Guest on 2D Is Against My Religion
Rami Tamimi
Geomatics project manager and Ph.D. candidate, WSP
LinkedIn ↗Rami Tamimi is a surveyor, geomatics project manager, Ph.D. candidate and educator. On 2DIAMR, Rami Tamimi talked about the surveying workforce crisis, AI in fieldwork and when you need a licensed surveyor.
Episode
1 h 33 minIn Rami’s words
“Anybody can scan, anybody can fly a drone, and anybody can run a GPS, and anybody can run a total station. It's do you know what you're doing?”
“Point clouds are useless unless you know what to do with them.”
“If it's not a legal survey or a certificate of survey, it's a sketch.”
Quoted in our tech guides
Will AI and robots replace 3D scanning operators and surveyors? What 9 practitioners say →
- “It hurts that population of folks that are basically laboring.”▶ 6:12
- “The human element is still gonna be there 'cause we need to check it and make sure that it's correct and sign off on it, and we're not gonna sign off on something that we haven't looked at or understood.”▶ 5:37
- “The average age of a professional surveyor, at least in the United States, is 57 years old.”▶ 0:24
- “Maybe you don't have to become a professional surveyor, but at least be able to do quality control and quality assurance work so that you can preserve your worth.”▶ 6:50
How to sell 3D scanning and digital twins to clients: what 11 practitioners say →
- “If you give them what they see in their raw data file and you say, 'Here you go. Here's your deliverable,' guess what? You just made it very easy, very seamless. They may not even realize that this data's coming from a point cloud.”▶ 51:48
Is a 3D scan a digital twin? What 9 practitioners say →
- “You don't need the highest level of accuracy. You're not trying to design anything.”▶ 56:14
Do you need a licensed surveyor for 3D scanning? What 8 practitioners say →
- “I genuinely believe that if you are not getting involved with boundaries, with legal documentation, with construction design, you don't need a licensed surveyor, right?”▶ 54:42
- “What we always say, if it's not a legal survey or a certificate of survey, it's a sketch. You are making a sketch.”▶ 55:28
- “The city's gonna require a professional surveyor to sign off on a certified boundary survey. Now we're getting into more legal work. Now you need a surveyor.”▶ 56:37
- “That doesn't mean you can't get involved with the project. It just means that you need to have a professional surveyor involved in the project.”▶ 57:01
- “You have different accuracy standards for different types of deliverables.”▶ 56:26
- “Why would I introduce something that has less quality to something that is more accuracy? Unless I need that absolute accuracy.”▶ 64:11
- “We're always gonna need control to check our work. We just don't need as much.”▶ 62:00
- “Point clouds are useless unless you know what to do with them.”▶ 47:40
- “They don't care about the coordinates themselves. They care about the rotation and the basis of bearings.”▶ 51:09
- “Maybe it's as small as just getting your Part 107, which is the FAA regulated drones pilot license.”▶ 7:51
SLAM vs terrestrial laser scanning: what 8 practitioners say →
- “It is a relatively compounding error. The more you use it, the longer you go, the more error will accumulate.”▶ 67:14
- “There are a lot of applications where just it doesn't make sense to have terrestrial scanners set up. It's just a slower workflow.”▶ 66:35
- “We're always gonna need control to check our work. We just don't need as much.”▶ 62:00
- “TLS will still dominate.”▶ 66:29
Questions Rami answered
- Will AI replace land surveyors?
- Rami Tamimi expects AI to complement surveyors – extracting features from geospatial data and helping with legal descriptions – while a professional still checks and signs off; field technicians who only push buttons need to level up to quality control. ▶ 4:41
- What is the difference between surveying and geomatics?
- Per Rami Tamimi, the term geomatics appeared as geodesy, satellite positioning and remote sensing entered surveying; Rami sees it as a more modern version of land surveying and partly a marketing term that signals modern technology. ▶ 35:20
- Do you need a licensed surveyor for 3D laser scanning or reality capture?
- In the US, Rami Tamimi says no, unless the work involves boundaries, legal documents or construction design, such as a certified boundary survey or an ALTA survey; then a professional surveyor must be involved, though others can still collect the data. ▶ 54:40
- Do you still need survey control for terrestrial laser scanning?
- Rami Tamimi says control minimizes errors outside the operator’s control or serves as checkpoints; as sensors improve, ASPRS has loosened its accuracy standards, so less control is needed – but never none – and how you fit it depends on the deliverable. ▶ 59:12
- Is SLAM accurate enough for surveying?
- Per Rami Tamimi, TLS will still dominate: SLAM trajectory error accumulates over time, which is fine for mapping a tunnel, ideally tied to RTK points at the start and end; survey-grade data underground still needs total-station control and a terrestrial scanner. ▶ 66:26
Talks about
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