Sam Lytle, founder of Beyond CAD, Inc., entered the field of civil engineering in 2010 and was immediately drawn to 3D visualization, perceiving its potential as a powerful communication tool. Lytle still considers it a vital part of any civil engineering project, particularly those that need to be funded and approved by the public.
But at the same time, Lytle recognized a few problems in the industry—3D visualization was out of reach for small or mid-scale projects, and there weren’t a lot of companies providing solutions aimed at the transportation/civil engineering industry.
“3D visualization in transportation has traditionally been so expensive, due to lack of ecosystem and industry-specific tools,” Lytle says. “Only mega projects, maybe $100 million and above, used to be able to justify good 3D visualization as part of public outreach like public meetings or even news media.”
With that realization, he founded Beyond CAD in 2020. The company’s first product, an Unreal Engine-based application called Beyond Typicals, is built specifically for transportation and civil infrastructure professionals. With its modular approach to street design, Beyond Typicals enables engineers to quickly assemble configurations of pavements, strips, road markings, foliage, and everything in between.
But at the same time, Lytle recognized a few problems in the industry—3D visualization was out of reach for small or mid-scale projects, and there weren’t a lot of companies providing solutions aimed at the transportation/civil engineering industry.
“3D visualization in transportation has traditionally been so expensive, due to lack of ecosystem and industry-specific tools,” Lytle says. “Only mega projects, maybe $100 million and above, used to be able to justify good 3D visualization as part of public outreach like public meetings or even news media.”
With that realization, he founded Beyond CAD in 2020. The company’s first product, an Unreal Engine-based application called Beyond Typicals, is built specifically for transportation and civil infrastructure professionals. With its modular approach to street design, Beyond Typicals enables engineers to quickly assemble configurations of pavements, strips, road markings, foliage, and everything in between.
After over a year of focused development, Beyond CAD has taken things a step further with the release of Civil Engine, another Unreal Engine-based application. Civil Engine is purpose-built to turn CAD drawings into 3D visualizations within a few hours rather than weeks, making it faster and easier than ever to bring infrastructure projects to life with realistic rendering and animation.
Civil Engine, recently released to the public, takes the company one step closer to achieving its goal of democratizing visualization as a common method of communication in urban planning.
“As tools like Beyond Typicals and Civil Engine bring down barriers to 3D visualization for these types of projects,” Lytle says, “medium and even smaller-sized projects can now benefit from clearer communication of these often complex projects.”
Civil Engine, recently released to the public, takes the company one step closer to achieving its goal of democratizing visualization as a common method of communication in urban planning.
“As tools like Beyond Typicals and Civil Engine bring down barriers to 3D visualization for these types of projects,” Lytle says, “medium and even smaller-sized projects can now benefit from clearer communication of these often complex projects.”
Courtesy of Beyond CAD inc.
Unreal Engine at the core
Both Beyond Typicals and Civil Engine are built on Unreal Engine as their core foundations. Unreal Engine does so much of the heavy lifting of development, Lytle says, that Beyond CAD is able to conceptualize and develop products that wouldn’t have been possible with their small team. They often source assets and materials from Quixel Bridge and the Fab marketplace, and lean on Nanite to make large, complex scenes possible.While Beyond CAD originally designed its products to use a custom launcher, they soon found so many advantages to distributing through the Epic Games launcher (EGL) that they now use it as the main method of delivery. “Some of our AEC customers were initially uncomfortable using a ‘gaming’ launcher, so we also offer a zipped download solution,” says Lytle, “but more and more of them have switched to EGL as it serves as the most stable option, especially when we release updates.”
For the development process, Lytle particularly appreciates the Blueprint visual scripting system as it gives him a way to use his civil engineering expertise to improve Beyond CAD’s features—despite him not knowing how to code.
“Part of what makes our products special is that I have been able to obsess over the smallest things,” he says. “Details like materials, vehicle options and composition, 3D asset library, and example projects are a direct result of my vision, and my work in Blueprints and data tables.
“I still can’t code, but I’m able to directly contribute to our products thanks to Blueprints.”
Courtesy of Beyond CAD inc.
Custom 3D visualization services with Unreal Engine
Beyond CAD has had such success with Unreal Engine that the team is able to offer 3D visualization services to customers that need help with their projects. This includes everything from creating specific 3D models to taking over full 3D visualization for a large project.While Beyond CAD is able to leverage Civil Engine for such projects, the team has the added benefit of being able to customize the software for a client’s project. For example, Lytle says, one client needed to show a specific quarry truck, complete with articulation, as a crucial part of the visualization’s story. Beyond CAD was able to add the quarry truck on the back end so they could not only deliver this important aspect for the client, but also update the next version of Civil Engine to include this asset.
“The concept of ‘eating our own dog food’ is a real thing, one that makes our software so much better when we are forced to use it ourselves for actual client work,” Lytle muses. “As quality goes up and costs go down, we are in a unique space to offer incredible value across the board.”
Courtesy of Beyond CAD inc.
The future of 3D visualization in civil engineering
Beyond Typicals and Civil Engine are unique to the industry, facing little competition from other software offerings, which might seem like a sure shot to success and widespread adoption. However, Lytle says they do have a stiff competitor in the form of the industry’s level of willingness to invest in 3D visualization.He draws on a comparison with the field of architecture, which makes wide use of visualization for even the smallest of projects. “We are hoping to change the transportation industry in the same way, so that in a few years 3D visualization won’t just be expensively outsourced to external teams, but it will be expected to be done in-house,” he says.
Civil Engine is currently in v1, but Beyond CAD has big plans for future versions and looks forward to eventually providing that one tool that truly changes the industry. Lytle imagines a version of Civil Engine that not only fully leverages all that Unreal Engine offers—lighting, physics, environments, assets—but also emerging AI technology, a ‘first principles’ type of approach where every element has its own intelligence.
“Users wouldn’t place traffic paths, for example—the vehicles would just spawn and understand where to go based on road markings and signs,” Lytle says. “The road base models wouldn’t be brittle imports, but rather living assets that would change and evolve along with the actual design.”
Courtesy of Beyond CAD inc.
Lytle is clearly excited about the future of Beyond CAD and Unreal Engine, and the company’s continued partnership with Epic Games, which he says gives them extra cachet for working with the largest engineering firms in the world.
One unexpected bonus from the release of Civil Engine is the level of interest for a gamified version of the software. Beyond CAD has been inundated with requests from would-be players to release what they would consider a realistic and satisfying experience in worldbuilding and city simulation.
Lytle is glad for the spotlight on 3D visualization of infrastructure, but intends to stay on the path he started following 15 years ago—at least for the foreseeable future. “Our answer is that we are currently focused on making the best 3D visualization products for professionals on real projects,” he says, “but who knows if we won’t venture down the gaming path some day.
“The amazing part really is that we get to live in a time where a small team like ours can utilize technology like Unreal Engine to make industry-changing software that gets better in weeks and months instead of years and decades.”
One unexpected bonus from the release of Civil Engine is the level of interest for a gamified version of the software. Beyond CAD has been inundated with requests from would-be players to release what they would consider a realistic and satisfying experience in worldbuilding and city simulation.
Lytle is glad for the spotlight on 3D visualization of infrastructure, but intends to stay on the path he started following 15 years ago—at least for the foreseeable future. “Our answer is that we are currently focused on making the best 3D visualization products for professionals on real projects,” he says, “but who knows if we won’t venture down the gaming path some day.
“The amazing part really is that we get to live in a time where a small team like ours can utilize technology like Unreal Engine to make industry-changing software that gets better in weeks and months instead of years and decades.”
How to install Unreal Engine
Download the launcher
Before you can install and run Unreal Editor, you’ll need to download and install the Epic Games launcher.
Install Epic Games launcher
Once downloaded and installed, open the launcher and create or log in to your Epic Games account.
Get support, or restart your Epic Games launcher download in Step 1.
Install Unreal Engine
Once logged in, navigate to the Unreal Engine tab and click the Install button to download the most recent version.
Watch how to install