In Microstation V8 they had Some tools called Earth tools to interact with Google Earth, although they were loaded separately. In the XM version they are integrated into Bentley Map (formerly Geographics) and are activated with "tools / google Earth"
Let's see what they serve:
First thing's first.
It is necessary to start assigning projection to the map, otherwise it will fall anywhere (this is only done by Bentley Map, not normal Microstation XM).
To assign projection is done:
- "settings / coordinate system"
- "master / edit"
- in my case I will choose UTM WGS84, Zone 16
- then "master / save"
The tools
Export to kmz / kml. The first icon is to export the file to kmz
Import Google Earth image. The second icon is to copy the image from Google Earth, it only works with a 3D seed file, but it is very practical because you bring the capture to Microstation and choose the ends of the image that you are importing and you already have your georeferenced image (more or less ).
Create point elements for Google Earth. this is for that ...
Synchronize with Google Earth. This is done with the following two buttons, the first one makes Google Earth focus on the view we have on the map, very practical to capture the image and then georeference it; the following is to do the reverse, bring the map view to the display that Google has.
Set properties. With this a panel is displayed to configure which version of Google Earth we want to export (3 or 4), also transparency, if we want to send only the visible levels, that convert line styles and if we want to take the images that are reference.
Additionally the option to immediately open the file in Google Earth.
Below are some render settings, elevation of 3D models, terrain and other herbs.
Animation. The last button is to run an animation saved in Google Earth ... those things I guess.
This is the initial map in Microstation
This is the map exported to Google Earth
These post explain how this is done with Manifold GIS and with AutoCAD