Coming Soon Civil Engine

The civil engineering world has long needed a better 3D visualization engine, one that’s not just powerful but also accessible to the designers and engineers who are actively shaping our transportation infrastructure. Beyond Typicals has become the industry standard for creating visual representations of street and bridge sections, enabling users to rapidly build 100-foot (give or take) segments with ease. However, a significant gap remains when it comes to visualizing more complex transportation designs, particularly those involving imported design files from tools like Infraworks, Sketchup and Microstation. And, unlike with Beyond Typicals, Civil Engine will be easily able to take on those intersections, complex projects and intricate project details.

In 2021, we launched Beyond CAD, a photorealistic 3D visualization engine built on Unreal Engine, aimed at tackling these challenges. While it showed promise, it didn’t fully meet the needs of the industry. Recognizing this, we paused its development in 2022 to focus on refining Beyond Typicals.

Today, we’re thrilled to re-enter the space with Civil Engine—a tool that finally makes advanced 3D visualization accessible to the very designers and engineers responsible for planning and designing our roads and transportation projects.

Civil Engine is not just an update, but a complete reimagining of our approach to 3D visualization. Built on the solid framework of Beyond Typicals and powered by Unreal Engine 5, Civil Engine combines the simplicity and efficiency of Beyond Typicals with the advanced capabilities necessary to visualize imported 3D designs.

This isn’t merely an upgrade of Beyond CAD—it’s a fresh start. By building on the proven foundation of Beyond Typicals, Civil Engine offers a cohesive and robust structure while introducing innovative features that make 3D visualization more accessible than ever. It’s designed to handle complex transportation projects with unmatched precision and efficiency, giving designers and engineers the tools they need to tell the stories of their projects without the steep learning curve typically associated with high-end visualization software. And while tools like TwinMotion and Lumion offer more accessible visualization for design, these tools are built for architectural and product visualization and typically struggle with complex transportation scenarios. Civil Engine will offer the ease of visualization of these tools, but built for transportation and other civil projects.

A standout feature of Civil Engine will be its intuitive ‘Path’ placement system, allowing users to easily and quickly place traffic, 3D objects, barrier rail, fencing, striping, cameras, and other assets with remarkable speed and realism. This system is central to the rapid visualization of transportation projects, making it possible for engineers and designers—not just visualization specialists—to create and manipulate 3D models with confidence. A similar tool, Areas, will allow users to place objects, visual graphics and other assets in a 3D pattern. Both Paths and Areas are built from the ground up to be incredibly dynamic and responsive to the changes associated with any design and visualization process.