Application of Deep Learning Approach for the Classification of Buildings’ Degradation State in a BIM Methodology

Abstract

Featured Application: To improve the integrated management in building conservation and encourage the AECO sector actors to adopt preventive maintenance in the field of cultural heritage. Currently, there is extensive research focused on automatic strategies for the segmentation and classification of 3D point clouds, which can accelerate the study of a landmark and integrate it with heterogeneous data and attributes, useful to facilitate the digital management of architectural heritage data. In this work, an automated image-based survey has been exploited a Region- Based Convolutional Neural Network. The training phase has been executed providing examples of images with the anomalies to be detected. At the same time, a laser scanning process was conducted to obtain a point cloud, which acts as a reference for the BIM process. In a final step, a process of projecting information from the images onto the BIM recreates the pathology shapes on the model’s objects, which generates a decision support system for the built environment. The innovation of this research concerns the development of a workflow in which it is possible to automatize the recognition and classification of defects in historical buildings, to finally interpolate this geometric and numerical information with a BIM methodology, obtaining a representation and quantification of the information adapted to the facility management process. The use of innovative techniques such as artificial intelligence algorithms and different plug-ins becomes the main strength of this project.