APPLICATION OF GAMING ENGINES IN SIMULATION DRIVEN VISUALIZATION OF CONSTRUCTION OPERATIONS

Simulation modelling is an effective approach for analysing construction operations that is not widely used by construction practitioners. Visualization in general, and particularly in construction projects, is a convenient and intuitive way of conveying project information among various project parties. Recently, construction management researchers have been investigating adding a visualization component to construction simulation models in order to make these models more intuitive and appealing to decision makers. These researchers argue that enhancing visualization and spatial representation of construction operations in a simulation environment can improve the adoption of simulation techniques by the industry. Among different industries that make use of advanced visualization technologies, the gaming industry is one of the leaders in utilizing and advancing these technologies. This paper explains the utilization of video game technologies in the development of a framework for construction operations simulation visualization. The framework is based on High Level Architecture (HLA) standards for distributed simulation and allows for hooking different visualization components to the simulation environment with great deal of flexibility. The paper presents the different elements of the framework and discusses the benefits and challenges experienced while using two different gaming engines as visualization portals in the framework.