St Albans Cathedral Measured Building Survey and 3D Laser Scanning
St Albans Cathedral in South Hertfordshire has the longest nave of any Cathedral in England at a staggering 84 metres. The Cathedral required changes to the historic Nave to make it more suitable for hosting events and to improve access.
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Objective
A detailed survey was required to provide the necessary information to accurately design nave alterations and obtain a complete record of the historic features, which may be affected by alterations. In addition a movie walk through at ground level and fly through at high level to look down on the entire nave in order to visualise the alterations was needed. Services Provided Laser scanning of the central Nave was completed in 5 days using the Faro LS880 Laser Scanner. This scanner was used to get the speed and density of scan points necessary to pick out detail and to ensure good colour photography overlaid on the scan data for the visualisation.
St Albans Cathedral Laser Scan Visualisation |
Deliverables
2D Drawings were created of the floor and also the bottom 1.5 metre of each wall and column. Each individual stone on the floor and cracks in the floor were detailed A 3D visualisation was provided to show how the new plans would work. The final animations were produced by collaborating with the architects and produced in Pointools, one as a walkthrough and secondly a high level fly-through. Key Successes
The clients budget would not run to having a detailed model of the nave but APR were able to demonstrate that the end result could be achieved by combining a pointcloud with simple modelled elements, thus dramatically reducing modelling costs. This project was a good example of the versatility of 3D Laser Scanning. Highly detailed plans and elevations were created as well as a 3D visualisation from one set of data. The data captured is an archive which can be revisited to create additional drawings or movies at any time without returning to site. An additional commission to complete the remainder of the cathedral interior and other cathedral buildings was subsequently completed. |
