Uploading Terrestrial (Static) Scans

Created by John Tapia, Modified on Fri, 06 Oct 2023 at 10:43 PM by Nicholas Czarnick

Terrestrial or Static Laser Scans

Terrestrial scans, also called static scans, are generated from a device mounted on a tripod.

Each individual scan comes with its depth map, associating X, Y, Z data to each pixel of the panoramic image grid.

Structured scans need to be ‘registered’, i.e. aligned in a same coordinate systems, using a registration software such as: Faro Scene, Trimble RealWorks, Leica Cyclone, Leica Register 360, Topcon ScanMaster, Autodesk ReCap Pro… Once registered, the structured data contains each scan location, each panoramic image & depth map, and the 3D point cloud, as the result from the registration process.

With structured scans, each scan location is visible in the 3D space. It’s possible to be in each scan position, see the panoramic image and navigate from scan to scan.

Structured scan file formats supported by Cintoo Connect

  • (Structured) RCP: the native format for Autodesk ReCap projects
  • (Structured) FLS or LSPROJ: the native format for Faro Scene projects
  • (Structured) E57: the standard exchange format for terrestrial laser scanning
  • Every point cloud software provides the option to export a structured E57 file.
  • To know how to generate a structured E57 from these software, please ask us at: support@cintoo.com
  • Note that there are other structured scan formats generated by point cloud software: FLS, PTX, TZF

Preparing your Cintoo Cloud project for the upload

You may want to:

  • Either upload all your scans at once and then organize and assign them to various Work Zones afterwards.
  • Or create Work Zones first and upload your scans in each one of them if you know already the organization of such data (for example: upload all level 1 scans in a Work Zone named ‘Level 1’, then all level 2 scans in Work Zone ‘Level 2’, etc.).

You may also want to create a Work Zone to host all your scans (you may call it ‘All Scans’) before eventually assigning them to sub-Work Zones.

Creating Work Zones

Select the project in which you want to create one or more Work Zones.

At the top right, select then ‘Create a Work Zone’ and fill the form (only the name is mandatory).



Uploading Scans

Click on “My Projects” in the top bar, click on the project in which you want to upload data, then select the Work Zone in which you want to upload scans.

Click on “Upload Scans” from the top right of the window to start uploading scans:

Or you can also click on “Prepare & Upload” from the middle of the window:

This will start Cintoo Connect on your computer:

Select ‘Terrestrial Laser Scanner’ tab.

Select your RCP (Autodesk ReCap), FLS (Faro), LSPROJ (Faro Scene project) or E57 data. Please note that either your RCP, FLS, LSPROJ or your E57 data must be a structured project (i.e. it must include the location of each scan, the panoramic images, depth maps and the point cloud).

  • Please check our video to understand the difference between a structured scan project and a unified or unstructured scan project.

Once the RCP, FLS, LSPROJ or E57 file has been selected, click on ‘Import’. The process should start right away (translation to Cintoo Reality Data first and upload next).



  • Should there been some scans that have ‘lost’ their structure, you will get this type of display:
    • This case mostly corresponds to cases when, in a RCP Project Support file, not all scans have their ‘RCC’ file. Cintoo Connect will still be able to upload those scans as ‘structured’.

  • Should your selected scan file be a ‘unified’ point cloud, this warning message will be displayed:

    • In this case, please refer to the team in charge of the laser scanning to request the source ‘structured’ file in RCP or E57 format.

  • You can see each scan details by right-clicking on one of the scans:
    • A pop-up window will then appear listing all the known information for this scan:


  • If some of your scans have a resolution lower than 1,000 pixels in one axis, they will be automatically unselected. They usually correspond to survey points, which do not need to be uploaded. Should you want to include them still, please toggle them ‘on’ in the Cintoo Connect scan list.
  • Structured scans that have lost their structure and that have less than 250,000 points are also automatically unselected.
  • On average, please allow around 1 to 2 min for the processing of one scan of 10 million pixels, 5 min for 40 million pixels, and about 25 min for 160 million pixels (times may vary depending on your computer).
  • You may process more than 2 scans (default setting) in parallel if you have a multi-core machine (up to 8 scans):

  • On average, you will need at least 400 MB of RAMper 10 million pixels to process. For example:
    • 8 GB of RAM will allow you to process 5 scans of 40 million each in parallel.
    • 64 GB of RAM will be needed to process 5 scans of 160 million pixels each in parallel.
  • Change the scale factor only if you have been told to do so by the Surveyor.
    • This scale factor expresses the difference between the local coordinate system that you need for your scans and your models, and the geographical coordinate system (such as a State Plane Coordinate System) used during the capture process.

  • Regarding the ‘Do not import deleted points from RCP’ option, please check this section of the documentation.


  • Regarding the ‘Blur faces’ option:  
    • It is checked by default, thus enabling the automatic blurring of people captured in any panoramic images included in the scans being uploaded to Cintoo.
    • Uncheck this option to prevent the automatic blurring any people in the panoramic images.
    • Blurring cannot be undone in Cintoo after the scans have been uploaded.
    • Any files uploaded without the 'Blur faces' option enabled must be deleted from the Cintoo project and re-uploaded with the option checked in order to apply automatic blurring.


  • Regarding the ‘Upload enabled (uncheck to pause upload)’ option:
    • It is checked by default, thus enabling the mesh-based scans to be uploaded automatically once the point cloud-to-mesh transformation is completed.
    • If ‘Upload enabled’ is unchecked, the point cloud-to-mesh transformation will happen locally on your computer, but the resulting mesh-based scans will not be uploaded. You will need to resume Cintoo Connect to upload your mesh-based scans later, for example when you have access to high-speed Internet.

  • Once a first scan has been uploaded, you can see the data in Cintoo Cloud by going to Data, Overview Map or 3D View tabs. You may need to refresh the page to see the list of scans already uploaded.

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