The iTwin Spatial Editor is a desktop application designed to assist with the manual adjustment of spatial alignment and display extents of iModels.

Key capabilities include:

	Editing iModel Display Extents	Resize the bounding box of an iModel to control the visibility of its geometry. For more information about this feature and related topics, please refer to the documentation available here.
	Transformation Tools [Tech Preview]	Utilize translation and rotation features to reposition individual models. Future enhancements are planned, including offsetting an iModel, point-to-point snapping, and others, to help address misalignments in iModel data.

 

 

Change the Extents

The iModel Display Extents define the bounding box or volume of interest within the iModel's coordinate system. For further information about this concept and related Synchronization Report issues, please refer here.

The Edit Extents tool  lets you easily adjust the extents by moving the arrows on the bounding box. You can quickly identify the position of the geometry based on its color (Image 1):

• Green – the element is within the extents.
• Red – the element is outside the extents.
• Blue – the element is at the boundary of the extent.

Image 1 - Editing iModel Display Extents

 

NOTE: If certain elements are far from the extents boundary, they may not be rendered. Depending on your needs, you may need to update the source files to position these elements correctly or delete them. For more information about potential issues and the best solutions, click here.

Once you are satisfied with your adjustments, don't forget to click Save to apply your changes. If you cancel the extents editing or close the application without saving, no changes will be made to the iModel.

 

Transformation

📌  Having the correct coordinate reference system (CRS) and location in native files is the best practice for model alignment. If your source data is not geolocated, it is not uncommon for model to be positioned incorrectly. 

To address this issue, transformation tools are available that enable you to define the necessary adjustments to correct any misalignment.

 

Offset individual models

To transform the position of a model, click the Transformation tool and select the model from the dropdown list. The XYZ and Rotation fields allow for manual entry and offsetting the model in any direction.

 

You can modify any number of models as needed. If multiple models are transformed, the dropdown will show an unsaved changes icon next to the model names, and a Transformation Summary will appear, detailing the positional changes for each model.

Once you are satisfied with your adjustments, click Save Transforms to apply the changes. If you choose to Reset or close the application without saving, no changes will be made to the iModel.

 

Image 2 - Transformation widget example

 

Tips

Ensure that model design data is contained within the chosen Coordinate Reference System (CRS) boundaries. Data located outside these boundaries can lead to various technical and practical issues. For example, when geometry is modeled far from the origin, it can result in precision and accuracy problems, as numerical precision decreases. This may lead to inaccuracies in geometry calculations. You might also experience performance issues, such as slower rendering and navigation, among others.

If during transformation the data is moved outside of the specified boundary, a warning will be displayed.

Image 3 - Data outside CRS boundaries

 

Given that iModel has a valid CRS, you can view its boundaries by enabling the Show CRS Boundaries toggle in the Geospatial Metadata panel, more about it here.

 

Coming soon...