An immersive architectural model in your pocket
By: Erin Quinn
KIND-Automatic, by Katz Industries, lets commercial real-estate developers, construction companies, and architects create and interact with fully rendered 3D models on their phones. Using our Maps SDK for Mobile and our Geocoding API, the developers added geographic context to the models so they are easy to explore on a map and referenced to real-world coordinate positions.
With the VR-powered app, you can walk through a building before it’s constructed — click a point on the map to step into the model:
Once “inside” the model, you can get creative. Walk around and experiment with the room’s design by swapping out existing furniture (is this corner better for a statue, or a painting?). Add in comments to show what’s changed:
KIND-Automatic makes it easy to collaborate as a team, too. Teams can use the markup view to add notes and drawings that instantly sync back to your preferred modeling tool or building information management system. Here’s a shot of an internal dashboard:
For a more immersive experience, the app can also take an entire team on a guided tour of a project with Samsung VR headsets.
Mapbox makes it super easy for people without a technical background to walk around projects. The real world geographic context and coordinate positions [from our Geocoding API] grant the opportunity to move from position to position in model space. This is not AR — everything is rendered 3D content. -Katz Industries founder, Joshua Katz
To hit the ground running with Katz Industries’ tools, give them a shout at info@kind-automatic.com.
If you’re already using our platform in your architectural workflow with AutoCAD, 3D Studio Max, Sketchup, or Revit, we’d love to hear about it — tweet us @Mapbox or chat with our sales team.
Explore your buildings before they’re built with Katz Industries was originally published in Points of interest on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.