3D laser scanning services in Ottawa

It depends on the size and complexity of the building and on what you need drawn. A single office floor with 2D as-builts is a different job from a hospital wing with its mechanical in Revit. Send the address, the building type and the deliverables and we will come back with a scoped quote. Our cost guide walks through what drives the price.

Capture on site is usually one to two days for a standard commercial building. The 2D as-builts or the Revit model typically follow in one to three weeks, depending on the level of detail and how much mechanical is involved. Large campuses, plants and heritage buildings are scoped individually.

Whatever the quote lists: the registered point cloud (E57 or ReCap RCP), 2D as-built floor plans, reflected ceiling plans, sections and elevations (DWG or DXF), a Revit model (RVT), IGES where mechanical work needs it, and slab elevation or deviation maps where scoped. Formats, the sheet list, the model elements and the coordinate system are all settled before the site visit.

Yes. We regularly scan occupied offices, institutional buildings and operating facilities. We schedule around staff, tenants and operations, after hours where agreed; the measurement itself is non-contact, and the scanner set-up and working space are planned with the site team.

Yes. Interior work goes ahead year-round, subject to access and site conditions. Exterior capture is scheduled around snow cover, which hides the surfaces we need, and around the operating temperature of the equipment. When a project has both, we capture the interior first and come back for the exterior once it is clear.

Across the city and the National Capital Region, including Gatineau, and elsewhere in eastern Ontario by arrangement. Send the address and a line about the project and we will tell you how we would approach it.

The registered point cloud on a building-scale terrestrial project is typically within ±3 mm (2–4 mm depending on scanner, range, geometry and control); when the project team supplies an established coordinate system, the cloud is delivered in it. That figure is the point cloud. The finished drawing or model carries its own tolerance, agreed in the scope; the model's LOD describes what is represented, not a measurement tolerance. Areas the scanner could not reach are marked not visible on the drawings instead of being filled in.

iScano provides point clouds and CAD or BIM existing-conditions documentation of visible building geometry. If a project also needs boundary definition, cadastral surveying or another service regulated under Ontario's Surveyors Act, that work is provided by a licensed Ontario Land Surveyor; for Gatineau projects, reserved land-surveying work is handled by a Québec arpenteur-géomètre. When the project team supplies a coordinate system, the point cloud is delivered in it. We compare the two methods in our 3D scanning vs traditional surveying article.

Yes. A conversion study starts from the floor plates, cores, slab-to-slab heights, façade openings and visible services as they stand, and the archive drawings of an older downtown building often do not reflect later fit-outs, alterations or current services. We scan the building and deliver the Revit model or the 2D set the design team works from, so feasibility starts from measured conditions. The scan is the measured base; structural assessment, concealed conditions, code review and the permit drawings stay with the architect and engineers.

Yes. The scan records mouldings, openings and out-of-plumb walls as they are, and the drawings or the model show the building as found rather than squared up. Where a project needs a heritage consultant's assessment or a conservation plan, that stays with the consultant, and any City or federal heritage approvals stay with the owner and project team; we supply the measured record they work from.

A contact for access, the hours we can work and any visitor, security or contractor paperwork the building requires. For controlled-access facilities, include any visitor, security, escort, badging or restricted-hours requirements in the quote request so the capture plan is built around the building's access rules.

They are existing-conditions documentation at the level of detail agreed in the quote (LOD 200 to 350 for models): the measured starting point for design, planning and coordination. They are not construction documents, fabrication drawings, building inspections or boundary and cadastral surveys under Ontario's Surveyors Act. Any dimension a design or a fit depends on should be field-verified before it is built to, and anything the scanner could not see is marked as not visible rather than filled in. Design and verification remain with the architect, engineer or contractor.