What if you could have a rich, interactive jobsite meeting with just your mobile phones, tablets and laptops, without needing to leave the trailer, office, or even area of the jobsite? What if you could record those meetings for interactive, 3D playback later? Imajion does this and more, helping contractors, owners and architects meet much more regularly, painlessly, and document work and discussions along the way.
Imajion
[00:00:00] Hugh Seaton: Welcome to constructed futures. I'm Hugh Seaton. Today I'm here with Adrian hatch co-founder and CEO of Imajion. And Tim Gollogly VP of sales for Imajion. Guys, welcome to the podcast.
[00:00:14] Adrian Hatch: Thanks a lot. Thanks for having us.
[00:00:16] Hugh Seaton: Awesome. So let's start with the beginning, what is Imajion, and what do you guys do?
[00:00:24] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. Imajion is a real-time communication tool for the job site and for facility environments. So you can think about it essentially like a zoom tool tailor built for the construction industry, real-time audio and video collaboration with an interactive augmented reality tool set that lets your callers and call participants reach onto the job site and make markup directing the conversation.
Like they were shining a laser pointer through their computer screen out onto the site in AR.
[00:00:57] Hugh Seaton: So there's a lot in that, let's unpack it. So, first thing is, this is primarily an augmented reality solution. Is that right?
[00:01:07] Adrian Hatch: I would say, so you can hold any kind of video audio conference on our platform.
But most of those meetings tend to be held with one person onsite using an AR device, like a Hololens or an iPad pro to host an interactive AR view.
[00:01:23] Hugh Seaton: Actually, that's an interesting point. I think I've been on some meetings with Tim that weren't AR, but the platform works as well. Right? So AR is obviously the special sauce or at least part of that, but it works just as a way to get together and talk, if you don't happen to need the AR at that point.
[00:01:40] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. It's essentially meant to be a one-stop shop tool for you to hold your project planning and coordination meetings in the AR is there so you can hold those meetings onsite effectively.
[00:01:52] Hugh Seaton: that's great. So what got you here? What made you think that this is what's needed now?
[00:01:59] Adrian Hatch: You know, we started this project around 2016, really getting into the beginning of 2017 and we were looking for a problem that was big and unsolved and might be best addressed by some of the newer technologies that were emerging around that time. 360 capture head-mounted displays like VR and AR headsets.
And we found this problem of the construction site meeting, that even though all around us, a more conventional office and desk paced work was going more and more remote. I knew folks who were graduating and taking fully remote jobs here in the construction industry. Where, whereas at the desk, we're taking it for granted now you can work remotely.
It's the opposite with construction folks. We're still taking it for granted that to move the project forward. You have to go to that job site and hold a physical meeting. Uh, and we looked at that as a place where. Maybe these new technologies will make it possible to bring those benefits of remote work that have already been changing how we work at our desks to the job site.
And that really brought us to first 360 video. And then our first couple of MVPs, we realized this needs to be a live calling tool. This needs to be something that lets me reach out to the job site and reach the people onsite. And that brought us to augmented reality. Took a lot of work, but we built our initial prototypes, brought them to the field and heard the positive feedback that, yeah, we'd use this to hold our meetings.
And then we just had to build and refine the vision from there.
[00:03:32] Hugh Seaton: And when you guys use augmented reality, there's a lot of ways to do that. Right. Some with headsets, some with an iPad or a phone or whatever, what do you guys like to use?
[00:03:43] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. We treat augmented reality as the simple and sharp tool that gets those offsite participants onto the job, lets them reach into the space and tell that person on site.
Hey, this is what's most important. Here's what has to change. So for us. The device is just what's capable of providing that functionality. When we founded the company, that was really only the Microsoft Hololens, a headset that's got a pass through 3d display and can sense its environment in three dimensions powering that real time 3d markup. Last year, apple released apple LIDAR for iOS AR kit. So now we also support the iPhone pro devices. And iPad pro devices with support for apple LIDAR. So they've got very similar capabilities to the Hololens. Uh, it's a trade off instead of having a hands-free headset, you're holding that tablet.
Uh, but now it's a sidearm that you can throw in your pocket, carry around site a little bit more easily.
[00:04:40] Hugh Seaton: And why did you need what LIDAR does? paint a picture for folks about the experience, why the capabilities of a Hololens, which is a pretty high end device and now LIDAR, which is radar using light for those of you who don't speak LIDAR.
But it's a really accurate way of understanding the scene that you're in. Why was that necessary for the experience that you're providing for people.
[00:05:06] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. It's really the accuracy. So LIDAR is able to map the surroundings pretty quickly and pretty accurately. And so that means that we don't have to have a manual scanning step where you Don this device and like manually step through the space, carefully scanning every inch.
It doesn't have very high power requirements. It doesn't need an added scanning device. So this is all able to be built into the headset or into the tablet. What it means is. For the meeting, you can just take it for granted. What I'm looking at, I'm going to be able to place that measurement on... somebody connected remotely is going to be click on able to click on and mark, without us having to take time to scan the space in detail, without us having to worry too much about the accuracy and precision.
Now it's not a matter port or a Leica scanner this isn't grabbing a scan. Absolute millimeter precision the way some of these very high-end LIDAR devices are, but anybody use use those devices can probably imagine, take that down to about 60 to 70% of its capability at that high tier Cadillac level.
And you've got something that can host an interactive site meeting pretty accurately, very reliably without any cumbersome, extra work for the people involved.
[00:06:23] Hugh Seaton: That's great. So the system knows where things are and when you put them there, they stay there. So whether you're showing somebody a virtual drawing or a model or whatever it is when you put it somewhere in virtual space, And it'll stay where you put it in, in real space.
So people don't get confused or God forbid sick.
[00:06:42] Adrian Hatch: Yeah, absolutely. And I think you actually hit the nail on the head there with a, with a key point. That's easy to forget. Really two. One is that content staying put. So it's not just when I see that a soffit that we need to make an adjustment to, or I see that section that I have a question about I can click on it and make a pointer. It's that you can walk around that room. You can get another perspective on it. You can even leave the room and come back, and that markup is still going to be there. The other side is the safety for that user because it has that more accurate understanding of its surroundings that content doesn't swim around it doesn't jitter or shake. The user doesn't feel like they're looking through a device. It really feels like those holograms have been added to the space around you. And that's less disorienting.
[00:07:30] Hugh Seaton: And one of the things that you're reading about recently, Facebook said something about this, and they're not the first ones to do it. Um, this idea of a metaverse and that can go two ways. It could be something that's a hundred percent virtual, but the more likely way most people are going to interact with that sort of an idea is a blending of virtual and real. And that's a lot of what you're describing, right. It's a stable blending of virtual content that lives out in space.
So it's not, you don't have to pull it out or whatever. It's there for you to look at and compare to the real world context that it's referring to, right. Is you can have a plan and right behind the plan, you can have the part of the building that plan is referring to. So you can map back and forth, match back and forth.
[00:08:12] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. And I think the job site is closer to the metaverse than a lot of environments we know today or take a facility environment. Uh, these are environments where we already might have a model closely corresponding to the shape and size of the building that has information about equipment running in that space about what needs to be installed about who needs to be, where.
That's that overlay of digital data to the physical world. That is the metaverse, especially when you make it collaborative. And so that's, what's pretty exciting for us to look forward with what we're learning from our customers, with what we're iterating in this product, bringing more and more of that data into the collaborative experience.
And then letting you bring more and more of that data out. Uh, one feature we just built recently is grabbing that 3d scan of the site from the headset and uploading it to the cloud as a record. Now you can start bringing some of that real world data back to that digital record letting you push that whole combined metaverse forward day to day as your project documentation.
[00:09:17] Hugh Seaton: So I'm going to switch gears and ask Tim a little bit about his experience, talking to customers and how this is getting used. Like, what are you hearing when you talk to people about this still pretty new technology?
[00:09:31] Tim Gollogly: Yeah. So, hugh, it's been interesting. People are looking at this, not as solely a replacement for in the field or in person types of interactions.
They're seeing this as an additive, where the team is able to check in on a more regular basis. So you can be more informed. Uh, we had a very eloquent description about construction, where a person can describe it to you verbally, but it's basically like looking through a paper bag, when you're trying to understand what is going on in the field.
This actually gives you the first person point of view so they're able to just talk through things. You're able to reduce the number of RFIs, because you're talking to someone in the field and seeing what they're doing. And you might have someone with more experience or knowledge that is behind the computer that can give an answer. Yes. Right now, or no, rather than saying to someone, I'm going to have to look into this, let me get back to you in a few hours.
So they're using it to keep the job site moving. Um, one of the other things that we found people are using this also is just simply create more hours in the day to get other stuff done. Uh, you have highly skilled, highly paid people that are literally being paid to drive their trucks to point a point B point C. They're losing 5, 8, 12 hours a week just driving where you're not able to do anything while you're behind the windshield. So we're finding that this is just allowing them to check in and avoid some of those counter productive meetings where they just have to look at something for two minutes, discuss it, and then make a decision.
[00:11:12] Hugh Seaton: What I love about that is they say that the more you can do something, that you start to do things differently, right? When you really reduce the friction of something, people are going to check in more often, or they're going to ask more often. Whereas if it's irrespective of whether those hours are useful in the, in the car or whether they're talking on the phone the whole time, it doesn't matter.
They've stopped doing something else and they've made, you've made it really painful and expensive to go do something. But you guys are doing is the opposite, right. Is making it cheap and easy to just, Hey, let's get everyone together for 15 minutes. I want to check on something. Are you hearing people talk about how that might change how they do what they do?
[00:11:52] Tim Gollogly: Yes. So There's a few people that realize that they don't have to be on the job site weekly anymore. Um, they're setting up, once a month or every other month in person visit because there are certain things you still can't get without being in person. And that's just the culture vibe. That's building relationships with the team in the field.
But they're using this to make those fewer and far between, because there's still a bit of interact with the people. So that's what we're finding the most of.
[00:12:27] Hugh Seaton: And how do you guys interact with the whole COVID and safety and all, I mean, obviously this is of some benefit. Are you finding that's a big part of the discussion or is it more well, you know what? Yes, it helps, but really I care that we're getting our job done.
[00:12:42] Tim Gollogly: It's been, been a bit of both. So COVID really is just opens people's ears to embracing technologies like these, where they might not have embraced it for another four years, five years. Um, so COVID opened up the door, but it's really just a fractional part of the ROI.
And they're starting to realize this, that, Hey, wait a second. Instead of driving all across New York city, right? Job site to job site. I can just give each one of my superintendents, an iPhone 12, and I could check in with them for a few minutes each week. And now I have all of that time that I spent in Manhattan bumper to bumper.
I have that time free to get caught up on everything else that I need to do.
[00:13:28] Hugh Seaton: Adrian. Can you talk a little bit about the recording and playback? You mentioned that a little earlier. Let's talk a little bit about that, right? Cause it's another benefit of something being digitally mediated is that you can record things that would have just been people talking to each other.
[00:13:45] Adrian Hatch: Exactly. And I think that's getting back to the crux of what we made this for is to bring those advantages that were confined to the desk, confined to the zoom meeting out to the job site. And that's where we've seen the platform used. Even when you have half the project meeting staff onsite, physically that day today's the day y'all got lunch.
You'll still take that iPad pro out to hold that remote site walk. Maybe you've got two people dialed in and five people on site, but now everything gets recorded. So because that Imajion meeting is now a digital meeting, you get to take it for granted that you can tap a button and everybody in the call, voice and video is getting recorded out on site.
That person walking the job site, everything, they look at everything that they examine and they're told to investigate. It's all getting captured in that first person view. With the holograms with whatever documentation they're looking at, whether that's holographic documentation plans that are open digitally, or they're even looking at the physical plans table in the trailer, whether they're taking an AR measurement or they're using a laser range finder, it's all getting captured.
And some of the value add we've got there is the markers that are being placed on site measurements, file shares, snapshots folks pointing out issues. Chat messages being sent. It all becomes an interactive bookmark to the recording. So when your call is over, you can always download that video file, watch it however you'd like, but if you revisit it in our platform, you can browse through that chat history and see, when did we point out that problem?
When did the designer mark that discrepancy against the. And jump right to that moment. So it's a level of rich documentation you've never really had before in a site walk. I think anybody who's been in that field environment knows that experience of a hour and a half, two hour walk where you're writing down everything you can on the clipboard or the iPad.
But by the end, you can hardly remember what you were saying when you were jotting down those first notes, being able to go right back to that moment in time, two days, two weeks, two months or two years after the fact is invaluable in the right situation. And it really just hasn't been in the toolbox until now.
[00:16:02] Hugh Seaton: So it's kind of like a rewind for reality.
I mean, how many times have you been listening to someone you got distracted and you're like, Aw, man, I wish I could just hit, rewind and get that again. Uh, and that's sort of some of what you're offering.
[00:16:14] Adrian Hatch: I think we're going to have to quote you on that one. Yeah. Rewind for reality is pretty good.
[00:16:19] Tim Gollogly: That's one of the other things though, too, is imagine that you get sent a list of notes, which many of us have, many a times, about a conversation, but you don't have the context of it.
You just have the written note. With this, you could also fast forward to that 30 second exchange, and you can hear the actual verbal context and see the job site. That that note was addressed to. So that just makes your followup that much more efficient and things not lost in translation.
[00:16:49] Hugh Seaton: The context thing is a big deal.
I really liked that. Um, there's another element is a few things actually that you guys have mentioned along the way that that may not be obvious to some listeners. One of them you talked about is AR measurements. So this again is where the LIDAR makes sense is that measurements can be real. I mean, it's not just, well, it seems big or small, but you can actually really understand how big something is in the world that you're, meeting in, is that right?
[00:17:16] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. It's one of those benefits of LIDAR is that it's building a accurate mesh of the surroundings and we're able to let you measure against that mesh. So actually some folks listening today might have an AR measurement app on their mobile device already. Um, if you've used that, you've got an idea of what the tool in our application is.
We tell folks don't cut steel rebar with this it is just LIDAR measurement but it is accurate to the nearest inch. And certainly what all you need to check clearances, understand the dimensions of a space, get an understanding of the space without necessarily standing there. Um, and so that is one of the tools we've got.
You can also grab that 3d scan of the space and always revisit it later, take measurements against that scan using Revvit or Navvis or whatever tools you usually use every day.
[00:18:05] Tim Gollogly: And Hugh I can firsthand tell that that solves a problem too, with the measurement or there's, there's something not being filled there because every time, without a doubt when I'm on the job site, and I show the measuring feature, all of a sudden, I hear, Hey, Jimmy bust out the measuring tape. And these crews put the measuring tape to it and it is within an inch. And it's something that I when I first started with Imajion, I had hesitation about that fear that the tape wouldn't add up.
And now I just, it's, it's a hundred percent confidence that the LIDAR technology is going to help that measurement be within an inch of accurate.
[00:18:45] Adrian Hatch: It's one of those opportunities to save everybody five minutes, a hundred times over the course of a day onsite because it lets you reach those measurements far further than you can reach with your hands and a tape, normally.
You can always pull that tape out and get it on video, but it might save you that climb up the step ladder that reach over a railing. Let you stay that much safer and keep your hands closer to you. No matter where you happen to be onsite.
[00:19:10] Hugh Seaton: It's funny, you mentioned that a lot of people who are listening will have a measurement app on their phone.
It comes standard with the iPhone. They had it even before LIDAR, it's just a whole lot more accurate. So Apple's been doing this and gathering data for at least a year. Um, and then the idea that, that, again, it's just one more thing that, because it's so easy to do, you might do it a lot more. I mean, that you should, that shows up in software and technology all the time. Right?
If something is easier to do, we just do it. If the thought even strikes us, there's no barrier to doing it. So it's like, let's just check. Let's just double check. What's the see about that, and that, and that. So I think there's something really exciting about that.
[00:19:47] Adrian Hatch: And I think that helps your team build a better intuition, even I can say one thing I've experienced having used this app on a lot of sites is I've got a better idea for what six feet is from across the room.
I have taken enough of these measurements now that it's definitely given me a little bit of a better intuition for, for judging distances, just out on the site.
[00:20:08] Hugh Seaton: It's like the opposite of Google maps, which is utterly eroded my ability to, to do turn by turn directions in this case, because it's visual, you're training your brain to be better at estimating.
That's pretty cool. I hadn't thought of that. Adrian. You also mentioned AR markers. Let's talk a little bit about what you mean by that. Because again, that's something that isn't an everyday experience, but I like the fact that you bring up why stuff should stay, where you put it. Talk a little bit about what that means.
[00:20:34] Tim Gollogly: But before Adrian talks about that, I would love him to also talk about the background of the person that does some of those graphics. Cause it's, it's pretty cool the talent that we have at Imajion.
[00:20:46] Adrian Hatch: Oh, sure. Yeah. Happy to throw that in there, which is that major props to Joe on the engineering team.
Who's built a lot of this front end easiest trivia to always bring up is that he previously worked on the terrain generation software for the Lego movies. So if you see the Lego movie yeah. Anywhere that you see like a mountain range or a valley hillsides, anything like that Joe wrote the software where it, you take a regular old terrain sculpt like a 3d model.
Run it through his algorithm and now it's built out of Lego bricks. So that's the kind of talent that I get to work with everyday. I really it's gotta be one of my favorite parts of this job is getting to work with these folks, hear their war stories and experiences like that. And like Tim was saying, one of the tools Joe's really built a lot of at Imajion is that augmented reality markup.
So I mentioned earlier that you can think about it like shining a laser pointer through the video screen through that AR view out on the jobsite. And really it's kind of like a sticky laser pointer or a Thumbtack. When you see that user's view, you're looking at a video of what they're seeing, either off the Hololens or the iPad, you click on that video and under your mouse, we're dropping an AR marker out on the job site that stays where you clicked and it's there in 3d.
So if I have the headset on and I'm looking at a dozen valves, 10 feet in front of me. And you click with your mouse right over the valve you want me to turn, even though that's 10 feet in front, maybe I'm looking at it from an angle. That pointer is going to be placed right on that valve out in front of me.
And because it's anchored there, I can walk around, I can walk to the left, I can walk out of the room and come back. And that marker is still going to be where you put it. And we've got two kinds of remote marker at Imajion. Your first one is like a laser pointer. Each click places it, it'll stay there until you click again, your next click moves it.
So that's how you quickly get somebody's attention and tell them where to look. We've also got a push pin tool, and so that drops a pin or a Thumbtack. Those accumulate on the job site. You can make as many as you'd like, they'll stay in place as you move through the job. Each of those tasks can have a note attached to it.
And so those notes become a list of documentation that you can download after your meeting, you can post into Procore, you can share with other team members and that act as bookmarks to that recording. And of course, everybody in the call can do those simultaneously. Right now we support up to 15 people in an Imajion call.
And it'll be more, as time goes on, all of those folks are assigned their own markup color. Everyone can be placing markers and notes simultaneously as the meetings proceeding. And for that user out on site. For them, it just looks as if those are appearing out in their field of vision stable and clearly not distractingly, but there to show them what's important so you can get their attention.
[00:23:43] Hugh Seaton: That's awesome. Um, so I'd like to switch gears from what, what you guys do now to where you see this going. Let's talk a little bit about, I mean, we've mentioned just now one obvious thing is more people and more functions, but you know, you're in the beginning of a technology development. In terms of AR right.
Everyone's thinking wow, Facebook's coming out with a, they did come out with there. They're not really AR, but with their smart glasses, but you know, whether it's Facebook or apple or other companies it's expected that this is just going to be, become more powerful, more useful, more consumery.
How do you see all this going over the next you pick the amount of years, but in the future.
[00:24:27] Adrian Hatch: Absolutely. Well, the near future is easier to predict than the far future. So I guess we can start there hugh, and I'll, I'll even quote what you were just saying, which is that the hardware is getting more accessible, more consumery.
And I'm excited for that because it means more and more people on the job site are going to have these capabilities. Now, when we started bringing this tech to the market, it was just locked up in that hollow. So your project needed a Hololens and you needed somebody trained to use it. And that's still great for getting the job done for what the Hololens is best at.
But what if you've already got a dozen iPad pros out in the fleet? Now you can put those into use too. What happens when next everybody's Android mobile device. Everybody's iPhone, not just the iPhone pro 12 all have support for Imajion's technology. It means when you look at that project roster of everybody out in the field, whether you're the super sitting in the trailer, or you're a project manager across the country.
You can immediately get eyes on what they're seeing out onsite and work with them interactively. So that's exciting for me, just knowing that this Tech's going to keep getting more accurate, more precise, easier to use and easier to access.
[00:25:42] Tim Gollogly: Well, Adrian mentioning that too, it takes it from being an organized site walk, Hugh to a daily interactive tool that you're able to hop on for three minutes.
If you need to discuss something rather than scheduling a one hour site walk. So it's going to become a very go-to tool within the site. When you just need to answer something quick, short, sweet to the point, you're able to do that. Get a clear answer and move on and just keep the construction moving.
[00:26:14] Hugh Seaton: Can you imagine what that's going to do to the process of running projects and asking people for their opinion? I mean, one of the things that we didn't talk about as much, cause I think it might be down the road is there's no reason what you're doing couldn't be somebody staring at something and they're, they think they have the answer, but they just want to ask Hey Fred, that you've done this before, what do you think? Right. Like the ability to, to borrow judgment and experience from people that aren't right there on site with you. It can absolutely change the way certain parts of, of construction are done. Is that something you're hearing about?
[00:26:50] Tim Gollogly: Absolutely.
[00:26:51] Adrian Hatch: Even, not necessarily onsite.
I think one thing we've seen in the business, the office side of business is I've talked to folks who will be exchanging instant messages and screen shares with folks who are just on the other side of the desk. It's something we can't even wrap our heads around quite yet in this industry, because it's been so long without access to these tools, because none of these tools haven't been suitable to construction until now, but when everyone on your site has immediate interactive, real-time access to one another, it starts to change the terms of engagement for all kinds of work. When, if that senior carpenters on the other side of the site.
Even if it's just saving 20 minutes. Now, I know I can always ask for their help without costing 20 minutes. And that time is going to add up over and over and getting their help's going to add up over and over. I'm going to glean their expertise more. I'm going to do a better job. I'm going to become a senior carpenter that much faster.
[00:27:49] Tim Gollogly: We have this, like this huge, huge amount of skill and experience in the field that doesn't want to travel that much anymore. They may be getting close to retirement, but they're not at retirement yet, but they have this wealth of knowledge that they could share in the field.
They just don't want to be on the road seven days a week any more at the stage that they're at that being able to tap into their brains for years to come with more, less experienced people in the field. I mean, I think that's going to extend the life cycle of some people's careers where you're still able to utilize their expertise.
[00:28:31] Hugh Seaton: Yeah. Our friend, Josh Bone at NECA has been talking about this for some time now, that, that really tenured trades person is going to have a role as a consultant that maybe wasn't true in the past. And I think your technology is one of those ways where you could see that happen, right? Is that they're able to lend their experience and judgment without having to get in the truck and go somewhere that also may not be the easiest place to get to. I mean, a lot of installation happens on the 40th floor where it's windy, where people just don't feel like taking those risks anymore.
Guys, this has been a great podcast. I really learned a lot about the industry and about what you do. Thank you, both for being here.
[00:29:13] Adrian Hatch: Thank you so much for having us, Hugh, it, it's always fantastic to talk with you and getting to do it on your podcast is, is even better. So I think I can speak for Tim as well. And I'd say, I feel like I learned quite a bit just preparing for this and going through it with you as well.
[00:29:26] Hugh Seaton: Awesome. Thank you guys.