Leading drone maker 3D Robotics is using the Autodesk’s Forge Platform to develop a new UAV-to-cloud solution for enterprise field professionals within the construction, telecom, survey, mapping, energy and infrastructure industries.

3D Robotics (3DR) is an early adopter of the Forge platform, which consists of a set of Autodesk cloud services, APIs, and SDKs for developers to quickly create the data, apps, experiences, and services that power the future of making things.

“Capturing site data today is costly, time consuming, and often dangerous. Drones can easily go where it’s inefficient or unsafe for field personnel, making it easier to accurately measure our world so we can better manage it,” said Chris Anderson, CEO of 3DR. “We’re delighted to leverage the Autodesk FORGE platform to deliver a complete solution for site capture that will help business customers save time and money and will take humans out of harm’s way.”

3DR is leveraging Autodesk’s Forge platform to develop a new UAV-to-cloud solution enabling field professionals to perform inspections, surveys and scans of work sites from its unmanned aerial vehicles.

3DR is using Autodesk’s ReCap Photo Web application programming interface (API) to develop a reality capture solution that allows field professionals to quickly and easily perform inspections, surveys and scans of work sites from its unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). For example, take telecom inspections that involve climbing tall towers. 3DR’s SOLO drone will capture data, then process it in the cloud using Autodesk ReCap, eliminating the need for personnel to risk injury.

3DR’s SOLO drone captures data then processes it in the cloud for to be consumed by Autodesk software.

Once processed by the Autodesk ReCap engine, the reality data (3D point cloud, 2D orthographic views, 3D mesh) is made available on A360, from where it can be downloaded to be consumed by Autodesk software to support various use cases such as monitoring sites, measuring stock piles, getting the as-built context, survey and mapping, etc.

George Hatch, Senior Technical Specialist, Autodesk, explains how simple it is to take data from the Site Scan app into Autodesk workflows.

“We are excited to collaborate with 3D Robotics to help field service professionals collect information and make insightful decisions across a variety of industries,” said Amar Hanspal, senior vice president, Products at Autodesk. “From the integration of Site Scan and Autodesk cloud services, to their use of the Forge platform, 3D Robotics is opening up new ways of working for our architecture, engineering and construction customers.”

To learn more about 3DR’s use of Autodesk’s Forge Platform, visit https://3dr.com/autodesk/.

ABOUT FORGE
The Forge Initiative is dedicated to helping developers, businesses and innovators create the data, apps, experiences, and services that will power the future of making things. The Forge Platform comprises a set of Autodesk cloud services, APIs, and SDKs that are needed to connect all of the steps to design, make and use the next generation of products. To learn more about Forge, visit http://forge.autodesk.com/