The Joyce Avenue Water Storage Tank is located on the east side of the City of Columbus. The tank was originally fabricated and painted in 1996. A student from the Columbus College of Art & Design painted it after winning a contest held by the City to create an imaginative mural on the storage tank.

The Joyce Avenue Tank was named the Steel Tank Institute Tank of the Year the same year it was fabricated and originally painted. Each year, the Steel Tank Institute recognized tanks which best represent the advantages and flexibility of steel construction.

The Joyce Avenue Water Storage Tank was originally constructed with an intricate mural painted on the exterior finish. Due to weathering and age deterioration, the city wanted to revitalize and recreate the original mural. An imaginative method was needed to efficiently capture the existing mural for recreation.

Using a Faro 3D Laser Scanner and DJI Inspire 2 Drone (unmanned aerial system) the team captured the existing mural. This equipment enabled the team to capture the existing mural in a 3D point cloud. This data was processed using Pix4D software and Revit to create a 3D model. From the 3D model, a plan set was created for the painting contractor to follow. The plan set featured several views and gridlines to orient the spatial location of each component of the mural. The water tower was laid out like a globe to represent the curved shape of the water tower on a linear plan set.

These 3D scanning, drone, and rendering services lead the way for an efficient and successful revitalization of one of the city’s landmark storage tanks.