A BIM-Centered Multi-Source Image Fusion Framework for Remote Client Site Visits

Clients need to visit project sites periodically during construction to visualize progress and identify deviations from expectations. However, physical site visits are time-consuming, costly, and potentially unsafe, especially for remote and overseas projects. More fundamentally, existing remote-site-visit solutions focus primarily on automatic recognition and visualization, while insufficiently addressing the scientific challenge of how heterogeneous, dynamic site data can be fused and operationalized to support timely, collaborative decision making. This research proposes a framework for clients’ remote site visits. It develops an RASE system that enables multi-source data fusion and real-time collaborative decision support by integrating UAVs, 360° cameras, BIM, and VR/AR technologies. RASE allows clients to synchronize real-world visual data with BIM models within predefined scenes, annotate issues directly on BIM components, and seamlessly switch among heterogeneous image-capture sources to maintain situational awareness in highly dynamic construction environments. The proposed framework emphasizes an operational data-fusion mechanism and an interaction paradigm that reduces the cognitive and coordination burdens of remote decision making. A case study shows that RASE reduces site-visit time by 78.0%, though initial equipment costs increase total expenses by 44.1%. Sensitivity analyses indicate that projects with greater remoteness or higher visit frequency significantly improve both time and cost effectiveness. The core contribution of RASE lies in enabling a scalable, operational data-fusion mechanism that supports collaboration for remote site visits, with the associated issues for the corresponding BIM components. Automatic image and voice recognition functionality may be incorporated with RASE to improve the efficiency of system control, textual input, and BIM association in the future.