Infraworks 360 is in the Autodesk AEC Collection http://www.autodesk.co.za/collections. Used in conjunction with Lumion it can give a very easy way to show context to video render.

Open the Infraworks model builder.

Zoom to the region in the world where the location is. Select the area of interest, give the model a name and then create the model.

One is advised that one will be alerted by email after the model has been created.

Close the model builder. When the email is received, open the model in Infraworks.

The model is processed.

The model after is has been processed.

Now write it out as a .FBX file.

Choose the settings as required and export.

Now import the .FBX into Lumion. Depending on the system that is running Lumion it may be found that the model is too large to handle. I run a NVIDIA GTX 950 M graphics card on my work laptop. I tried a 200 square kilometre (the maximum allowed) model which was exported as a 481 MB .FBX file that failed to load into Lumion. The model showed below is 24 square kilometres and results in an FBX file of 79 MB. It took about a minute to load.

While some of the buildings have been indicated (corresponding to the ones for which the GIS databases contain data), the model only contains some generic appearances for them. Other buildings will not have geometry created for them and only an indistinct (fuzzy) surface drape appears for them. While the vegetation surface drape is not in high resolution, it is nonetheless a remarkably realistic representation of what is already there, and this also applies to roads.

This also does not give a very high degree of accuracy, as can be seen when the ocean is switched on.

A separate model of a planned building can now be placed on the Infraworks model. However, the model cannot be used for terraforming using the Lumion tools. Plants and other models may be placed on the FBX surface.