After hearing from Jens Löfqvist at Ronneby, that a journalist writing for Sydöstran thought that a rendering they produced using a Cetopo model was in fact an aerial photograph, we were really excited to learn a bit more about how they use Cetopo.

Ronneby is a small Swedish municipality, which is expecting major population growth in the next few years due to rapid industrial growth in the defence and energy sector as well as Sweden’s upcoming NATO entry. Jens spoke to us about a few of their ongoing projects and how using Cetopo has impacted their workflow.

Ronneby’s spatial planning projects range massively in size from “really big areas like maybe 200 hundred hectares and down to the small scale planning like city blocks and in-fill projects.” of which there are often up to 40 ongoing. Most projects are visualised using Sketchup, and Jens told us that Cetopo’s native .skp files, and component trees ‘saves a lot of time’ particularly since they are a small municipality with limited resources. He also added that Cetopo’s relatively low price point allows them to ‘compete’ with larger municipalities who use advanced GIS systems.

For municipalities, it’s always really important to be able to easily communicate with residents, particularly when proposing new construction – and visual tools are often vital in clear communication.

“It also has been like a step up in quality and communications towards our citizens….. and politicians, they love it.”

Traditionally, public consultations involved presenting technical drawings, plans, elevations etc, which are not intuitive to read for most people, and texts which are, in Jens’ words ‘longer than the bible’ and full of legal jargon. For Ronneby, Cetopo has made it much easier for them to produce convincing imagery which sits alongside traditional material, making it much more accessible, and apparently massively reducing the number of complaints received!

“when you show something with quality, people have an easier time accepting it. I know the saying a picture speaks more than a thousand words is kind of cliche but using pictures and 3D-models makes it easier for our citizens to understand what we’re planning and to give us much needed feedback. The result is a better built environment for everyone.”

When asked to summarise his experience of using Cetopo, Jens told us that:

“the biggest thing we like about Cetopo is that you’re taking a pretty complex task and you made it simple to use in a few steps. In a few clicks you get something that will take a 3D artist a significantly longer time. You don’t have to have the technical skills to know everything about things like 3D rendering that to get a pretty decent model.” 

Thanks very much to Jens for taking the time to speak to us. It was really interesting to hear how Cetopo helps you, and learn about your ideas for our future development!