Innovative and creative solutions emerge when the right people, products and attitudes converge. That occurred when Business Events Adelaide (BEA), formerly known as the Adelaide Convention Bureau, commissioned Aerometrex to generate a high-resolution 3D model of Adelaide’s North Terrace precinct and delivered it to the Clarity VR visualisation studio. The resulting products included are a fully interactive and data-enhanced 3D map of Adelaide that communicates the city’s strengths and capabilities to host large conventions and a competitive game where users adjust the speed and height of a drone flying above the Adelaide CBD.
ABOUT THE PROJECT
Clarity VR is a company specialising in creating 3D imagery, animation, interactive tools, and virtual environments for a diverse range of clients, from urban development, tourism, education, government, defence, conferencing, and much more. Business Events Adelaide engaged with Clarity VR with a request that was both novel and challenging, as Nick Selth, Director, Clarity VR says; “Nic Mercer from BEA wanted something he could easily and portably take with him to discuss all the different facets of Adelaide and what it has to offer to potential clients. It would have everything ranging from the number and quality of hotels to how many people can fit into a venue, all within the one interactive tool.” Co-director at Clarity VR Chris Traianos expands; “Nic also had the Aerometrex 3D dataset but wasn’t quite sure how to utilise it to his exact needs. We sat down with him, looked at the data, and pitched the idea of a client-specific, photorealistic Google Maps.”
THE PROBLEM SOLVED
BEA operates in a highly competitive environment, battling against hundreds of event organisers from larger, better-known cities for a limited time with potential clients. The drone game and interactive map developed by Clarity VR provided an engaging, compelling, and fun experience that also acted as a sales tool, as Nick Selth explains: “There’d be dozens of cities each vying for the attention of conference goers, but BEA had a point of difference. People would gather around wanting to play, and that would facilitate a discussion about the city of Adelaide. The drone game is a great way of highlighting what the CBD has to offer. You’re entertaining everybody while getting them thinking maybe this would be a fantastic place for a conference.”
Check out this interview with Nick Selth, Director at Clarity VR, who speaks about the innovative solution that they executed for client, Business Events Adelaide, using Aerometrex's high resolution 3D model of Adelaide.
HOW 3D DATA ENABLES VISUALISATION
High-res 3D data offered Clarity VR far greater flexibility for their visualisation and media creation, as Nick Selth found with the BEA project: “At Clarity VR, we are creating structures that don’t exist yet but placing them in environments that do exist. The trouble we’ve had previously is that we need to either recreate those environments that do exist or not have them at all. By using the Aerometrex dataset, we had the ability to place our modelling, which is our specialty, straight into that environment. Previously we’d have to find a specific drone shot and place our files within it or manually create entire environments around specific structures we’re building. 3D mesh creates those spaces for us, and it’s a huge time saver.”
3D MESH & UNREAL ENGINE 5
With Aerometrex data, and Clarity VR’s creativity, the recently released Unreal Engine 5 (UE5) was the final element needed to facilitate the project. UE5 was uniquely capable of building the interactive map and drone game and optimising it for portability. Unreal Engine’s Nanite Virtualized Geometry system was vital to bringing unprecedented efficiency to large datasets, applying a lossless level of detail compression to the mesh. It was an ideal system to handle Aerometrex’s high-res 3D products, as Chris explains: “We couldn’t have done it without Unreal Engine 5. Nanite’s introduction in UE5 allowed us to use the massive photogrammetry data sets without having to do any LOD creation or remove high-fidelity data from the model. It’s very exciting for us to know that we’ve got this kind of data that we can use and know how to use it effectively.”
3D DATA FOR YOUR BUSINESS
3D data’s ability to communicate and engage audiences is only constrained by creativity and imagination, especially since Unreal Engine 5’s release. Clarity VR’s work for Business Events Adelaide demonstrates how flexible Aerometrex 3D reality mesh can be. Please speak to our team to learn more about how we can collaborate to integrate 3D data within your business and improve customer and stakeholder engagement.
