Cesium for Omniverse v0.25.0

Cesium for Unity Samples v1.19.0

CesiumJS 1.135

Smart Cities

One of our newest Cesium Certified Developers is Moritz Cermann, a student at the Technical University of Applied Sciences Würzburg-Schweinfurt, whose Cesium-based application won the Best of Entertainment and Events category in the Google Immersive Geospatial Challenge.

Moritz Cermann, Cesium Certified Developer

The challenge invited participants to create location-based virtual or augmented reality (AR) applications. Using Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles and Cesium for Unity, Moritz created navigAtoR, a demo app intended to inspire a vision of more immersive navigation experiences.

navigAtoR

It certainly inspired us! navigAtoR is an AR phone app that makes navigation more intuitive with a 3D model of the user’s location. navigAtoR enables highly accurate direction and position accuracy, which is essential to displaying location-based content and critical to lining up Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles perfectly with the real world. With 3D Tiles, Moritz was able to stream these highly detailed photorealistic 3D Tiles datasets to edge devices, creating a world-scale app. 

“Typically, maps for navigation are only displayed in 2D, which often lead to confusion. But with recent advances in hardware, efficient 3D geospatial platforms like Cesium, and 3D Tiles for streaming massive datasets, we've reached a point where 3D navigation can be implemented and used in our daily life.”

In navigAtoR, Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles streaming in Cesium with an AR navigation app allows users to find points of interest and directions, all in a context that matches where they are standing. 

Moritz included his app as part of his application to become a Cesium Certified Developer. This program recognizes the technical expertise of developers who build on the Cesium platform. Moritz applied to be a Cesium Certified Developer so he could connect with like-minded individuals also engaged in developing innovative 3D spatial solutions.

Moritz sees many use cases for geospatial AR beyond navigation. Not only would displaying a 3D map of a user’s surroundings make navigation more intuitive, but the ability to overlay virtual elements onto reality opens numerous possibilities: placing the model for a planned building precisely where it is meant to be constructed, adding vegetation to barren areas, bringing robots to life–all visualized in their exact corresponding location in the real world. Moritz has explored other future possibilities in travel-compAnIon, a demo app created for the GoogleAI Hackathon using Cesium with Gemini, Google’s LLM, as a tourist guide. 

If you’re also working with Cesium, consider applying to become a Cesium Certified Developer.

Google Immersive Geospatial Challenge Winner Becomes Cesium Certified Developer

日本最大の都市住民の「生活の質の向上」を守る

デジタルツインのリアルタイム可視化を３D地理空間技術で支えるCesium

「東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューア」では、３D都市モデルに加え、都市における３D点群データや都営バスの位置情報、河川データ、様々な２Dデータや動画などを重ね合わせた可視化を行う事ができます。その３Dビューアの可視化基盤となって利用されているのがCesiumJSとCesium ionです。　

東京都のデジタルツイン データを単一のポータルで

「東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューア」

　1,400万人を超える日本最多の住民を抱える東京都は、デジタルの力で東京のポテンシャルを引き出し、都民の生活の質の向上（クオリティ・オブ・ライフ：Quality of Life、以下QoL）のため、東京都全体のデジタルツインの社会実装を目指しています。都庁は都市のデジタルツインを3つの柱、「データ整備」「データ可視化」「データ解析」と定義、この３つの柱を３D地理空間プラットフォームの活用で連携させ、利用者に最も体験を提供しやすい「データの可視化」に先駆けて取り組みました。「データの可視化」は、都民や企業、各行政を含めた利用者とともに都市を創っていくために必要な共通認識や合意形成を図るうえで非常に重要と判断したからです。その結果、2021年に都庁のデジタルツインの世界を３D地理空間情報の可視化で体現する「東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューア」を生み出し、現在では自治体を超えた多くの行政・企業・市民からの利用が進んでいます。ここで３Dビューアの基盤として利用されているのがCesiuｍプラットフォームです。

Cesiumは海外諸都市ですでに利用実績も多く、CityGMLやLASといった様々な3Dデータ形式を3Dタイルに変換しストリーミング用に最適化し、属性データを保持して可視化できる点、グローバルレベルで地形、画像、写真測量データなど実世界の３Dコンテンツが豊富な点、Web上で可視化され誰でも利用できる点、などが評価され採用されました。

さらに、大量の点群データの3Dタイルへの変換は、すべてCeisum ionのタイル変換機能が利用されています。また、庁内環境の地形データ配信を行うCesium ion Asset Serverや、外部へのデータ公開もCesium ionで実現されています。

点群データ（伊豆大島）＋ 離島港湾ライブカメラ

これらのリアルタイム情報をさらに都民への迅速で正確なサービスに繋げるため、都庁内DXの一環として庁内に分散していた様々な形式の地理空間データの整備を進め、庁内・庁外のリアルタイムデータのCesiumベースでの３Dビューアへの反映と、各種サービスの創出につなげています。

高精度の視覚化・リアルタイムデータをもとに、利用者とインタラクティブに創造する都市づくりを目指す

現在Cesiumの利用をもとに、東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューアでは、地形データが25cm精度の詳細なものとなっており、日本のジオイド2011に基づいて変換しているため、高い垂直方向の精度を実現しています。また、自動車のセンサーデータ、交通量調査ビデオからAI解析した交通量データの可視化を官民で試行しています。

さらに、災害多発国日本での都市のQoLを守るため、最大の注力領域の一つである防災分野では、防災に関するリアルタイムデータを充実させ、災害発生時に都外の他の地域にも及ぶ広域支援も実施しています。 

例えば水害時には、予想される氾濫時の浸水エリア、海の近くでは高潮による被害想定、地形データ、避難所などの情報を一元的に可視化し防災対策を立てやすくしています。また、実際の豪雨時には、河川のリアルタイムデータ(水位、雨量、ライブカメラ、警報の発令状況)、高潮に関するリアルタイムデータ（水門付近の水位、ライブカメラ）を一元的に可視化、発信することで、都民が迅速に現状把握し、早めに避難行動に移れるようにしています。

水防災情報システム 水位データ＋河川監視カメラ＋浸水想定区域図

様々な可視化を実現しインタラクティブなサービスを目指す

また、日本は世界有数の地震の多発国ですが、東京都として、今回の能登半島地震で被災前のデータと被災後のデータを掲載することで早期の復興対策を支援しています。測量のもとになる精緻なデータとして緯度・経度・高さ・色情報を有する点群データを使用し、被災前の点群データやそれをもとにした地形データを３Dビューアに掲載、被災後の斜面崩落に関するデータと重ね合わせることで、被害状況の把握や復旧・復興活動の迅速化を支援するものです。

東京都庁は、日本における3D地理空間情報の第一線の使い手として、「東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューア」をデジタルツイン実現の軸と位置づけ、都市の災害に対する強靭化や都民のQoLの向上をさらに進化させ続けています。私たちCesiumは、東京都庁のこのような取り組みを支援できたことを誇りに思います。

CesiumJS を使用して独自のインタラクティブな Web アプリを構築するには、ラーニング　センターのガイドをご参照ください。また、Cesium ionを使用すると、世界中の地形、画像、建物を含む実物大の地球に独自のデータを取り込むことができ、Cesiumの 3D タイル パイプラインは、データセットの大きさに関係なく、ストリーミング用にデータを最適化します。ぜひ無料のCesium ionアカウントにサインアップしてお試しください。また、独自の環境で3Dコンテンツの作成とホスティングを開始する場合はCesium ion Self-Hostedサービスを是非トライしてみてください。

Tokyo Metropolitan Digital Twin 3D Viewer Uses Cesium to Improve Quality of Life for Residents

"The Tokyo Metropolitan Digital Twin 3D Viewer” enables overlaying various types of data, including 3D city models, 3D point cloud data within the city, location information of Tokyo Metropolitan buses, river data, various 2D data, and videos, in addition to the 3D city model. CesiumJS and Cesium ion are utilized as the visualization infrastructure for that 3D viewer.

Digital twin data for Tokyo city in a single portal

Tokyo, which has the largest number of residents in Japan with over 14 million people, aims to unleash Tokyo's potential through the power of digital technology, and to achieve the social implementation of a digital twin for the entire Tokyo metropolis, aiming to improve the quality of life (QoL) for its residents. 

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG) has defined three pillars for the city's digital twin: "data organization," "data visualization," and "data analysis." It has proactively addressed "data visualization," which offers users the most accessible experience, by integrating these three pillars through the utilization of a 3D geospatial platform. This is because the TMG has deemed "data visualization" to be extremely important in fostering a common understanding and consensus among users, including citizens, businesses, and various administrative entities, in order to collectively shape the city. As a result, in 2021, the TMG created the 'Tokyo Metropolitan Digital Twin 3D Viewer,' which embodies the world of the metropolitan government's digital twin through the visualization of 3D geospatial information. Currently, there is increasing utilization of this viewer from a wide range of administrations, businesses, and citizens beyond municipal boundaries. The Cesium platform serves as the foundation for this 3D viewer.

Cesium has been widely adopted in various cities overseas, with numerous successful implementations. It is praised and adopted for its ability to convert various 3D data formats such as CityGML and LAS into 3D Tiles, optimizing them for streaming while retaining attribute data for visualization. Additionally, its rich availability of real-world 3D content such as terrain, imagery, and photogrammetry data at a global level, along with its accessibility for visualization on the web, has been recognized and embraced as well.

Furthermore, the conversion of large point cloud data into 3D Tiles is all handled by Cesium ion's tile conversion functionality. In addition, Cesium ion Asset Server, which delivers terrain data for the interior environment of the TMG, and external data publication is executed through Cesium ion.

Point cloud data (Izu Oshima) + Remote island port live camera.

As part of the TMG's internal digital transformation efforts, various formats of geospatial data dispersed within the government offices are being organized to further connect real-time information to swift and accurate services for the citizens. This initiative aims to reflect both internal and external real-time data onto a 3D viewer based on Cesium, facilitating the creation of various services.

Aiming to create cities interactively with users based on high-precision visualization and real-time data

Currently, based on the use of Cesium, the Tokyo Digital Twin 3D Viewer has detailed terrain data with an accuracy of 25 cm, this precision is achieved through conversion based on Japan's geoid 2011, ensuring high vertical accuracy. In addition, the public and private sectors are experimenting with visualizing traffic volume data analyzed by AI from vehicle sensor data and traffic survey videos.

Furthermore, in one of the major focus areas, disaster prevention, which is crucial for maintaining the quality of life in disaster-prone Japan, efforts are being made to enhance real-time data related to disaster prevention. Additionally, broad-scope support extending to other prefectures is being provided in the event of disasters.

For example, during floods, we visualize various information such as anticipated inundation areas during expected flooding, damage estimates due to high tides near the sea, terrain data, and shelter locations in a unified manner, making it easier to plan disaster prevention measures. Additionally, during actual heavy rainfall, the 3D viewer unifies and visualizes real-time river data (water levels, precipitation, live camera feeds, status of warnings) and real-time data related to storm surges (water levels near floodgates, live camera feeds). This enables citizens to quickly understand the current situation and take earlier evacuation actions.

Water disaster prevention information system: Water level data & River monitoring camera & Expected flooding area map.

Aiming for interactive services by realizing various visualizations.

Furthermore, as Japan is a country prone to frequent earthquakes, the TMG is aiding in early recovery efforts by publishing data before and after the Noto Peninsula earthquake. Using point cloud data containing precise information such as latitude, longitude, height, and color, which serves as the basis for surveys, the TMG is posting pre-disaster point cloud data and the derived terrain data on the 3D viewer.　By overlapping this data with data related to subsequent slope collapses, this will assist in understanding the damage situation and speeding up recovery and reconstruction activities.

The TMG positions the "Tokyo Metropolitan Digital Twin 3D Viewer" as a cornerstone of digital twin realization, serving as a leading user of 3D geospatial information in Japan. Continuously evolving, it aims to further enhance disaster resilience and improve the quality of life for citizens in the city. We at Cesium are proud to have supported the Tokyo Metropolitan Government in such endeavors.

To build your own interactive web application using CesiumJS, please refer to the Learning Center. Cesium ion also allows you to incorporate your own data into a full-scale globe, including terrain, imagery, and buildings from around the world. Cesium's 3D Tiling Pipeline optimizes data for streaming regardless of dataset size. Feel free to sign up for a Cesium ion account. Or you can request a Cesium ion Self-Hosted evaluation to begin creating and hosting 3D content in your own environment.

東京都デジタルツイン3Dビューアは Cesiumを活用し、「都民生活の質の向上」を守る

We’re excited to join our partners at NVIDIA GTC 2024, a global AI conference running March 18-21 in San Jose, California. 

Join us at the following sessions to learn about using 3D geospatial technology with Cesium:

Digitalizing the World’s Largest Industries with OpenUSD and Generative AI

Cesium CEO Patrick Cozzi will join this panel of enterprise leaders to provide an update on industrial metaverse projects — what milestones they’ve reached, what development priorities they have next, and what they see as the current blocks to progress. 

●      Christine Osik, Head of Simulation, Amazon Robotics

●      Dean Takahashi, Lead Writer, VentureBeat

●      Rev Lebaredian, Vice President, Omniverse and Simulation Technology, NVIDIA

●      Joe Bohman, Executive Vice President, PLM Products, Siemens Digital Industries Software

●      Andy Pratt, CVP of Emerging Technologies, Microsoft

●      John Lu, Wistron Manufacturing Operations Director, Wistron

●      Paulina Chmielarz, Industrial Operations Digital and Innovation Director, Jaguar Land Rover

Enabling 3D Geospatial Workflows for Industrial Digital Twins 

Mar 19, 2024
11-11:25- AM PDT
Session info
Live stream available

Shehzan Mohammed, Director of 3D Engineering & Ecosystems at Cesium, will share insight into the creation of Cesium for Omniverse, an open-source extension for NVIDIA Omniverse that enables an accurate WGS84 globe, a 3D Tiles streaming engine for massive 3D geospatial data, and integration with Cesium ion for easy access to 3D tiling pipelines and global data. Learn how Omniverse’s OpenUSD and Fabric, combined with 3D Tiles and glTF, enable high-fidelity streaming and rendering for global-scale digital twins using open standards.

Transforming 2D Imagery into 3D Geospatial Tiles With Neural Radiance Fields

NVIDIA will be demonstrating a real-time process for taking a set of 2D geo-tagged drone images and transforming them into a high-resolution 3D tiles representation of an outdoor scene leveraging Cesium ion and Cesium for Omniverse.

Look for these demos to see Cesium for Omniverse in action in the GTC exhibit hall on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday:

Innoactive will demonstrate the power of NVIDIA Omniverse, Cesium for Omniverse, and Cesium ion Self-Hosted to quickly bring the capabilities of the AECO Demo Pack into a VR environment. 

Cesium AECO demo pack in combination with Innoactive Omniverse Extension: Create a sharing link to render photorealistic architecture visualization in the cloud and stream it to any standard office PC or standalone VR headset.

Ansys will demonstrate two RF Channel Modelers: one that uses Cesium for Omniverse to visualize the lunar surface in the Ansys RF Channel Modeler, and another that uses Ansys STK, Cesium ion, and Aerometrex data of Denver, Colorado, and streams results from the cloud to a web browser. 

Register for NVIDIA GTC today. We look forward to seeing you!

CYENS Centre of Excellence in Nicosia, Cyprus, focuses on emerging technologies and interactive media to move the region forward through academic research and innovation. One way it’s doing that is through building the iNicosia flagship project, a digital twin of the divided capital city connecting the city’s smart infrastructure and IoT data, visualized in CesiumJS.

An overview of 3D reconstructions of Nicosia, Cyprus, in iNicosia. Courtesy CYENS.

CYENS is building iNicosia, a digital twin of the divided capital city connecting the city’s smart infrastructure and IoT data, visualized in CesiumJS.

iNicosia by CYENS

CYENS, funded by the European Union, is a joint venture among the University of Cyprus, Cyprus University of Technology, Open University of Cyprus, the Municipality of Nicosia, the Max Planck Institute for Informatics, and University College London. Work on iNicosia began in 2018, and the push to immersive 3D and the desire to share information widely made Cesium the right fit for the accurate, interactive model of the city.

Eleftheria Square in iNicosia. Courtesy CYENS.

iNicosia incorporates highly detailed 3D models created by the team using both terrestrial and aerial photogrammetry and laser scans, time-series data, smart city and IoT data, and Bing Maps Aerial imagery and Cesium World Terrain to present Nicosia accurately and digitally: city landmarks and monuments, road networks, environmental data, vegetation, and other facets of daily life for residents, tourists, and businesses. CYENS stores iNicosia data on Cesium ion, where it is also tiled into 3D Tiles for streaming and sharing in CesiumJS. Architects, land registries, researchers, government agencies, and the public can share and access data in iNicosia.

For some particularly high-definition reconstructions and animations, CYENS uses Cesium for Unreal to combine graphics rendering power and accurate geospatial context.

The CYENS team uses Unreal Engine 5 for immersive visualizations as part of iNicosia. Courtesy CYENS.

The CYENS team uses Unreal Engine 5 for immersive visualizations as part of iNicosia.

iNicosia: Old House

The quality of 3D reconstruction is especially important to the CYENS team, with a focus on cultural heritage and even an eye on reunifying the city, which has been divided since the 1970s. With the ability to share information and ideas through Cesium-based iNicosia, the communities on the island can collaborate.

Readers can explore CYENS’s Cesium Stories about reconstruction progress for iNicosia. To build your own CesiumJS app with global 3D data, follow the tutorials in our learning center.

Smart City Infrastructure in CesiumJS: Connecting Nicosia

Point cloud processing has traditionally required high-performance computers and extensive human involvement. Locus Blue, a Cesium Certified Developer based in Japan, created ScanX to automate point cloud data segmentation and make visualization accessible on the web. ScanX is a browser-based platform using CesiumJS to provide access to massive datasets, enable timely analysis, and reduce reliance on specialized equipment.

ScanX improves operational efficiency. Courtesy Locus Blue.

ScanX users CesiumJS to visualize and analyze point clouds and other massive datasets.

ScanX

ScanX, released in 2020, has processed more than 10,000 datasets in Cesium for construction companies, municipalities and first responders, foresters, and insurance companies, among others. It has users in 43 of Japan’s 47 states, with plans to make its SaaS platform available globally. Japanese city governments, as well as the national government, are building 3D models of their country to enable collaboration across industries, visualize crowded areas, and encourage public input on development.

Data classifications in Shizuoka, Japan. This image uses data from Virtual Shizuoka, Shizuoka Prefecture, Mt. Fuji, and Eastern Shizuoka and is licensed under CC 4.0/ODbL. Courtesy Locus Blue.

ScanX’s users acquire their data from terrestrial laser scanners (TLS) and lidar scans by drones, UAVs, and even iPhones. They drag and drop these datasets into ScanX’s uploader, where the datasets are automatically segmented into the different point classifications using ScanX’s deep learning algorithms. ScanX processes mostly point clouds but also commonly handles glTF, OBJ, and 2D files such as floor plans. These files are hosted in Cesium ion, where they are tiled into 3D Tiles and streamed to Cesium ion SDK. Cesium ion SDK extends the open-source CesiumJS JavaScript library with additional 3D analysis tools and UI widgets. Like CesiumJS, it was designed for precision, interoperability, and accessibility. ScanX also accesses Bing Maps Aerial imagery and Cesium World Terrain through Cesium ion, providing accurate geospatial context for the users’ data.

Data classifications of a forest area on Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost island. Courtesy Locus Blue.

The advanced machine learning algorithms behind ScanX remove noise in the point clouds and automatically segment the data to highlight waterways, land, vegetation, buildings, wires, and other classifications, so users get the information they need quickly. 

With a single URL, entire dashboards and data-derived intelligence can be shared within organizations and across outside collaborators, enabling smooth teamwork and timely action. Insurance companies and aid organizations, for example, can detect hazards and damage after natural disasters; municipalities can manage smart city projects and infrastructure maintenance; construction companies can monitor progress; and foresters can count and measure trees and estimate carbon data. 

Canopy segmentation, helpful for forest management. Courtesy Locus Blue.

ScanX plans to add more objects to be segmented, increase tools for change detection, and support heat maps. 

Sign up for a free Cesium ion account and take your massive datasets anywhere.

ScanX Analyzes Point Clouds in the Cloud with Cesium

LUUCY is offering tools built on CesiumJS for urban development and city planning with a focus on Switzerland. Development in urban areas can be complex, with many stakeholders of diverse backgrounds. 

With Cesium, LUUCY provides greater transparency from planning to realization so all stakeholders, whether investors, business owners, construction teams, or government officials, can collaborate on future development projects.

Sketches created in the app allow stakeholders to quickly explore a proposed development from all angles. These are intended for early in the development process, and not as a replacement to a CAD program.

LUUCY is meant to be used at a preliminary stage of planning as several variants of a feasibility study can be easily sketched within a few minutes. These visualizations are meant to inspire the imagination, support communication, and aid in the decision-making process.

Proposing alternate designs for a development area in the optional sketch shading mode. Users can model different buildings with many variations and compare them on the fly both visually and statistically.

Users can also create presentations to share with other stakeholders. LUUCY automatically flies to the individual locations of the slides and switches the desired layers on or off, not requiring the user to know how to navigate a 3D environment. 

LUUCY is designed for interactive views from any device and for large multi-screen presentations to invite comment on planned development. 

The core of the app is a 3D model of the real world with representative buildings, topography, and vegetation. 

The flexibility of the Cesium framework allows for a wide variety of different and highly detailed data to be visualized at the same time, with good performance. 

Beginning with that canvas, users create their own building sketches with simplified modeling tools and can connect to external data services, including Cesium ion assets, web map services, or self-hosted content. Upload functionality offers integration of detailed BIM models, GIS datasets, or site plans. If a dataset is not georeferenced, the user can place it with the built-in Georeferencer App, powered by MapTiler.

Providers can integrate many different data types thanks to Cesium's versatility, including detailed underground structures.

Existing buildings, trees, or other objects can be hidden so users can construct their own buildings or volumes on already developed plots. Custom-built shaders like high-quality screen space ambient occlusion and custom edge shaders also enhance the display possibilities and quality.

With the open source API, LUUCY can be extended with integrations such as construction cost estimates in early design stages.

In the LUUCY marketplace, apps, maps, and 3D data are ready to be integrated into users’ workspaces with just a few clicks.

By making it easier to visually communicate proposed designs, LUUCY makes it easier to explore all aspects of proposed development, including mobility, ecology, energy efficiency, and public spaces. 

Public presentation of visualization of zoning parameters. 

By giving users tools to quickly view, sketch, and share 3D datasets, LUUCY is using Cesium to improve workflows and decision making. To get started building your own CesiumJS app, sign up for a free Cesium ion account. 

LUUCY Providing Better Urban Planning and Site Development with CesiumJS

The Urban Data Project, developed by the GATE Institute at Sofia University, is tracking air quality data in Sofia with a CesiumJS application. 

The Urban Data Project includes a 3D model of the city of Sofia. 

The Urban Data Project supports better air quality monitoring and environment-aware urban planning. With Cesium, they’ve been able to integrate static models of the urban infrastructure with dynamic information from the environment.

The application provides data on air pollution from various sensor stations throughout the city. 

Air quality sensors throughout the city have been in place for some time, but that data has been fragmented in various applications. The Urban Data Project migrated these various applications to GATE’s platform for data processing on their private cloud. That migration required integrating information from multiple sources, including sensors, databases, and interactive models, which was all in different formats, e.g., JSON, SQL, KML, RDF. Those datasets were also ingested in different modes of delivery, including streaming, messaging, file uploads, database imports), and stored in different repositories, e.g., SQL databases, NoSQL databases, GML databases, graph databases, distributed file systems. 

Users can get more detailed information from each sensor, updated in real time. 

By integrating all the data and providing a simple, intuitive user interface built on CesiumJS, the GATE Institute made the data more accessible and simplified navigation so users can quickly find relevant data around buildings, streets, and transport routes. 

To get started building your own application, sign up for a Cesium ion account. 

Sofia University Synthesizing Air Quality Data with Cesium 

CAE is one of the world’s most prominent modeling & simulation companies. Their latest initiative, created by the Synthetic Environments and Immersive Technologies team, is a new capability for creating complex, city-scale simulations. The project integrates data about energy infrastructure, lines of communication, the population, emergency services, and cyber and networks, as well as the physical environment. And that smart city is made accessible through the Cesium platform. 

Building a city-scale digital twin requires enormous datasets. In the case of the London demonstration, CAE turned to Bluesky International, the UK’s leading aerial survey company and their MetroVista product London city model, which comprises more than 1 TB of detailed photogrammetry. The best way to access such a large dataset is with 3D Tiles, the OGC community standard developed by the Cesium team. While most users are able to tile their datasets in the cloud using the 3D Tiling pipelines available on Cesium ion, CAE’s dataset was so large that they built a custom on-prem, cloud hosted solution. To tile the dataset, CAE put together a 3D content processing pipeline, built on Microsoft Azure, that included Cesium’s on-premises 3D tiling pipeline to tile the photogrammetry data as 3D Tiles.

With the dataset ready for streaming, CAE used Cesium ion on-prem to stream the 3D Tiles into a CesiumJS viewer.

London at 5 cm resolution with photogrammetry data from Bluesky. This interactive model is shown in CesiumJS and can be accessed through a browser on any device. Smart cities like this stream smoothly thanks to the 3D Tiles open standard. 

London at 5 cm resolution with photogrammetry data from BlueSky. This interactive model is shown in CesiumJS and can be accessed through a browser on any device. The massive model streams smoothly thanks to the 3D Tiles open standard.

CAE digital twin

The resulting model shows the buildings of London in high photorealistic detail. When connected to live data feeds, such as traffic, utility, and emergency services updates, the model can provide real-time insights into the activity taking place in the city. 

CAE’s capability goes beyond providing an up-to-date digital view of a city. The real strength of their model is in the simulations they’ve integrated. In their London demonstration, that includes the simulation of 100,000 pedestrians, the electrical power network, and other data feeds from the region.

These integrations allow the simulation of, for example, a power failure stemming from a cyber attack, showing which regions of the city and which aspects of critical infrastructure would be affected. 

Simulating a power outage in London. The simulation is visualized in CesiumJS. 

CAE utilities simulation

Modeling the entire city, CAE was also able to create pattern of life simulations using 100,000 simulated pedestrians traveling throughout the city. They could then simulate crowds of variable sizes gathering for demonstrations at various locations to review potential impacts. 

Here each green dot represents a pedestrian. The simulation is visualized in CesiumJS. 

Each green dot represents a pedestrian. The simulation is visualized in CesiumJS.

CAE pedestrian simulation

First person simulations in Cesium for Unreal

Having created a complete digital twin of London, CAE didn’t limit their users to a single interface. Besides streaming into CesiumJS for visualization, CAE also serves the same 3D Tiles datasets from Cesium ion into Cesium for Unreal. 

Pedestrian simulations in Cesium for Unreal.

Pedestrian simulations in Cesium for Unreal

CAE Cesium for Unreal

In Unreal Engine, CAE further enhanced some of the photogrammetry dataset with custom 3D models to improve the first person view. For example, the Trafalgar Square area has custom models for Nelson’s column, traffic bollards, and subway entrances.

The Cesium for Unreal experience, available as a desktop application, provides a first-person perspective into the same data and simulation capabilities. Users can see the crowd simulation at street level, including vehicles simulated in Unreal Engine. With a more photorealistic experience and street-level view, these types of simulations are especially useful for training scenarios. The Cesium for Unreal application opens up a range of interactive experiences, including AR and VR.

Simulations for the metaverse built on Cesium

By giving developers the tools to work with huge 3D geospatial datasets, Cesium supports the modsim community with tools for multi-domain operations (MDO), joint all domain command and control (JADC2), humanitarian aid and disaster response (HADR) and urban operations. Supporting that level of integration is just one way we’re committed to building the metaverse. 

CAE was able to simulate a complex dense urban environment by taking advantage of the complete Cesium platform:

Urban simulations visualized in CesiumJS 

Hosting, tiling, streaming, and analyzing 3D geospatial data with Cesium ion

First person visualizations in Cesium for Unreal 

To visualize your complex city system interactions and simulations, contact CAE. To begin building with the Cesium platform, sign up for a Cesium ion account. 

CAE Simulates Complex Dense Urban Environments with Cesium

Australia is leading the world in investing in large scale digital twins. They got started early: in 2014 the Terria team built a National Map using TerriaJS with Cesium to visualize geospatial data from all levels of government. In the years since, Terria has developed digital twins for three of Australia’s six states: Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland. That’s 78% of the total population of the country supported by a digital twin built on Cesium. 

New South Wales Digital Twin

“Creating these digital twins has brought about a digital transformation for state agencies as they have been able to share, manipulate, and manage their data. The visualization component is critical because it brings the data to life. Our stakeholders recognise Cesium as a fundamental enabling technology for an open digital twin ecosystem." 

These digital twins are virtual representations of the real world that serve the government, private companies, and the public with data on the natural and built environment. Not only do these digital twins contain vast amounts of geospatial data, but they are updated in real time with live information from an array of sensors, and they use AI, simulation, and machine learning to support decision making. 

That’s a lot of data to track. Terria has helped state governments set up the infrastructure to manage—and visualize—that data so it becomes much more usable. 

With a digital globe built on Cesium, users can zero in on the data that’s relevant to a particular area. And with the streaming efficiency of 3D Tiles through Cesium ion, they can stream whatever they need, right in the browser.

Users can layer numerous datasets for visualization and analysis, like this photogrammetry layer from Aerometrex. 

One of the greatest strengths of these state digital twins is bringing so many disparate—and previously inaccessible—datasets together into a single platform. Whereas traditionally parcel information, flood simulations, building proposals, and traffic monitoring may have all been siloed in different agencies, the digital twin brings it all together, allowing people to make faster, more informed decisions while reviewing the impact on multiple dimensions. 

Bringing all these datasets into the same place, even sensitive datasets secured by access control, creates a collaborative digital workspace where all organizations work from the same authoritative datasets. This collaboration is essential to building resilient communities. For example, as telecommunications companies share their datasets with emergency agencies, the two are able to cooperatively analyze past wildfires, predict future hazards, and protect critical infrastructure. 

These digital twins cover entire states, including urban and rural areas, offering the ability to coordinate on many levels.

Terria’s digital twins are living models, updated in real time with data from across the state to reflect current conditions.  The digital twins provide real-time updates on wind farm production levels, pest activity, air quality, and live transport data. Because Cesium runs in the browser, users can access updates instantly. 

Like the models, the digital twins themselves will continue to grow with ongoing investments from the government and the many stakeholders with data to share, evolving over time to meet future needs. 

A workbench allows users to select relevant datasets to view, whether government land use data, 3D photogrammetry models, infrastructure details, or live updates like this air quality index dataset. 

A digital twin not only allows users to see current conditions, but enables them to run simulations to make more data-driven decisions in transport, infrastructure, and land management. 

For example, with Cesium 3D terrain it’s possible to review historic flood data and evaluate the potential impact of flooding events. Builders can model project scenarios to demonstrate the feasibility of proposals. Engineers can predict traffic congestion. City planners can analyze infrastructure plans to improve services. Simulations allow users to see the impact of changes on their communities and the environment. 

Digital Twin Victoria

We’re proud to have supported Terria’s transformative work in creating virtual replicas of communities that will support the future of smart cities. 

With the Cesium platform you can bring your own data to a full-scale globe complete with global terrain, imagery, and buildings. Our 3D tiling pipelines will prepare your data for streaming, no matter how large the datasets. Sign up for a free community account to try it out. 

Cesium Supporting State-Sized Digital Twins

The City of Munakata, Japan, is making it easier for citizens to access building data with their i-Urban Renovation application built on Cesium.

Local governments throughout Japan collect data about buildings, including their usage, the number of floors, construction materials, and the construction year. Munakata City, in the northern part of Fukuoka Prefecture, tasked their Urban Structure Visualization Promotion Organization with making this data accessible to the public in a way that was easy to understand.

The distribution of buildings in the area. The number of buildings is aggregated into a regional mesh (1 km grid), and the 3D grid graph is created using the value of the mesh code displayed in Cesium. Because the grid is linked to the information in the place and the number of buildings, it allows for an easy-to-understand presentation when explaining the local situation to residents.

The i-Urban Renovation app they built uses CesiumJS to visualize and share this data. Even though Munakata City covers approximately 120 square kilometers filled with numerous buildings, the application efficiently streams building data using 3D Tiles.

Styling buildings by usage, and comparing with land use zoning requirements. You can do something similar for your own data in Cesium Stories, which supports 3D Tiles styling.

With the Cesium app, users can see any building’s current status. Buildings can be colored across a variety of metrics, including based on:

usage, such as residential, business, commercial, government, agriculture, and so on,

number of floors, making it easy to see the distribution of high-rise and low-rise buildings,

construction materials, such as wood, or reinforced concrete, and

construction year, showing the distribution of the new and old buildings.

Also, users can check the relationship between the building usage and land use regulations by combining the building dataset with a land use zone dataset. When users click buildings, detailed building attributes will be displayed.

Viewing building usage. Click on individual buildings to see detailed data. We’ve recently added feature picking to Cesium Stories so you could build something like this yourself.

Check out i-Urban Renovation or the data encoding specification. Or bring your own data into Cesium ion to easily create 3D Tiles you can stream with Cesium.

i-Urban Renovation Visualizes Munakata City Building Status with 3D Tiles

Siradel produces 3D digital twins of cities. The data-driven platform has simulation capabilities for smarter infrastructure network planning and greater well-being of inhabitants.

A subsidiary of the Engie group, which has offices in more than 60 countries, Siradel works with telecom operators and with national and local authorities to make cities more sustainable, resilient, and safe.

In this use case, Siradel simulated the impact of urban infrastructure for Rennes, France. Using the Smart City Explorer platform, Siradel examined the electromagnetic fields (EMF) related to mobile networks and mapped EMF exposure levels throughout the territory on a globe built with Cesium.

The resulting 3D scene is displayed on a public website customized by Siradel’s teams that can be consulted by all actors in the city, including representatives, operators, associations, and citizens.

Visualizing radio propagation with Cesium

To build the model, Siradel first took an exhaustive inventory of the city’s relay antennas, then measured the peak levels of exposure in the streets for all mobile networks. Using their Volcano radio propagation modeling software, they also simulated the level of exposure to EMF on the ground, walls, and roofs of buildings in 3D for the whole city.

Visualization in Cesium made Siradel’s simulation and planning tools accessible, creating a smart city platform to aid the development of Rennes.

Simulation, Planning, and Visualization for City Development with Smart City Explorer Web Platform