Building 3D survey: your existing building measured to the centimetre.

Why an as-built 3D survey?

Before a refurbishment, an extension, a change of use or a restoration, every project starts with a reliable as-built survey. A manual survey with a laser distance meter is slow, leaves areas out of reach (roofs, high facades, attics) and only records the dimensions someone thought of taking.

A building 3D survey by photogrammetry records the whole structure instead. The model stays available throughout the project: a forgotten dimension can be measured later, from the office, without going back on site.

What we survey

• Facades and gables, including upper parts, without cherry pickers or scaffolding
• Roofs, coverings and chimneys, surveyed by drone
• Interiors on every level, captured on the ground with a full-frame camera
• Entire buildings, houses, public buildings, religious buildings, commercial premises
• Unusual structures: ships, bridges, large objects

Interior and exterior are merged into a single georeferenced model: sections cut through the building and show the actual thickness of walls and floors.

Deliverables designed for architects and engineers

The architectural survey is delivered in the formats of your usual tools (AutoCAD, ArchiCAD, Revit, CloudCompare, ReCap):

• Dense point cloud in LAS / LAZ, E57 or PLY, for modelling
• Plans, sections and elevations in DXF, DWG or PDF
• Scaled facade ortho-images for drawing and condition surveys
• Textured 3D mesh (OBJ, FBX, glTF) and area measurements
• Accuracy report showing the residuals measured on control points

Every survey is also published in the Visuoz viewer: your teams and partners take measurements and cut sections in the browser from a simple link.

How does a building survey work?

1. Preparation: review of your specifications, airspace and flight permission checks, choice of coordinate system.
2. Capture: a few hours on site for a typical building; control points measured with RTK GNSS, drone flights and ground photography.
3. Processing: photogrammetric computation, georeferencing and accuracy check on independent points.
4. Delivery: in about two weeks, in the viewer and in the requested formats.

3D scan or photogrammetric survey?

A building 3D scan usually refers to a laser scanner survey. Photogrammetry produces the same kind of deliverable — a measurable point cloud — with richer photographic texture and easy access to roofs thanks to the drone. To find out which technique suits your project, read our comparison photogrammetry or laser scanner.