Clearly communicate your transportation and civil projects in 3D with Civil Engine

The world needs a better 3D visualization engine for transportation projects

Beyond Typicals is becoming industry standard for creating visuals for transportation projects, and is now a stable, version 3 product. Users love the ability to quickly build out street and bridge sections using drag and drop functionality, 100 (or more) feet at a time. While we will continue to improve this product and support our growing user base, there is still a gap in the market for better 3D visualization for imported design files (like Infraworks), intersections and complex transportation projects. 

In 2021, we introduced Beyond CAD, a photorealistic 3D visualization engine built on Unreal Engine for transportation projects that was set to solve this problem. While Beyond CAD found some early success, it wasn’t as cohesive a product as it should have been. Knowing this and wanting to focus all of our efforts on the success of Beyond Typicals, we paused development of Beyond CAD for a time.

We are now ready to revisit solving this problem and are excited to announce the spiritual successor to Beyond CAD, Civil Engine.

Civil Engine represents a significant evolution from what Beyond CAD was, offering a superior solution to the challenges faced by civil engineering professionals. Leveraging the foundation laid by Beyond Typicals (and not Beyond CAD), Civil Engine embodies a comprehensive 3D visualization engine, powered by Unreal Engine 5.

Imagine the ease and power of Beyond Typicals, but with the ability to visualize your imported 3D engineering designs, like Beyond CAD sought to do.

Civil Engine is not a refinement of Beyond CAD, but a complete reimagining of our approach. By forking the codebase from the proven framework of Beyond Typicals, Civil Engine inherits a solid and cohesive structure while introducing groundbreaking advancements. With a renewed focus on imported 3D designs, primarily sourced from Infraworks and other civil engineering software, Civil Engine will empower users to visualize complex projects with unparalleled precision and efficiency, while also feeling familiar in UI, textures and assets to Beyond Typicals users. Built for transportation design professionals, Civil Engine will have a core ‘Path’ placement system that will be used to linearly place traffic, 3D objects, cameras as well as other static and dynamic assets. This Path paradigm will be fundamental to the speed and realism needed for rapidly visualizing transportation projects.

And for the many Beyond Typicals users that have been asking for the ability to visualize intersections, Civil Engine will provide that and more.

Our development team is diligently working towards a 2025 launch for Civil Engine. We invite you to stay informed about our progress by signing up for updates below.

Thank you for your continued support as we strive to redefine the standards of 3D visualization in the civil engineering industry with Civil Engine.

Sincerely,

Sam Lytle, PE

Founder, Beyond CAD Incorporated

Understanding the functionality of Civil Engine

While both Beyond Typicals and Civil Engine will offer efficient 3D visualization for transportation projects, they operate under different paradigms. Beyond Typicals relies on a drag and drop system of pre-made sections. Assets are attached to these sections, and other changes can be made to materials and other aspects of the road sections. With Beyond Typicals, there is no need for existing data to import, which makes it an incredibly accessible tool to jump right in and get started.

Civil Engine offers a much wider range of possible project types and other visualization features, but comes at the cost of needing a good 3D model of your project to get started. We refer to this as a ‘base model’ and it can come from InfraWorks or Sketchup (other workflows may work, but will not be encouraged). We are diligently working on refining these workflows as well as getting a better understanding of how 3D design models can go from Autodesk or Bentley products into either InfraWorks or Sketchup as necessary.

We are also excited to announce that we will be offering services to create 3D base models from customers design files in 2025. We will refer to this group of artists as Beyond CAD Studios.

Once the user has a base model ready (either through their own work or from our Studios artists), it can be imported and textured in Civil Engine in preparation for other steps in the visualization process. Where Beyond Typicals uses the section + asset paradigm, Civil Engine uses a base model + Paths and Areas paradigm. The Path system is incredibly dynamic and intuitive and each path can be placed one node at a time on the surface of the base model. These paths can be used for everything from vehicles to pedestrians to guardrail to trees and even pavement markings using any of the dozens of path ‘presets’. After the paths are placed, assets can be assigned and customized, similar to how assets can be assigned to sections in Beyond Typicals. Paths will be one of the defining systems of Civil Engine because the linear nature of transportation and other large civil projects lends to a linear placement system of traffic, assets and other elements.

The Paths system is core to what makes the Advanced Traffic System possible. After placing paths with traffic, intersection controllers and other features (like merge/diverge) can be used to create a dynamic and customizable network of paths to efficiently represent traffic for your project on the base model. The traffic library (which vehicles or people show up) can be customized per path or globally, along with other values like traffic density and speed. Traffic isn’t just vehicles, it also includes pedestrians on foot or bicycle along with various types of rail. All of these traffic types can interact with each other (much like the real world) through the intersection controller and other features of the system.

To tie traffic to cameras and other publishing tools, Civil Engine offers an innovative and cutting-edge traffic ‘baking’ which allows users to record and edit the positions of all vehicles and pedestrians to ensure the right traffic is in the right place at the right time for your render.

While the traffic system of Civil Engine cannot replace true simulated traffic, it is the most realistic representation of traffic in a photorealistic engine to date.

The Areas system is similar to Paths, but for enclosed surfaces. This will be the most efficient system for placing trees, grass and similar 3D assets that need placing in an area rather than along a path.

Assets and other elements can also be placed, adjusted and edited individually as necessary.

Dynamic assets builds on what is already possible within Beyond Typicals with animated construction equipment, customizable traffic lights, custom buses and trains and much more.

A hierarchy system works to efficiently organize all paths, areas, assets and imported base models. Foldering and phasing is possible within the hierarchy as necessary for project needs. The phasing system can be used for phases, project alternatives, or even for just organizing projects as needed.

Basic rendering tools put image and video renders at your fingertips, including the much celebrated feature of Beyond Typicals- photo compositing. 

For more advanced visual experiences, the Civil Engine Publisher is a robust system with a number of tools to most efficiently present your visualized base model. Camera creation, Presenter Mode, GANTT chart phasing and even a video editing style ‘Sequencer’ are all available within the Publisher section so that users can give full visual experiences and productions without ever leaving Civil Engine.

The Publisher also includes a ‘Publish to Web’ feature for an additional cost that allows users to render image and video cameras (including 360 views) and automatically publish them to a website for quick and easy sharing.

A custom and familiar UI ties all of this together, along with our excellent customer support and 3D modeling services to (finally) make efficient and accessible visualization for transportation and other civil projects possible.

• Advanced traffic system (vehicles, pedestrians, rail)
  • Easy and dynamic path placement
  • Customizable traffic libraries (per path or globally)
  • Intersection controllers for complex movements and signal timing
  • Auto placement of traffic signals with intersection controllers
  • Merge and diverging of paths
  • Articulating trucks (single/double) and trains
  • Pedestrian/cyclist animations that stop/start as necessary
• Traffic animation baking to tie vehicle and pedestrian movements to cameras
• A dynamic Paths system for traffic, asset placement, fencing, rail and more
  • Use any of the dozens of path presets to quickly place traffic, 3d assets, fence, barrier and more
  • Assign multiple assets to the same path for powerful combinations and incredible efficiencies (imagine trees + tree grates or traffic + construction cones, for example)
  • Add, adjust or remove nodes for any path or even extend previously placed paths with new nodes  
  • Place striping using path presets for solid, dashed, double and more
  • Color-coded path visualizers can be turned on and off in editing for quick reference
  • Pathway arrows can be turned on for any path to communicate various traffic movements
• An Areas system similar to paths, but for enclosed areas and surfaces for efficient placement of trees, grass and other objects
• Importing of base models or other 3D assets is possible through .obj or .fbx files (InfraWorks and Sketchup recommend exports) with a number of importing options including units, scale, rotation, texture import and more
• A 3D asset library of more than 700 hand-picked photorealistic models for transportation and other civil projects
  • Hundreds of trees, bushes, flowers, cacti and other realistic nature assets
  • Transportation-specific assets like highway lights, guardrail, delineators and more
  • Construction-specific assets like barriers, equipment, signs and more
  • Buildings of all types including multi and single family residential, commercial industrial and even generic white buildings
  • A large selection of pavement marking symbols including arrows, BUS, BIKE and more
  • Shadows off for striping and pavement markings 
• Dynamic assets build on what’s possible with Beyond Typicals, adding even more for Civil Engine
  • Animated and customizable construction equipment including an excavator, backhoe, dump truck and more
  • Flashing signs including RRFB, overhead and more (turn them on, off or other options)
  • Dynamic traffic signals with lights that actually flash color based on user customization
  • Adjustable arrow boards and dynamic message sign (DMS) with text box (multiple fonts) for highly customizable construction phasing and traffic control
  • Basic building block shapes with customizable texturing for more advanced building
  • Dynamic people placement with options for selecting the character and animated pose
  • Save customized dynamic assets to send to other users using the proprietary .bca file format (similar to .bta files in Beyond Typicals)
  • More dynamic assets are planned for possible development before launch
• Photorealistic textures with focus on transportation and other civil projects including detailed and seamless asphalt, concrete, soil and other materials
• Detailed striping and other pavement marking textures for better realism
• Wear paths are on by default for traffic paths for added realism
• A robust and proven hierarchy system for organizing assets, paths, areas and imported base models
  • Organize and reorder all elements of a scene, including folder and sub-folder organization
  • Lock, rename, turn visibility on/off, delete or phase any element or folder in the hierarchy as necessary for highly ordered projects
  • Organize and texture base model sub-mesh components as necessary
• Adjust time of day, clouds and background colors to get the right aesthetic look for your project
• A phasing system even more robust than Beyond Typicals for full phases or alternatives
  • Phasing can also be used to turn off certain elements while editing (like large amounts of trees) for faster performance
  • A GANTT chart system can be used to tie phases together for full rendered productions without need for post-processing
• A number of included example projects to explore and learn more about how Civil Engine works
• Basic rendering for quick image and video renders (using the same system as Beyond Typicals)
• Make image and video photo-composites easily within Civil Engine by importing project photos and camera matching the 3D model (similar to Beyond Typicals)
• Camera controls in the bottom left (similar to Beyond Typicals) allow for quick camera customization
• Scene effects make blueprint or other rendered looks possible
• The Publisher section of Civil Engine unlocks advanced camera and visual experience options
  • Set up, name and organize dozens of still or animated cameras
  • Attach cameras to paths for efficient path cameras
  • The Presenter mode allows for a customized and minimal UI for presentation of visualized scenes in group settings
  • Touch controls allow for navigation of Presenter mode on touch devices for public presentations
  • 1st and 3rd person navigation is possible for walking, cycling and driving vehicles using keyboard controls or gaming controller
  • The Sequencer allows for advanced video editing within Civil Engine and ties together cameras, phasing, baked traffic, sound and more for full rendered productions, eliminating the need for post-processing in video editing software
• Basic features include file saving, auto-backup, undo/redo and more