Two new videos on Autodesk Building Solutions Channel. The first one shows how to use features of 3DS Max to quickly add animated people to an animation of a Revit model. Nice!
This one is about updating linked Revit models in 3DS Max:
Category: Uncategorized
Read Zach’s post:
http://buildz.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/dynamo-052-daily-builds-rtc-and-more.html
Daily builds (unintentional pun?) of Dynamo are available for download at:
http://dyn-builds-pub.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/
Plug this into your RSS reader:
http://www.inoreader.com/stream/user/56667/tag/REVIT_FEEDS_RSS
I also burnt this feed to allow for easy subscribing (via email etc):
http://feeds.feedburner.com/Revit_feeds_rssInoreader
I previously had used a shared folder on Google Reader to aggregate all of this into one RSS via Feedburner (and then into PDF), but obviously that method is broken now.
Dare I say that I think that InoReader is going to be my Google Reader replacement…
Some other notes
Another way to view the Revit Feed reading list, check out:
http://www.feedspot.com/folder/4RTJsGUe
(this one will not be updated, as I think I’m going to go with InoReader, not Feedspot)
Another idea
I thought I had found a way to aggregate my Revit Feeds into one RSS for easy reading / viewing. Without getting into all the details, it uses a Yahoo Pipe to turn an OPML (containing many feeds) into one RSS feed, sorted by date. Here it is:
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.run?_id=70129693f6803988c7fe858f4fb9822b&_render=rss&opml=http%3A%2F%2Fanonanon.p4o.net%2Fpipelist.xml
In the end, the result is not very predictable or reliable…
This is the pipe:
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.info?_id=70129693f6803988c7fe858f4fb9822b
Revit deals in realities. The reality is, many Rooms are not rectangular. So we can forgive vanilla Revit for not having a built in tool or method that could only really ‘guess’ at X and Y room dimensions for irregularly shaped rooms.
There are two workarounds that I think can be useful:
- A Room Schedule that calculates X and Y dimensions for rectangular rooms only
- A Model Family with built in nested annotation labels that needs to be manually stretched and updated to the assumed X / Y dimensions of the Room. Just place the family and then adjust the grips.
I can’t take credit for the Calculation method. This uses a formula based on Perimeter and Area to establish calculated values for X and Y room dimensions in a Schedule. I downloaded an RVT back in 2008 that demonstrated this method — from … somewhere.
Similarly, I can’t really take credit for the Model Family with Annotation Labels idea for the family either. Daryl Gregoire posted it years ago in a series of videos, and it was mentioned in this post as well.
Download this file to see both methods in action. Be sure to review both the Floor Plan and the Schedules to see how it all works together.
I chose Casework because it has built in X, Y and Z parameters – meaning I did not have to use Shared Parameters. I control visibility by placing these Casework families on a secondary Design Option. You could actually use a standard Casework Tag instead of the built in annotation if you prefer. The Casework Schedule is filtered by Type Comments, and the other good thing about Casework is that we can Schedule the Room that the Model family lives in.
Feel free to comment, even if you think both methods are a bad BIM idea 😉
Strangely enough, I recently came across two different BOQ methodologies for Revit – one is an addin, another is a cloud based solution. This post is about the addin, called eVox, by Luca Vocella.
To be totally honest, I haven’t had much time to do a proper review of the addin. However, I was waiting for it to be available on Exchange before I posted about it. It is there now, at:
http://apps.exchange.autodesk.com/RVT/en/Detail/Index?id=appstore.exchange.autodesk.com%3aevoxbillofquantities%3aen
Luca is very interested in any feedback on comments you may have – feel free to post them here, and Luca will then improve the app according to your recommendations.
Further reading:
http://www.evoxelettronica.com/servizi/evox-bill-quantities-il-computo-metrico-estimativo-integrato-revit/
There is a lot of practical wisdom presented in this recent article by Gensler’s Jared Krieger.
He recommends against “BIM execution plans as long as 50 pages, with page after page of information and procedures.”
A few more interesting quotes:
discussion early on about which team members will be modeling which pieces of the building
where should the model be during the schematic design, design development, and construction document phases
setting up a duplicate workset with the consultants’ grids so they can be turned on and off as needed
On clashes:
concentrate on the areas where you know there are going to be problems. You can’t let the computer do everything. Good architects know where they need to focus their coordination efforts.
During team meetings:
only team members who are proficient in Revit get to drive the model
This one is sure to raise some eyebrows:
“Anything in a design that is smaller than two inches in size—such as wire, conduit, and pipe—should not be modeled, because small components can usually be worked around larger components on site”
Read the whole article:
http://www.bdcnetwork.com/my-bim-journey-%E2%80%93-6-lessons-bimvdc-expert
EDIT: This seems to be broken in 2014 at this point. Even if you have it working in 2013, when you open in 2014 it will “break”. I’m unsure if there is a good workaround yet…
Absolutely awesome workaround from Dave Light! He shows how to use an instance Shared Parameter to pass Keynote value via a Family formula to allow the tagging of Window Mark and Keynote in the same tag. Read the whole post here.
On a wider level, this method shows that you can formulaically reference System parameters (built in family parameters) and pass their value to a Shared Parameter to allowing tagging.
“As an alternative to controlling Revit tools and analysis features using the Options dialog > User Interface tab, you can define the DisciplineOption setting in the Revit.ini file.”
Use this link to access a calculator that provides you with the right value:
http://wikihelp.autodesk.com/Revit/enu/2014/Help/3663-BIM_Mana3663/3689-User_Int3689
Heads-up from Steve at:
Revit OpEd: User Interface Configuration Calculator
