{aF} Albert Fit
portrait

Hi, I am Albert.

I am a lead developer and principal surveyor at The Scan Station, a laser scanning, photogrammetry, aerial surveys, and robotics.

I joined The Scan Station as a surveyor and quickly found out that most of our clients were receiving drone and laser scanning data on an SSD. My focus turned towards creating a delivery system for the 3D point cloud data along with 360 imagery and ortho-photography. Broadly speaking Portal is a MERN (MongoDB, ExpressJS, ReactJS, and NodeJS) web app, hosted on AWS. 

I originally wrote Portal (www.site-portal.co.uk) as a pilot delivery system for one of our biggest projects: an extensive survey of the oil and gas fields in Southern Iraq. The requirement was simple: an online interactive platform with multiple users where point cloud and photogrammetry data can be shared across teams.

The initial pilot was a success and a version was created for Projects based in Britain. The Scan Station leveraged the online delivery platform alongside excellent field work to secure several contracts including a framework for survey and inspection at the Essar Stanlow refinery near Liverpool ( Essar Energy Transitions ). Portal started to be a line item in framework agreements and as such, more budget was allocated to its development. This enabled me to transition from working in the survey branch of the business to full-time software engineering. 

Our competitors have expressed interest in using our photogrammetry and delivery systems and as such I have started working on a cloud-based photogrammetry pipeline. I am learning Terraform which I am hoping to leverage to create a compute-optimized workflow for ingesting raw images and returning finished 3D point clouds.

To allow our competitors to use our platform, the database has to be re-designed. I am working with the MongoDB Python driver to translate the existing client data to a new schema, which is better optimized for the additional access control requirements.

Beyond the world of cloud engineering and full-stack applications, I also have a deep interest in Machine Learning. This interest was sparked when attending a day of the "Build your own GPT2.0" Arena 2.0 course at the Future House - Thank you Joseph Reeves for the opportunity. I would like to learn more about TensorFlow and TensorFlow TFX pipelines. 

Before my current position, I worked as an acoustic consultant at RSK, one of the world's fastest-growing environmental consultancies. 

There is something magical about observing natural objects, such as vibrating industrial equipment or a 50t piling rig. The physical vibration and noise can be captured and analyzed, and predictions can be made about future levels. These predictions help engineers make processes more efficient and ultimately improve the future. 

It is these types of observations that attracted me to my first graduate role as an acoustic consultant. My tenure in the role was an eye-opener to numerous industries across the UK and the incredible people that make these industries work. It was also the first time I had to work hard to sell my findings. Reporting, descriptive graphs and standardization are critical armaments in an acoustic consultant arsenal.

Hobbies

I love reading, helping others with technical work and researching tech. 

Some of my hobbies include:

  • Learning about machine learning and automation with Python;
  • Playing with Raspberry Pi;
  • CAD design;
  • 3D printing; 
  • Racing FPV Drones;
  • Bouldering; and
  • Tinkering and riding motorbikes.