Integrating BIM and Virtual Reality

Have you ever thought of walking down the empty streets of Paris without actually visiting it? Or go for bungee jumping on a boring afternoon? Well, not everything is pocket friendly, but there’s indeed a way to experience all of it sitting on your comfortable couch at home or at your office desk. All this can be partially possible because of Virtual Reality. The idea of VR is to replace your reality with something that doesn’t exist physically. Human brains can be exposed to any sort of virtually generated environments like a park, a computer game, a movie, or in short to anything and everything that can be duplicated into a Virtual Reality.

But what is there in it for BIM?
Imagine how it will be making your clients walk through the actual life sized model of an on-going architectural project. Or imagine yourself sitting virtually inside the model and evaluating it. This is definitely more interesting than sitting at your table and zooming into a 15’screen.

The acceptance and expansion of VR has been growing exponentially. Ever since the idea of VR has launched, the AEC (Architecture, Engineering and Construction) sector has benefited a lot. As per the reports, companies began seeing faster project approvals, increased positive client interactions and higher client satisfaction.

The checklist of requirements based on priority can be prepared smoothly so as to save valuable time and money for the company as well as the client. With all these progress happening, it is not surprising that architects, engineers and construction techies are already exploring the length and breadth of this technology.

How would you achieve it?
There are various VR software and hardware tools available, that can redefine the way BIM can be implemented. It is a real-time motion capture system for virtual reality. In some software, the user can make use of body movements to navigate through the virtual environment instead of the conventional mouse and keyboard. The sensors are calibrated such that even the minute finger movements are captured accurately and these corresponding movements are occurring in the VR world too

It also has a 360° viewing angle making it somewhat more realistic while navigating through a model. Thus, using this technology in BIM will not only save time and money but also make the work for an architect more interesting which in turn increases clients thus expanding its business.