Encoding 64 bit Walkthroughs (4 GB limit, AVI corruption)

Luke Johnson

Update: check out this page for the 64-bit Xvid codec

I encountered a problem today related to walkthrough creation in Revit 2010 64 bit with Vista 64 bit. I was exporting a large walkthrough to uncompressed AVI format, and the file size would reach 4.00 GB (4,294,967,296 bytes), and then corruption of the AVI would result. It appears that a 4 GB limit was being imposed at some point in the walkthrough creation process.

Therefore, I tried to use an encoding format. When using Revit 32 bit, I recall that I had a number of options in the Video Compression ‘codec’ dialog when exporting a walkthrough. However, in Revit 64 bit, I only had a couple of basic options (Microsoft Video 1, Intel IYUV Codec, Full Frames (uncompressed)).

After some searching, and trialling a few different ideas, I found that I could access some decent codecs in this box after installing Shark007’s 64 bit components (link below).

64 bit Encoding Components

In addition to the above, it is recommended that you install Shark007’s 32 bit Codec Pack (link below):
Vista Codec Package 5.5.3 Final

After installing both of the above and restarting Revit (you may also need to restart Windows), I was intermittently able to access an additional filter in the dialog called ‘ffdshow’ – clicking ‘Configure’ opened up a whole range of encoding formats for use!However, there appear to be a few problems:

  1. The ‘ffdshow Video Codec’ encoder only appeared in the Video Compression dialog when a certain ‘Size Crop’ and resolution were selected. For me, the only settings that consistently seemed to work were: Size Crop width = 150 mm, and export resolution 886 x 500.
  2. The corruption still seemed to result if the uncompressed AVI format would have exceed 4 GB (even while using a compressed codec).
  3. Choosing H264 actually crashed Revit.
  4. WMV 8 using libavcodec simply did not proceed past the first frame.

Given the above limitations, my solution at this point is:

  1. Split the walkthrough into parts that have a size less than 4 GB (ie. part 1 = frames 1 to 100, part 2 = frames 101 to 200 etc) and use FULL FRAMES (UNCOMPRESSED) AVI format.
  2. Use VirtualDubMod to ‘append’ these segments together, and
  3. Use VirtualDubMod to ‘Save As…’ a different format. I was able to choose ‘Cinepak’ compression in VirtualDubMod, which turned my approx 5.4 GB uncompressed AVI into a 167 MB file in only about 5 mins of processing time.

After spending quite a few hours trying to make this work in a satisfactory and simple manner, I decided to contact our reseller and lodge a support call. I will let you know if I learn anything helpful.During this investigation, I tried a few things without success. They may be of interest to you (see links below).

Windows Media Encoder 64 bit

Xvid 64 bit

x264 64 bit

osun.org – Search Engine for PDF DOC PPT !

Luke Johnson

Just came across this search engine for PDF, DOC and PPT files. It is called http://www.osun.org/

http://lumion3d.com/

For example, lets say you wanted to see what PDF files are available that include the words ‘ revit families’. Have a look at the results by following the link below:
http://www.osun.org/revit+families-pdf.html

This could be a very useful site for quickly searching for quality data. If Google can’t find what you are after, give this site a go.

Revit 2011 New Features (???)

Luke Johnson

I’ll be the first to admit that the subject of this post was intended to stimulate your interest – but in my defense I did include question marks!

Have a look at this link, and see if you can make sense of it:
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=zh-CN&u=http://bbs.beiweihy.com.cn/viewthread.php%3Ftid%3D12666%26from%3Dindexfeeds&ei=UfhMS4vDENCTkAW7poyXDQ&sa=X&oi=translate&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CBcQ7gEwBDgK&prev=/search%3Fq%3Drevit%2B2011%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-au%26sa%3DN%26tbo%3Dp%26start%3D10%26tbs%3Dqdr:w

Any comments?

OEM Vista Activation Backup and Restore (clean installation)

Luke Johnson

I had to format and re-install Vista on a laptop over the holiday break. Given that it was an OEM version, and the original disks were not available, I was faced with a bit of a conundrum. How will I restore the activation data without having to contact Microsoft?

Perhaps you have faced a similar problem. Often, OEM installation media is packed with software you don’t need, and it only serves to slow down your PC right from the get-go. However, you can install Vista using standard installation media, and then ‘backup and restore’ the Vista activation data. This way, you are starting with a truly ‘clean’ system. Of course, you will then need to download and install all the necessary drivers for your system.

Before starting the process, I backed up the activation data using the software at the link below. After obtaining some installation media, I installed Vista without providing any product keys (you should be able to do this with any retail Vista media). Then, I restored the activation data. It worked perfectly.

You can download the activation backup and restore utility at http://directedge.us/content/abr-activation-backup-and-restore

You can find a pretty good guide to re-installing a clean system at http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=120228

2009 and Beyond | Revisiting the Report on Integrated Practice (Repost)

Luke Johnson

Check out the following page to revisit the report. You can download interviews in mp3 format to listen to at your leisure.

In essence: “One of AIA’s 2009 Integrated Practice Discussion Group’s (IPDiG) projects involves revisiting the “Report on Integrated Practice” released during the 2006 AIA National Convention in Los Angeles…”

Thanks to Eddy Krygiel at ArchTech.

FREE RevitTV.com Paint for Revit 2010 – Beta

Luke Johnson

RevitTV.com are offering a free ‘Paint’ plugin for Revit 2010.

The features are:

  • Import and automatically create Revit paint materials from existing AutoCAD Color Book (.acb) files.
  • Search and filter hundreds of Revit paint materials by colour name.
  • Manage hundreds of manufacturers paint materials in Revit with ease, including Resene and Sherwin-Williams.

    • RevitTV.com Paint for Revit 2010 – Beta (download page)
    RTV Paint ver 2010 – Windows 32 bit Installer
    RTV Paint ver 2010 – Windows 64 bit Installer, coming soon…

    Search by Sketch

    Luke Johnson

    I had this great idea this morning – why can’t we do a ‘search by sketch’ of images or other data?

    In other words, you draw a small sketch of something, and then the search engine returns results that are similar to or related to that sketch.

    First I thought ‘quick, I better blog about this, before someone else does!’, but then I thought, ‘I better see if this exists yet…’

    And, it does. Have a look at retrievr. I did not have great results when trying this out, as it is ‘experimental’.

    If you want to search through some 3D models using a 2D sketch and keywords, have a look at Princeton 3D Model Search Engine.

    There is a paper written on the subject. It is called 3D content-based search using sketches.

    The next logical question is – is there some software that I can download that can perform this search on my own images?

    Check out the vid below:

    For more information, check out http://www.chrisharrison.net/projects/searchbysketch/index.html.

    I foresee a time (in the not too distant future) when a full blown image search engine will be available, that takes either a sketch or uploaded image as input, and returns a list of images in order of similarity. Perhaps you can also specify a ‘tolerance’ value, that filters out the least similar and simply does not show them.

    If you know of any technology or software similar to this, please comment.

    View Ranges (and TOLERANCES) Explained *REPOST*

    Luke Johnson

    There is a great video on View Range by Paul Aubin at the link below here: http://www.screencast.com/t/eCJaIgaevE

    It is very well explained and I learned some things I had no idea about, like the ‘tolerances’ associated with various elements when using View Range. After using Revit for so long, I’m surprised this piece of important information had ‘slipped through’! I did some searching, and these tolerances are listed in the Revit online help at this link and hinted at in the support information here.

    For your convenience, I have copied the information from the Revit help page below:
    Additional View Range Rules

    • Model elements located outside of the view range generally are not shown in the view. The exceptions are floors, stairs, ramps, and components that stay or are mounted on the floor (like furniture). These are shown even when slightly below the view range. In addition, fascia, gutters, and edge slabs are shown when their bottoms are within a tolerance of the primary view range bottom.
      Floors located outside the view range use an adjusted range that is 4 feet (approximately 1.22 meters) below the bottom of the primary range. Floors are drawn with the Beyond line style if the floor exists within this adjusted range.
    • Elements that are strictly below the cut plane, but are at least partially within the view range, are shown as viewed from above. Components display according to Family Element Visibility Settings for Plan/RCP. See Managing Family Visibility and Detail Level
    • Walls shorter than 6 feet (approximately 1.83 meters) are not cut, even if they intersect the cut plane.
      The 6 feet are measured from the top of the bounding box to the bottom of the primary view range. For example, if you create a wall with a sloped top face, when the top of the wall is 6 feet away from the bottom of the primary view range, the wall is cut at the cut plane. When the top of the wall is less than 6 feet, the entire wall shows as projection even where it intersects the cut plane. This behavior always occurs when the Top Constraint property for the wall is specified as Unconnected.
    • There are a few categories for which an element located above the cut plane but partially below the top clip is shown in plan. These categories include windows, casework, and generic model. These objects are shown as viewed from above.
    • Visibility in RCP views is similar to plan views with the exception that objects are presented as viewed from below and mirrored.

    You can view Paul Aubin’s site at:
    http://paulaubin.com/lrt/

    I received the information about the screencast from Fear and Loathing in a CAD vs BIM World at http://cad-vs-bim.blogspot.com/2009/12/view-ranges-explained.html