Automated LiDAR Scan Planning of 3D Indoor Space Based on BIM and an Improved GA

In engineering construction, Indoor 3D laser scanning can detect the geometric quality of components (such as flatness and verticality of surfaces), which has a positive significance for geometric quality inspection. However, traditional indoor scanning schemes are often based on manual experience, and there are limitations, such as incomplete scanning long-time scanning. Therefore, this study proposed an automated LiDAR scan planning method for 3D indoor space at the same elevation using BIM and an improved genetic algorithm (GA). Required information, including geometric and semantic information as well as topology, is first processed and extracted accordingly. After extracting the region to be scanned, the GA is used to optimized the station positions considering scanning constraints (e.g., scanning visibility and scanned completeness). With an illustrated example, it is found that the proposed LiDAR scan planning for indoor 3D space can greatly save the time and labor cost, and solve the problems existing in the traditional indoor scanning schemes.