3D modelling from GDL object

[Tom Elliott]

Hi All,

I am trying to create a manual point cloud! I have a Leica disto x4 p2p setup, which I use to measure up existing buildings and land. I'm trying to push it past its 'marketing' limits and use it as a manual 3d laser scanner. I can export data in .dwg / .dxf in 2d, 3d and raw mode. The .dwg raw data export I can import into Archicad as a gdl object and it gives me exactly what I've 'pointed' in my survey in 3d only as a static object with no hotspots. So that in itself I can't use, but I read in another post here that if I open the gdl object and go into the 3d page I can copy all of the 3d data points out to excel and, with a bit of editing, save it out as a .txt file and then 'place a mesh from surveyors data' back into Archicad. I then end up with a mesh whose ridge points represent the building in 3d that I have surveyed, which is an immensely pleasing discovery. My issue is that all the ridge lines from the mesh make it extremely difficult to understand what is what and where is where. Is there a way to import this data as points rather than a mesh? Or is there a way to automatically assign coordinate points to each mesh point?

Many thanks for any and all answers. Much appreciated. I'm running AC26 on a macstudio m1 max.

[Laszlo Nagy]

I would try to manipulate the Point Cloud in the free tool CloudCompare. If I recall correctly, there is a command in it called sampling using which you could simplify the Point Cloud so there is always a single point for each cube the size of which you define. So, for example, you set the sampling size to 100 mm, and the Point Cloud is simplified so there is a single point in each 100x100x100 mm of space. This way the Point Cloud will contain much fewer points. Then you can save the results as XYZ file, which you should be able to open in Archicad and convert to Mesh.