wrong coordinates with loaded pointcloud object

[tino_riedel]

Hello,

i've loaded several pointclouds (*.rcp) within 3ds Max 2018 and got always wrong location respective transformation of the pointcloud related to the global origin of the coordinate system. Other apps like Navisworks, AutoCAD don't have this issue. They place pointclouds with the same coordinates like in ReCap so they match together if you combine several objects, not in 3ds max which is important for fast and reliable workflow.

To see the deviation in 3ds Max i imported two times the same pointcloud and reset the coordinates taken from ReCap (moved pointcloud object). I imported also other assets who used the same coordinates. Currently we must always check and reset the transformation of the pointcloud in 3ds max before we can continue, because it causes matching problems with other assets using the original transformation.

Please use the original coordinates from ReCap also in 3ds Max for the pointcloud object to ensure a smooth and secure workflow and save time for modelers. It would be very helpful to fix that issue.

[dgorsman]

I suspect this may be related to the coordinates of the points.  In surveying it is normal, and even essential, to have real-world coordinates.  However this becomes much less important when doing engineering work (it's more about dimensions than coordinates) and virtually irrelevant with visualization work (it doesn't matter if the picture is rendered from real world coordinates or from 0,0,0 - you can't tell the difference).  Design software like AutoCAD and Navisworks are designed to work at a higher precision than visualization software, so they are better at handling large coordinate values.  However they still fail when the numbers get big enough.

Surveyors aren't driving your project - you are.  Get the point clouds transformed to coordinates that work for your project i.e. no true-north skews or large value coordinates.

[tino_riedel]

Hello,

first thank you for quick response but i most strongly disagree with your explanation. It is not just about dimensions. It is crucial for us to have reliable pointcloud coordinates streamlined over several applications and in our workflow the only app which uses not the proper coordinates after importing a rcp file is 3ds max. We use the following unit settings

system units: meter

And we couldn't detect systematic behaviour after importing. It is not about just have an fixed offset, which would be easy. It is all about how 3ds Max handles these pointclouds which could mean how it extracts a center point of a bounding box, uses hidden points or not from ReCap or whatever. The only thing we know we get always wrong location of the pointcloud object. It is not about 1mm, it is about 0.5m or more. The term "wrong" means in comparison to all other apps who simply place the pointcloud with the exact same offset from global origin as in ReCap.

Our application is not just remodel from pointcloud we also need the exact same coordinates to streamline position of the final object over AutoCAD for example and not have to guess what 3ds Max had done to the coordinates.

The dimensions of the pointclouds can be 5x5x5 meters or 50x50x10m. It makes no difference. There is a different behaviour than in other apps like Navisworks and AutoCAD and that should be fixed because it is intented by Autodesk that these apps can fluently work together without hassling about non systematic deviations which in my point of view have nothing to do with precision built in 3ds Max.

Please check this with a test pointcloud between ReCap, Navisworks, AutoCAD and 3ds Max.

[Kristian.LarsenM6CEN]

Getting the same issue in 3dsmax 2021, ~0.5m offset. 

I've wasted a day and delivered a model in wrong location. 

Do you have any fixes for this?

[3d-labor]

As I have the same issue I want to aks if there is somebody who can confirm that this problem is solved in MAX 2024.

[3d-labor]

Sorry that this is another "answer" from me, but the internet connection was so slow that I thaught the first "answer" didn´t get through.

I only wanted to add: in my case I have a georeferenced pointcloud with a point distance of 0,2m. I shifted it in CloudCompare to prevent problems with great distances in MAX. After inserting it in MAX the bottom left point is at 0.3,0.3. According CloudCompare it should be 0.1,0.1 , the center point of the first 0,2m rasterfield. So i think that MAX somehow added one raster width. When I move the insertion point -0.2,-0.2 all seems fine.

[3d-labor]

Found out that in MAX 2025 the error doesn´t exist. The pointclouds are showed on there exact position. My workflow here was to insert a pointcloud object, move it to 0,0 and then load the pointcloud in the modify panel. I dont know why there is no standard insertion point for pointcloud objects of 0,0...But of course you can use snap