Can't Stop Talking About Project Neon

Ask anyone here in the Ideate Portland office what my favorite Autodesk Labs project is right now and hands down they’ll reply, “Project Neon!” Before we get into why Project Neon is one of the best Labs projects out there, let me first explain Autodesk Labs.

Autodesk Labs relies on user feedback to develop innovative product ideas and technologies at a conceptual level. Although they specifically state they are not a beta community, it is a community, where you can explore potential commercially relevant technologies, whether you’re in architecture, engineering, manufacturing, or media and entertainment. Some of my other favorites include:

• Project Photofly Create 3D models from photographs taken by a digital camera
• Project Galileo Conceptual design tool for infrastructure projects
• Shape Extraction for AutoCAD Convert point clouds to geometry

These are only several from a long list of interesting technologies available. Take a look here.

On to Project Neon
Project Neon is a cloud rendering service for Revit. Rendering has always been a time and hardware intensive process, and required a pretty “beefy” machine and hours (if not days) to render out detailed scenes, but not anymore. Project Neon leverages cloud computing and an “outside” render farm to quickly produce high quality renders of your Revit 3D views. This frees up your machine from having to push out the render and production work can continue.

Once installed an configured Project Neon will show up under the Web Services tab on the ribbon in Revit 2012.

Open a project with a 3D View and click Render Online. Next choose which view should be rendered, the quality level, image size, and file format (jpeg, png, tiff, etc.). I recommend keeping the “Notify me by email when complete” box checked. When finished click Start Rendering.

In the Autodesk Online Services field in the upper right hand corner you’ll see a little indicator showing the render in progress.

Now you’re free to continue working within Revit and not lose valuable time. You can see how Project Neon would be extremely helpful for presentation renders like accurate material representations, lighting analysis, etc. where you can send scene after scene for comparisons.

Depending on the quality of render and image size; within minutes you’ll be notified by an email when the render job is complete. I highly recommend checking Project Neon out. As long as this project is available I’ll never use my machine to render out scenes it takes too much time.

Take advantage of Project Neon, as of right now the project will be around until late September 2011. Let’s hope they keep it up longer.

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Derek Wielkopolski
Technical Support Manager/Application Specialist
Derek holds a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Roger Williams University, Rhode Island. He is experienced working within the AEC industry from concept design through construction administration for both small and large scale projects. As Ideate’s Support Manager he ensures a timely and quality response to support requests and questions. Follow Derek on Twitter: @dwielk

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Ballad of the Note Block

Keynotes, as defined by Revit, can be a wonderful tool. The premise behind Revit keynotes is that you have a database of notes (text) that correspond to a key (number) and that you can place the keynote via a Tag onto your views and then have a Keynote Legend display both the keynote and the related text. This simple concept makes it easy for the Specifier or Project Manager to easily control the contractual language within your construction documents.

While many of our customers have implemented Revit Keynotes with a high degree of success we also hear many complaints about the rigidness of this tool (it’s difficult to edit the text values - which is also why it’s so valuable!).  In some cases the use of Generic Annotation objects (a.k.a. the “dumb” tag) along with a Note Block is a more appropriate solution for the task at hand. Yes, the Note Block is blog-worthy, and it’s time it had its due!

A Revit Note Block is similar to a Schedule entity though it reports on Generic Annotation objects, which are often referred to as Symbols. The most common usage of this would be for Demolition Notes. Other diverse uses include Signage Plans, Piping and Electrical Control diagrams, Renovation Notes, and requirement lists such as the CalGreen Mandatory Requirements Checklist. As many of our California-area customers have experienced the requirement to document the location within the sheetset of each CalGreen requirement presents an interesting Revit conundrum. The Note Block is a perfect way to manage this type of task.  Learn how to make a Note Block and see how Ideate BIMLink can support this kind of checklist requirement.

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Glynnis Patterson,
N.C.A.R.B. – Director of Services
Glynnis is a Registered Architect and has worked within the BIM industry since 1998. A graduate of Carnegie Mellon University, she has worked as an architect, educator and construction site manager. Glynnis is currently the Director of Development Services at Ideate, Inc. and continues to work with AEC clients across the nation, developing, and implementing best practices solutions. In her spare time Glynnis is a member of the Morristown Environmental Commission and builds Lego projects. @GVPinNJ

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