Carlson Software offers a full suite of commands for downloading, entering, and processing field survey data and for generating final plats and drawings. Carlson Software can function as a total and complete software solution for the land surveying firm, or as an affordable downloading, calculation, and preparatory solution used in conjunction with the more full-featured Carlson Software. Built around the Autodesk 2007 OEM graphics engine, Carlson Software reads and writes standard AutoCAD drawings and assures familiarity to AutoCAD trained staff.
The power of Carlson Survey begins with data collection. Carlson Survey downloads all major collectors ranging from Geodimeter and TDS to Leica, Nikon, Sokkia, and SMI. The raw data is stored in “RW5” format and can be viewed, edited and processed. The processing, or calculation of coordinates, recognizes “direct and reverse” and other forms of multiple measurement, and processes sets of field measurements. Surveys can be balanced and closed by selective use of angle balance, compass, transit, Crandall, and least squares methods—or simply by direct calculation with no adjustment. Commands exist for finding bad angles and for plotting the traverse and sideshot legs of the survey in distinct colors as a means of searching for “busts” or errors. In addition to downloading of data from electronic data collectors, the program accepts manual entry of field notes directly into a spreadsheet format, permitting review, storage, and editing. Alternatively, field notes can be entered for immediate calculation and screen plotting of points, with the “raw notes” stored simultaneously, permitting re-processing and re-calculation as needed. For data that was not field-surveyed, but was provided in the form of an ASCII or binary point file, Carlson Software offers the “Import Text/ASCII File” command, unrivaled in its flexibility to read foreign data sources.
The survey world is recognizing the power of coding field shots with descriptions that lead to automatic layering, linework, and symbol work. Office drafting time can be reduced by 50% or more with intelligent use of descriptions, leading to “field to finish” plotting. For example, breaklines, which act as barriers to triangulation, should be placed on streams, ridges, toe-of-slopes and top-of-banks for more accurate contouring. With the field to finish command, breaklines can be created by field coding, with descriptions such as DL, for creating 3D polyline ditch lines, or TB for creating top-of-bank polylines, etc. and this coordinate data can be simply plotted to the screen as undifferentiated points. However, with the field to finish command, the data can be plotted in one step, creating 3D polyline break lines, building lines, light poles, manholes, edge-of-pavements, that are all distinctly layered and fully annotated. The field to finish command within Carlson Survey is extremely robust, so much so that it can adapt to a coding system made up on-the-fly, or a coding system that has been received from an outsourced survey. Field crew coding and office processing using the field to finish command can save valuable hours of drafting and eliminate misinterpretations, paving the way for quick plat generation or supporting supplemental engineering work.
Carlson Survey allows you to enter old deeds and plot the linework, then add bearing and distance annotation optionally. Distances can be entered in meters and feet, and even in the old measurement forms of chains, poles, links, and varas. Both tangent and non-tangent arcs can be entered. Closures, distances traversed, and areas are automatically reported. Working in reverse, the command Legal Description creates a property description suitable for deed recording directly from a closed polyline on the screen. If that polyline has point numbers with descriptions at any of the property corners, these descriptions will appear in the deed report, as in “…thence N 45 degrees, 25 minutes, 10 seconds E to a fence post…”. Deed files can be saved, re-loaded, edited, re-drawn and printed or plotted to the screen in a report form.
Carlson Software offers approximately 150 different symbols and north arrows, broken down by categories (for example, points, trees, map symbols). You can create new categories or supplement or change the available point symbols within any category. The program is designed to receive entire sets of new, customized point symbols in a single command. Attributes of points, such as elevation and point number, can be selectively “frozen,” allowing the creation of final plats with symbols and optional descriptions remaining on points, as desired. Linework, typically in the form of polylines, can be drawn by any combination of point number and “snap” selection, to create property lines, street lines, easements and right-of-ways, building lines and borders. In addition to Carlson Software’s standard line types, dozens of special line types are available, including tree lines, fence lines, all manner of utility lines, stonewalls, and customizable line types. Design features include automatic street intersections and cul-de-sacs, and automatic lot layout. For lots, you can pick your right-of-way and back property polylines, specify desired acreages and frontage/rear lot parameters, and the lots are automatically calculated and drawn. Hinged Area, Sliding Side Area, and Area Radial from Curve are excellent design tools, with an easy, graphic interface. All design polylines can be converted to point numbers at vertices and radius points for purposes of field stakeout.
With a full slate of annotation commands, Carlson Survey is all you need to finalize your boundary surveys and plats. There is a wide range of bearing and distance annotation options, including the Auto-Annotate command, which allows you to annotate an entire selection set of polylines in one step. Station and offset annotating, as for right-of-way lines, is provided. Use commands such as Special Leader, Station Polyline, Draw North Arrow, and Draw Bar Scale to dress up the drawing and give it a hand-drafted look. Commands such as Title Block and Draw Legend, as well as sequential lot numbering and the area labeling commands, help you complete the finished drawing quickly.
Carlson Software contains many strong utilities, particularly polyline utilities. You can Join Nearest disconnected polylines, turn 2-sided figures into closed, 4-sided figures, offset, trim, and extend 3D polylines, create building “footprints” with left and right entries using Extend by Distance, even reverse polyline directions. There are over 20 significant polyline utilities available, including Reduce Vertices, which weeds out duplicate or unnecessary vertices and cuts down on drawing size. Boundary Polyline is a simplified version of the AutoCAD command Boundary, and its opposite, Shrinkwrap Entity. Other categories of utilities include point attribute editing, scaling, twisting and re-sizing, text editing, font alteration and re-sizing, and advanced layer manipulation. Raster images such as aerial photos and scanned images can be placed on drawings.
There are many higher order features in Carlson Survey. Full contouring is provided, with options for smoothing and labeling contours, highlighting index contours and clipping contours to selected perimeters. Carlson Survey can be used to create both grid files and TIN files (.flt format). Volumes can be computed between grid files, inside any selected polyline perimeter. Profiles can be extracted from contour maps or hand-entered, as generic “point-to-point” profiles or as road profiles with vertical curves. The Design Pad Template command carves in building pads, pits, parking lots, roads, and other 3D features into any existing terrain. Land forms created by contouring and Design Pad Template can be viewed in 3D and rotated in real time, using the 3D Viewer Window command. In addition to all the commands needed to create final drawings, Carlson Survey also contains commands to perform many engineering tasks typically encountered by survey firms.
Carlson Software is the ideal stand-alone solution for the survey and drafting organization, but it is also the perfect go-between product for the large civil engineering firm with in-house or outsourced survey operations. It compliments Carlson Roads. Carlson Survey enables Carlson Software to serve the full spectrum of the surveying and civil engineering design world.