What
are the current advantages of Revit/BIM?
With
the spreading idea of Building Information Model (BIM), Revit becomes a
“standard” tool for building design in famous companies. We may raise a
question that what the current advantages of Revit are.
First
of all, as Professor Mitchell had discussed in the class, the mechanism of
Revit is totally different from AutoCAD. In AutoCAD, any drawings can only be
identified as the combination of lines. Only in the case that people define the
different meanings of those lines, we can understand that thicker lines refer
to walls, and thinner lines refer to other stuff. Machine or program itself
could not identify them. However, when it comes to Revit, the situation is
different. In Revit, the drawings are bases on different elements instead of
lines. And, machine or program knows that this element is wall, and that one is
window. Besides, each elements can be assigned basic information such as
dimensions and material. Those information can be scheduled and kept with the
element. This can help users to better understand what they are doing.
Second,
Revit can serve multifunction as an analysis program. In addition to the design
function, Revit can combine all models from other programs for the analysis of
architectural, structural, MEP and so on. All those depends on the element
based program. As I have discussed above, since program can understand the
representation of each element, the program can directly take the data of the
model for analysis purpose. In addition, Revit has a strong linkage function,
which means when you make modification either in section view or 3D view, the
whole model will automatically update to avoid any simple mistake. This can
help the design firm to save a lot of time for checking the model. I have read
an example that, a design firm reduces their project from two and a half months
to one and a half months just in design phase.
Third,
Revit has great ability in modeling and exporting. Using Revit, we can export
dimensions and volume data of any building element. All these data can help us
to calculate the cost estimation of the project, which also depends on the
accuracy of the modeling. Since cost is always vital to a project, a better
cost estimation can help designers to follow the budget strictly. And the
render function in Revit can provide you a great view of your design including
color, shape as well as height. It can give you a thinking image of the
building before you actually see it. Any needed modifications could be caught
easily.
In
addition to the advantages I have discussed above, Revit has a lot of other
advantages. In my opinion, skilled in use of Revit or other BIM tools will
become a must for both Architectural Engineers and Civil Engineers especially
in the practical world.
Comments:
Comment to Santiago Uribe: Santiago lists about five advantages very clearly. I have the same idea that Revit or other BIM software increase the speed of project delivery. I think this is a very important criteria. On company side, time means money. Increasing the project delivery will save a lot of money for the design company.
Comment to Mark Bancroft: I agree that different contributors can work off one model. I think this relates to the data share between different programs. if we can make data translatable, this will provide more help for the integrate of the design.
Comment to Yanzhao Nong: I agree that schedule is a very good property in Revit. As professor Mitchell discussed in the class, schedule actually represents the database stored in the software. From the schedule, we can clearly see the number of doors or windows uses, as well as the dimensions and materials. It will make users to check each detail very convenient.
References:
“Why
do we use Revit?”, Jeffrey McGrew, http://becausewecan.org/node/261
“Advanced
Revit 2014 API Features and Samples”
http://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/files/dv2010_advanced_revit_2014_api_handout-1.pdf
No comments:
Post a Comment