BIM DIARY: WEEK 08

Material schedule and floor finishes demarcation.

This week was a little short. I had been introduced to material schedule while helping my another team member to create the schedule ready for tender purposes. But before going into it, I had many questions in mind.

First of all, the project I involved in is a mix-development- the revit model is done separately for residential on the upper part and commercial units on the lower part. The combined ( or the central model) is the final model which compile the both parts into one for final checking. Here's the thing. If I were to obtain information from these imported models in the central model, I could not do this because it was locked within the model itself. In other words, I was unable to extract related information, for example, the total amount of fan used in both models when I want to create a schedule about it. 

Sadly, I wasn't given the solution and certainly I could only create a schedule with empty data. At the very least, I learned the way to create the columns of the schedule effortlessly. My training session continued by helping the team on demarcating different floor finishes on each and every plans for the project.

So,

I still couldn't taste the magic out of what I've learned so far in the documentation for tender using Revit. I was surprised by how things got messed up and even complicated. I have still a very long way to go.

BIM DIARY: WEEK 07

This week was a fresh start going back to Revit from Lumion.

My sensei finally got me into a real-time project, a project which undergoing KM process and preparing tender at the same time. I was assigned to work on window schedule with the leader in the team.

At first I thought it was a fast process- since the Revit should be more effective when it comes to documentation, well that was what I had in mind, not until I got into the real scenario. The reality is that, it will only be easy if the element is a window itself, one can simply obtain information like plans, window types, and all other data, easily generated in one click away. But in many cases especially in commercial projects, curtain walls are created for a project and yes, those ain't no windows.

Then I learned using their tricks and extra effort to generate schedule for such curtain walls using sections, a lot of hiding and revealing unrelated elements, create sheet, and then drag each and every wall one at a time into the sheet. I have to say it was pretty handful. It was doable, but quite troublesome if there are great amount of curtain walls to cut section.

So,

I thought I had a much higher expectation for Revit's efficiency performance. But I should not make a definite judgeent based on just one day experience, it is afrerall a complex software. Stay tunned.

BIM DIARY: WEEK 06

Lumion in a nutshell

This is quite a short week working on the project. But it was great that I can finally get the glimpse on how Lumion works on both exterior and interior rendering.

Due to the first week of fasting, most of my Muslim colleagues were not around to guide me through the process, so it was rather a do-it-yourself week. The first ever thing to learn is of course, exporting the model to the Lumion. It come to my surprise that the steps to do that were quite hassle-free.

On key thing to note is the difference between importing a Revit family and importing a sketchup model into Lumion. Both works extremely different and for fast production, Mr.S seems to be the better the option to do that. Mainly it shortens the time to update each and every model, while keeping the texture as it is (Lumion will recognize the texture as a material)

So,

I've completed an exterior scene in one day, and another for an interior view. In fact, Lumion is pretty user-friendly, and really fast when it comes to rendering. Not to mention the superb quality of foliage and environmental ambience (presets). I've even learned how to make a simple video of the project with just few clicks away. Love the software!

BIM DIARY: WEEK 05

CUT, CURTAIN WALL MAKING, DESIGN OPTIONS & PHRASING

It was a short Revit training this week due to busy schedule in our own office and Labour day.

First thing to do was sharping up my skills in Generic modelling- creating curtain walls with several ways, including extrusion and void, wall type, and array.

While trying to fill in more detail into the model, I discovered some useful tools like design options and phrasing- the tool to allow you to categorize things you've wanna show in your model, especially when you are sending it to the client. What it does best is hiding elements whenever you want it to hide, and group these hidden elements at your will. To illustrate, when your client asked for two options on the facade of a same building, you can create options by grouping them into Option 1, Option 2, and so on. Unlike using Mr.S, I normally will duplicate models of the same building in Mr.S and then starting to edit each and every one of them. Doing that might just increase the size of the model that you're working on and eventually lead to the risk of crashing/lagging.

Another useful tool I've learned was the 'cut' key. It's simple and it literally means cutting a model line into two (sounds funny haha). By doing that, you can delete the lines you do not need while making sure the other lines are still connected.

So,
Nothing much to conclude for this week, but my guardian is taking me to the next level of the design process ( All designer might already know what it means) next week. Yes, from Revit model to rendering. Stay tuned!

BIM DIARY: WEEK 04

Full Set of Drawings: Done in a snap!



The fourth week ( to be exact, it's only the eighth day) reached to the state of where I can now draw a schematic model for presentation, including the structure of the building. It was so far fun and enjoyable, even though the process could be taken a lot faster if I do it with Mr.S.

What impressive of Revit this week is probably the power of Sheets. Learning to create sheets and import different views into these sheets make plotting pretty much effortless. Not to mention the quick annotation and pre-filled project details while you import the title block into the sheets. Where using Mr.S or Mr.A, you'd still take some time to get these done even you're an expert. Especially in Mr.S, most of the time you'd get hairlines and unnecessary stuffs into CAD, and of course, you need the pro version to do that too! (means money la)

Another most amazing feature I've learned this week is probably the Axonometry presets that make iso drawings done in seconds! If one is unsatisfied with the result, he/she can even delete it or reset all the pullings within the iso drawings, magically, it will never affect the original drawing/model at all.

So,

I starting to understand how Revit could really save us time after we master it. Unlike the conventional way, say CAD-SKETCHUP-MAX- everything you build in Revit will be used for 2D, 3D, and eventually rendering. There will be no double work whatsoever.

Isn't that brilliant?

BIM DIARY: WEEK 03

It'd been 3rd week of Revit-ing. Things are starting to come together by pieces.

We're still in the phrase of modelling simple plans and massing of a small scale building, which somehow a way to familiarize the command and the workflow to achieve things we want Revit to do.

This week are mainly focusing on a small scale spa building we propose for a project in a remote retreat in Malaysia. Learning how to model as generic model is fun and so far I've finally work out the 'set plane' and 'edit profile' for certain configuration to work. Also learning the difference of 'assembly' and 'group' make things so much easier when it comes to repetitive element. The most challenging part should be the angular roof that I am still in the middle of making it right. = =

So,

It's a transition: Switching from Sketchup to Revit is one thing. Time efficiency in Revit is hardly there for a 3-week-user like us as some easy task that we can achieve in Sketchup is painful to produce in Revit (e.g. getting family right, wall is wall, roof is roof). I suppose it will take some time until we can totally break up with Mr.S..

The journey continues.

BIM DIARY: WEEK 02

What does it really mean by BIM?

To explain in simple terms, it's a chunk of information of every little piece of a building project.

It's literally means modelling information of a building that involve inputs from Architect, Engineers, and Contractor. In Malaysia, so far architects are taking the role more seriously and most of the works are done by themselves.

The second week started off by testing our new learned skills from the previous tutorials and trying to model up the office space that we're currently situated in. The extent of our details wasn't go complicated just yet. As so as we realized the time we are building the walls in 2D, the walls had been up in the 3D view as well.

Selection of different materials for different component can be tricky. Unlike CAD, we draw lines without even thinking about the nature of the element yet.

So,

We're building up the spirit of BIM so far. I was amazed of how far can Revit actually go when I starting to understand the concept of Common Data Environment. The simple click of synchronization can easily blow things off, or the other way round.

Thirsty for more to come.

BIM DIARY: WEEK 01

Starting this week, I'll be recording down my journey with Revit on Building Information Modeling (BIM).

We were lucky to have an opportunity of learning Revit from scratch with a local architecture firm that specialized in BIM. Through a work-and-learn basis, we ought to pick up the software and skills that come along with it by working on some real-life projects.

Basically the first week was mainly introductory and was rather boring. Going through all 12 Chapters of the tutorial videos are little way compact for the brain to absorb every single details. End up we took longer than 3 days to finish the videos for the fundamentals, or simply just to understand the dos and donts trying not to get into trouble.

So,

I start to get the overall picture of how Revit works, especially on data that it can contribute to BIM are humongous, almost unreal. Things that Revit can achieve really save us all time. 

I found the software was quite easy to pick up as Revit shares a lot of similar interfaces and commands with AutoCAD and 3dsMax that truly helpful for users to familiarize with. After all, it will take quite some time to make Revit handy to me. I suppose we all have to undergo the hardship before we can harvest the fruit. 

LEAVING TOO SOON

VOON TSE LIK, you have shocked us all today.

Like any other day, I was browsing through my Facebook feed in the morning while I was waiting the traffic. Until I saw Jun Xian's post about how he appreciated Lik as his most important pal in his life with an ending of 'RIP'. At first I thought it was just a joke ( as Lik was known to hack his friends account for fun), ended up it was indeed something real.

Other of Lik's close buddies ( we have many mutual friends) started to pay their condolences to him. Many had shared the media news of what happened to him and how he was stucked in his car with fire. The whole scene was surreal. It was something we would never imagined happen to anyone around us having caught in such terribly case. It made us feel deeply emotional.

I know Lik probably dated back to primary school time in Sam Tet. He was known to be really smart ( always in the first or second class), a little naughty, and make a lot of friends around the school. We probably know each other but we do not consider each other as a friend. In high school, we've known Lik as again in the smart boy category, with extra talents in art and dance. He hanged out with cool buddies, played basketball, and formed some breakdancing group at school. In fact, we knew him as the 'super cool guy' and pretty popular among the girls. He got the brain, the look and the style in all. Then, we continued to become schoolmates during A-Levels in Taylor's College and architecture. But somehow we never get closed even though we've such coincidence and known each other for quite some time.

I always remember Lik as someone who is charismatic of whatever he does, he always in style. He cares about his brothers (friends) very much, not to mention to his girlfriend. As an elder brother, we can always see his posts in social media, showering loves and accreditation to his sisters' and parents. His public persona was very sociable, well traveled, and indeed intellectual. Even though he stopped his architecture study half-way, but I admired his decision as he could always take actions on things he believed in, and had the guts to make his life as how he wanted it to be.   

Amazingly, his aura continues while bringing us together again, even though it shouldn't be the way to gather his friends and family. Many of us started to recall the fond memories we had with him, and cherished those precious flashbacks with emotions. I wish his family could be strong while going through this difficult moment. And you'll be in heaven and blessed with love and happiness.

Rest in Peace Lik.

With love