TBC point cloud tools.
-
The “Point Size” button is a simple and intuitive tool (6A). All this button does is change the size of the individual points in the Plan/3D view visualization. This can help make the image more clear, or hide away some of the noise on very dense scans.
-
The “See inside/outside” button is a handy tool for users that have data that includes the inside and outside of buildings (7A). With a simple click of the button, users can filter their data to only see the outside of the building, or switch everything else off to just see the interior data depending on their deliverables. This can also be a useful tool to use to speed up processing as turning off unnecessary points will reduce hardware load!
-
The “Shading mode” (8A) tool is useful for datasets that may not have any RBG imagery attached to them, or if users simply want to see their data in a different light! This tool basically lets users determine how they want their visualizations to appear based on how light interacts with that point. However, this tool got its own TBC Tip a while back that goes into much more detail! See TBC Tip #60 for the full breakdown.
You're all set! Maximize your TBC experience and ensure smooth workflows by utilizing learning & support material most aligned with your needs and personal preferences.
To download the latest version of TBC, you can head to https://trimble.com/downloadTBC.
Complete free self-paced workflow-based courses with hands-on guided software experiences on Learn.Trimble: https://learn.trimble.com/pages/422/trimble-business-center-tbc
For additional learning content, visit our TBC Survey and Construction YouTube page:
https://www.youtube.com/user/TBCSurvey/videos