Revit Live: Explore Your Model

Transform your Revit models into interactive visualizations you can step into and explore with Revit Live! 

This cloud-based software allows you to move around your model, from outside to in, up and down stairs, and through doors that open when you approach them. You can also easily explore the model from any height; view it from the perspective of a toddler or wheelchair user. It even comes with options to control the time of year and day, giving you a good idea of how your structure will appear in different light and weather conditions.

It’s easy to convert your Revit files into Revit Live. Simply create a 3D view that contains the things you want to see in Live. Click a button, and all your content is carried over, including materials, lights, and Rich Photorealistic Content (RPC) Families – no need to rework anything. Your terrain model will be extended to the horizon to produce a robust 3D landscape. Then it’s easy to move around and present with the simple click and drag method and by using the mouse wheel.

One of the most promising features of Revit Live is non-Revit users can really get a feel for your design without owning Autodesk Revit Software. All they need to do is download a free 30-day trial of Revit Live.

Options for exposure control and animations are available in Stingray – but I will save that for a later post.

For now, check out the accompanying video to this post to see Revit Live in action. 

For more information on the software solutions, training, and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

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Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise, and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after university curriculum developer, instructor, and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions, and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings, and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

Mass Models: Two alternate Energy Analysis Model Studies

This post was updated on March 29, 2017, and is part-one of a four-part series on Energy Analysis Modeling.

Suppose you have two alternate building design options, both created using masses, and you want to evaluate and compare the energy performance of your designs. Well, I have good news for you; you can create two energy analysis model (EAM) studies in Revit, in about 5 minutes.

And, if you're working in Revit 2017, you have access to Insight 360, which lets you see the building's performance overall (EUI) in addition to the specific impact of various design factors, such as a range of alternate insulation values or wall/window ratio. 

The goal of this post is to help you establish an energy efficient direction for the design at a conceptual stage. We will go in depth with Revit building elements and things like the thermal properties of materials later in this four-part series. 

To start, I want to focus exclusively on managing thermal conceptual values applied to various mass surfaces and generalized energy loading according to building type. For example, the weather station data is specific to the building's location and the study factors in the surrounding context.

All classroom activities on the ground level

Classroom activities stacked

When using masses for your energy analysis model you will be asked to select values from a compact dialog that assigns your design assumptions. These can be values related to:

• Energy loads such as occupancy (i.e., office, school, or residential)
• Geographic location and a local weather file
• Percentage of glazing on surfaces
• Thermal conductivity of the masses faces (i.e., Walls, Floors, Glazing, and Roofs)

This process will enable you to compare the energy performance of both of your designs and select the one that works best for you.

Once you have decided on the best design option, you can refine the masses by adjusting values per surface or by assigning occupancy per mass zone - I will explore this workflow later in the series. For now, watch my video, Revit: Energy Model Studies and Insight 360, and let’s see which building design option makes most sense, purely from the energy use point of view.

Don't forget to stay tuned for parts two through four of this series, where I will be covering Mass Overrides for Surfaces and Zones, Building Elements with Masses, and Building Elements and Material Thermal Properties.

For more information on the software solutions, training, and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

---

Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise, and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after university curriculum developer, instructor, and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions, and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings, and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

Revit or FormIt for Massing?

Revit and FormIt each have strengths and weaknesses when it comes to Massing. As an AEC Specialist at Ideate, I am deeply familiar with both. Here I highlight the differences and provide examples of how you can get the best of both worlds by using them together.

Revit lets you use parameters and organic forms in creating masses. However, it is not very intuitive when it comes to creating families. It requires a plan for content creation and someone with advanced skills in Family creation.

FormIt 360, on the other hand, is very intuitive and easy to use, but has no parameters to drive content form. It does create forms categorized as “masses.” FormIt files (*AXM) can be converted to Revit files and the default “masses” can be used for energy analysis and By-Face creation of Revit elements.

These two products can also work together, giving you the benefit of intuitive modeling in FormIt, and the ability to swap FormIt forms, or “masses,” for true organic masses in Revit, when needed.

Revit masses representing activities can be assembled to create a school proposal.

FormIt Groups can be easily modeled to create forms categorized as masses and convertible to a Revit mass in Revit. FormIt 360 Pro is a product in development so its features are evolving day-by-day.

A FormIt Group is used to pass changes along in a project file and to separate components. It is like a Family (Revit), Block (AutoCAD), Component (Sketchup), and a Cell (Microstation), but is editable inside of the project file.

While intuitive, FormIt also involves some planning around controlling visibility, managing groups, creating content as separate AXM files, working with Materials and Scenes, and more. Reviewing an application’s features is not enough. You need to understand how best to apply those features.

Watch my video, Revit or FormIt for Massing?, for a demonstration on how both products can be used together to leverage their strengths, as outlined below.

Revit:
+ Data rich (parameters)
+ Parametrically driven
+ True Organic Forms

FormIt:
+ Intuitive modeling
+ Familiar functionality (Sketchup)
+ Interoperability with Revit

For more information on the software solutions, training, and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

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Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise, and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after university curriculum developer, instructor, and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions, and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings, and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

Managing the Revit Project Browser: View Usage

The Revit Project Browser lets you navigate between project views. When the Project Browser has many views, it can be hard to find the one you want. The good news is there is an option to sort the browser and impose order according to parameter. While default options include sorting by File Type, Discipline, Not on Sheets, Phase, or a combination of these, most people think of View Usage as a good way to sort and arrange the views.

If you add a View Usage parameter, values for view function can be added to the View Properties. This means views can subsequently be sorted using these values. You can isolate View Usage in the Browser for several things, including:

• CD - Construction documentation
• EXPORT - Export to other products such as 3ds Max, Navisworks, BIM Glue, or Autodesk Live
• MODELING - Working or modeling views, not going onto a sheet
• PRESENTATION - Presentation views to explain the model, but not on a sheet
• PRINTING - Views to be printed as posters, not placed on a sheet
• RENDERING - Rendering 3D views to produce images that will go onto a sheet

Project Browser sorted for View Usage

A View List can be used to manage these views in the project and to maintain project standards such as View Usage or designation of View Templates. This will allow you to control what is visible in these views and how they look graphically.

Manage Project Standards

With the Project Browser sorted by View Usage, it is, for example, clearer to everyone on the team which views they should working/modeling in and which managed views are reporting on the model and will be part of the construction document set. The result? Better communication all ‘round!

To see this workflow in action, please watch the accompanying video to this post.

For more information on the software solutions, training, and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

---

Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise, and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after university curriculum developer, instructor, and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions, and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings, and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

Interoperability: Image Sequences for Easy Editing

Did you know can create and save a sequence of images from 3ds Max as a single file (AVI or MOV)?

By combining the best features from Revit and 3ds Max it is possible to edit specific frames (images) within a movie. From Revit we get the required, linked building elements with their materials, and from 3ds Max we get the ability to render a sequence of PNG files. This workflow saves us the trouble of having to re-rendering the whole movie, say after removing reflecting materials, or making other edits.

In this video tutorial, Interoperability: Image Sequencing for Easy Editing, only the first 40 images of a 900 image sequence needed to be fixed. The first sequence had a reflective paver material that took 40 minutes to render in one frame. The second, “fixed,” sequence used a matte material that took about 20 minutes to render in one frame.

First Sequence with relective paver material

Second, fixed, sequence with matte paver material

The building used for this example is a proposed prefabricated house, designed by Lt. Russell M. Amdal and featured in Art and Architecture Case Studies, 1945.

For more information on the software solutions, training and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

---

Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after University Curriculum developer, instructor and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

Interoperability: Animated 3d Studio Max AEC Objects and Revit Models

Only a camera can be animated within Revit, but we often need opening doors, windows or other animated objects in a presentation. This workflow shows how we can reuse our Revit model, minus doors, plants and people, and add animatable objects from 3d Studio Max. The model we will be using as an example is a prefabricated house as proposed by Lt. Russell M. Amdal, Art and Architecture Case Studies, 1945. 

By combining the best features of both products we get, from Revit, the majority of the required building elements, and the AEC objects from within 3d Studio Max. We can use their parametric properties to animate them – such as the angled opening of the door.

This example shows a 3d Studio Max pivot door in the door opening that can be animated.

For a close-up look at this workflow, watch my video Interoperability: Animated 3d Studio Max AEC Objects and Revit Models.

Thank you for reading. For more information on the software solutions, training and consulting Ideate provides, please visit the Ideate Inc. website.

---

Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after University Curriculum developer, instructor and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

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Model In-Place: Prefabricated Non-Planar Building Modules

A Component Model in-Place workflow is typically touted as a one-off solution for when you have a custom situation in a project, not addressed by system or loadable families, such as a curved roof or ceiling or a serpentine wall – but what if the built-in solution repeats?

The scenario covered here is for a repeatable prefabricated, modular unit, as initially explored by Eileen Gray in her Maison Elliptique (1936), where three or four prefabricated modules are combined to make a home. 

Revit lets you create an in-place family for the required categories (Roof with Ceiling) but editing them can be problematic because each copied in-place family – unlike normal Revit families – is unique. Objects created belong to the datum objects (reference plane) they are created on. This makes it difficult to edit a copied in-place family. 

A solution is to create a Group from the in-place family for copying and then to ungroup them for unique editing. 

Two Modules With Opening

The in-place families can be grouped, copied, ungrouped and edited to add more modules. 

Four Modules With Opening

For more detail on how to group and upgroup families for editing, watch my video Model In-Place: Prefabricated non-planar building modules.

For information on training and consulting for the various products Ideate services, visit our website. Also check our blog for continued solutions as we encounter them.

---

Jim Cowan

AEC Senior Application Specialist

Jim Cowan’s extensive AEC design industry experience, Autodesk design solutions expertise and status as an Autodesk Certified Instructor have made him a sought after University Curriculum developer, instructor and presenter. Jim’s areas of expertise include eLearning, interoperability between solutions and overcoming barriers to the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM). Educated in Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art/Heriot–Watt University and in Landscape Architecture at the University of Manitoba, Jim has a special focus on sustainability issues: daylight analysis, sun studies, lighting analysis, modeling buildings and conceptual energy modeling (models with shading devices). You can learn more from Jim on his YouTube Channel.

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Each class is designed to give you specific, improved results in a particular topic. You can interact with the instructor right from your own office, while eliminating travel time. Because the class schedule rotates, you can easily select your topics of interest and choose the day which best meets your schedule.

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Each class is designed to give you specific, improved results in a particular topic. You can interact with the instructor right from your own office, while eliminating travel time. Because the class schedule rotates, you can easily select your topics of interest and choose the day which best meets your schedule.

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