Create a Groin Vault Roof in Revit

Apr 30, 2013

I received an email today asking me how to model a groin vault in Revit. In lieu of an email reply, I decided to record a quick video to show the basic steps. I started with a simple extrusion roof using a half-round arc. Then drew a second one at 90 degree. Next you use the join roof command on the Modify tab to connect them together. I tried using a dormer opening to cut the underside of the groin vault. I did not have much success in this attempt, but I think it had more to do with the fact that my geometry was perfectly flush at the bottom. I had the same issue with joining the roofs in the step above and so had to make the intersection barrel vault slightly shorter to get it to work. So perhaps if I also made it slightly above the Level 2 plane, it also would have worked with the dormer opening. Instead, I went with an in-place void form in the video. Finish it off with cut and join geometry.

Here is the video on YouTube. Enjoy.

I got lots of replies on this one, including this video response.

And here is part 2 from me:

And dare I say, here is a better solution by Jay Zallan:

Revit Architecture Book Updates

Apr 24, 2013

My publisher Cengage decided to take a different approach to many of its CAD titles last year. The title of my Revit Architecture books is “Revit Architecture 2013 and beyond” where the beyond part means that we would not necessary publish a new edition for each new release. Instead, the book shipped with a CAD Connect card in the back that gives the purchaser access to downloadable content to update the book to new releases as they become available. Honestly this is something of an experiment we are trying; it will change again shortly (with the speed of change these days, there is more to the story, but more on that in a future post…) For now, let me tell you about the 2014 update that is now available as a FREE download to supplement the 2013 and beyond edition of the book.

This update weighs in at 26 pages and is posted as a downloadable PDF document. It gives a rundown of many new features. The focus is on the platform and architectural features. I do not cover structural or MEP in this document. The document is intended for owners of “The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2013 and beyond“. However, I have provided it as a free download here for anyone to download. If you have a copy of the book, you can use this document to learn what’s new in the 2014 release of the Revit software. After each feature description, I list the chapters, topics and pages in the book where the feature is discussed. In the case of totally new features, I either suggest locations in the book to try them out or simply note that the feature is new. (The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2013 and beyond is not a command reference and makes no attempts or claims to cover every tool and feature, so some new features are not accentuated if they do not fit the scope of the book.)

If you do not own a copy of the book and are just curious about what is new in 2014, please feel free to download the document anyhow. You can use it without the book to explore the new features in 2014.

(But of course I think you will enjoy it more with a copy of the book, so please note the handy “buy the book” link in the righthand margin… )

 

Mass Colors

Apr 17, 2013

I saw a question on the LinkedIn Revit Users Ireland group and thought I would post a quick reply here since you can’t post pictures there. The question asks if it is possible to apply colors to masses in Revit. This is possible, you simply need to apply materials. I did a quick mock-up and created an image to illustrate.

Simply select your mass, and then on the Properties palette, click in the Material field and then click the small browse icon. This will open the material dialog where you can choose a material. Make sure the material has a color assigned to it or it will still look boring gray. I also like to make sure to check the “Use Render Appearance” checkbox (on the Graphics tab of the editor) to make sure that the shading color matches the render color. I am not sure why all materials don’t do this by default???

If you want to assign the material as a parameter, click the small gray button to the far right instead. You can even use the Paint command to paint just one surface. (Both shown in the figure above).

These colors/materials will persist when you load this mass into a project. (As long as Show Mass is on that is…)

 

Hope that is useful for some. Thanks.

Cross Post

Mar 8, 2013

I wrote an article for lynda.com’s blog recently on the migration from AutoCAD to Revit. You can read the complete post here.

Creating Project Browser Folders

Mar 3, 2013

I had an email today from a reader asking how to create custom folders in the Revit Project Browser. You can do this by customizing the browser organization and including a custom parameter. I thought that I would go ahead and post the steps here instead of just replying privately.

The first thing you want to do is decide how you will apply this custom parameter. It can be a Project Parameter or a Shared Parameter. There are arguments to made in favor of both approaches. In the steps that follow I am showing it using a simple Project Parameter. This means that we do not need to bother with the shared parameter setup. But if you already have a shared parameter file and prefer to do it that way, just choose the shared parameter radio button at the top instead of project parameter. The rest of the steps would be the same.

If you always want to use this organization in your projects, save this in your office standard project template file. That way all new projects will already have the custom parameter. Let’s get started:

• On the Manage tab, click the Project Parameters button.
• In the “Project Parameters” dialog, click the Add button.
• In the “Parameter Properties” dialog, choose the kind of parameter at the top (I chose Project Parameter for this example, but as noted, you can choose Shared Parameter instead if you wish).
• Type in a name such as: “Sheet Folder”
• Change the Type of Parameter to Text.
• On the right side, from the Categories list, check the Sheets box.
• Click OK twice.

The parameter is now ready. Next, you create some sheets and apply this new value to them.

• Create some sheets. (or work with existing ones)
• Select one or more sheets and then on the Properties palette, locate the new Sheet Folder parameter and type in a value such as: “Plumbing” and apply it.
• Repeat for all the sheets.

Now we will create the custom browser organization. You can find  this command on the View tab, on the User Interface drop-down.

• On the View tab, click the User Interface drop-down and choose Browser Organization.
• Click the Sheets tab and then click the New button.
• Give it a name and then click OK.
• In the “Browser Organization Properties” dialog, on the Folders tab, choose the new custom Sheet Folder property for the first Group by item.
• If you wish, you can choose additional Group by criteria such as Sheet Number.
• For Sheet Number, you can even tell it to only use the first few characters by choosing the “Leading Characters” radio button and then setting it to a number such as 4. (this will display only the first four characters of the value – sheet number in this case).
• Click OK.
• Check the box next to the new sort to make it active and click OK to see the result on the Project Browser.

That’s it. You can do other customizations if you like, but that is the basic process. The only thing to be aware of is that since this is a custom parameter, Revit will not know about it and assign values automatically. In other words, each new sheet that you create must be assigned to a Sheet Folder or else you will see the ??? group in your browser and the unassigned sheets will appear there. Hope that this tutorial is useful.

New lynda.com courses!

Feb 21, 2013

I am pleased to announce two new Revit courses on the lynda.com video library authored by yours truly. Please visit my page at lynda.com to learn about these and all of my courses. (Full disclosure: I get a small referral fee if you purchase from this link)

The two new courses are:

Migrating from AutoCAD to Revit

This course shows AutoCAD drafters and designers how to migrate their CAD workflow to Autodesk Revit software. Author Paul F. Aubin details how to transfer your files and explains key distinctions between the packages. Along the way, learn how to customize the Revit settings for optimal control, get a basic handle on the modeling tools, and adjust yourself to the differences in visibility, plot style, object creation, and the user interface.

Phasing and Design Options in Revit

Phasing in Autodesk Revit allows you to show the complete life cycle of a project, such as a before and after or existing and proposed status, while design options allow you to save multiple iterations of a concept in a single project file. In this course, Paul F. Aubin shows how to use phasing and design options to organize multipart, multifaceted projects in Revit. The course also covers adding and assigning phases to views, scheduling phases and designating future work, working with design option sets, and presenting complex designs to clients.

Both of these course are around 2 hours in length. They focus on specific topics rather than a comprehensive look at the software. If you want a more general look at Revit Architecture overall, you can check out my other courses at lynda.com including Revit Architecture Essentials. There are also a few other courses on Revit there by other excellent authors as well. And if you want to learn more than just Revit, lynda.com is the place to go. You can learn about nearly anything you like with new topics being added every day. I highly recommend it.

Comments and questions welcome. Please enjoy the new courses. Thanks!

Corinthian Update

Dec 7, 2012

Well Autodesk University is behind us now and I have found a little time to make some progress on my Corinthian capital. I now have something that is “reasonably” complete. However, there is still much to do to make it “actually” complete. For example, I tried two different approaches to the volute scrolls. The ones at the corners are a series of stacked lofted forms. Each one using the last shape from the previous one as the first shape for the next. The middle scrolls instead use a single swept form (more of a swept blend actually) along the single continuous scroll shaped spline path. This gives me the fillet (or raised lip) portion of the volute. To create the solid material behind the fillet, I used two slightly smaller forms in the overall shape of the scroll and revolved it to create a form. Both this revolve and the nested scroll forms are hosted on the ends of the reference planes on an arc. Believe it or not, the flower at the top abacus was one of the most difficult forms. I kept getting the dreaded “cannot create form” message, or “line is too short” message. So for now, I built that as a “one off”. It is not parametric or scalable yet.

**Edit** By the way, this rendering was done directly in Revit. The two renderings were composited together in Photoshop. I tried Steven Shell’s method, but I was unhappy with the break line, so I resorted to Photoshop. Otherwise, it is all Revit.**

The part that I am the most dissatisfied with so far is that all of the leaves are surfaces instead of solids. I have tried various approaches to create solid leaves, but always get the “can’t create form” message. If I build scalable rigs as nested profile families, the create form button does not like them. It seems to choke on the Reference Lines in the nested family. I can use traditional Generic Model families, but it is much trickier to make them parametric since I cannot do the Reference Line rig approach there. Finally, this file is currently HUGE!. 13.8 megs!!! Clearly I need to get that down to a more manageable size. I also still need to make the Course detail version and the materials still need work.

So, I will continue to hammer away at this. But in the meantime, enjoy some images of what I have so far.

    

 

#AU2012 MEP Book discount code

Dec 4, 2012

Hello:

For those of you that made it to #AU2012 this year, I hope you enjoyed the conference. We had a great time as always. We gave out discount cards at AU for 40% off our MEP book titles. I just got an email about some trouble folks were having getting the code to work. I have updated the site and everything should be working now. My apologies for any inconvenience. The discount code is: SGESYKP2 and entitles you to 40% off the cover price for any of the MEP titles on this site sold through the CreateSpace eStore. (Please note that this code does not apply to the books sold through Cengage Learning or on Amazon).

The code will remain active at 40% through the end of this week and then it will drop to a 20% discount. Thanks very much!

AU2012 – Day 2

Nov 29, 2012

Boy has this week flown by. I am in my room after a long day 2 at Autodesk University 2012 (#AU2012). I have taught four of my five classes and I am turning in early tonight because my last class (What’s new in Revit 2013 Stairs and Railings?) is at 8:00 AM tomorrow! Ick. If you have ever been to Vegas, or AU, you know that getting up for the first class is a bit of a challenge. More so as the week wears on. So we’ll see how many people make it tomorrow of the 138 signed up. The conference has gone well so far. Lots of good sessions. Plenty of time catching up and networking with colleagues I have not seen in a while, and lots of activities and exhibits to explore.

My classes have gone well and I have had really good audiences. So I thank you all for that. Well, that’s all for now. I’ll post a more complete report after tomorrow. If you are here in attendance, try to swing by my session in Mandalay Bay C tomorrow morning (if you can drag yourself out of bed early…)

AU 2012

Nov 25, 2012

Just about ready for #AU2012.

Boarding pass printed, class materials uploaded, schedule downloaded to iPhone, handouts annotated and printed for my classes, backups of everything on a thumb drive, cleared to do items till I return, books and giveaways all set, packing almost complete, ride to the airport scheduled…

I am good to go. If you are going to be at AU, please drop by one of my sessions if it works in your schedule. Click here for more details. See you at AU!

Classical Shades

Nov 8, 2012

Some days you start out with your agenda and your planned activities for the day and you know exactly what you plan to do that day. Sometimes things even go according to plan. My favorite outcome here is when i get to check things off that ever-present to do list. Other days, you have your plan but the minute you sit down to your desk, something unexpected comes along to “change” the plan. Today, mom called with a burst water pipe and the associated mess, and Andy Milburn posted a rather long and thoughtful missive about Corinthian columns and Revit. If you are not familiar with Andy’s Shades of Grey blog, it is fantastic. You definitely want to add it to your read list.

Well, I don’t think I will get quite as long and thoughtful as Andy did in this post, but he asks a few specific questions that I thought I would address. First, I love the photos Andy. You captured really nice variety there. And you raised some fantastic questions like: “The spirit of the corinthian seems to live in it’s infinite ability to be constantly re-invented. How do you factor that into an equation ?” and “And how could a Revit family that resizes itself on cue to a few typed numbers hope to join such a tradition ?” I asked myself these same questions and while I did take some photos, I suppose I took a more academic approach to the project. As my primary source material, I am using “The Classical Orders of Architecture” by Robert Chitham. I have a copy of the first edition. There was a second edition published in the mid nineties. It seems to only now be available online or in used outlets.

What I love about Chitham’s book is he seemed to be asking the same question about variation. He took all of the previous treatises and put them side by side and in so doing came up with a sort of “idealized” set of orders based on the features of all the other masters like Vitruvius, Vignola, Gibbs and so on.

Perhaps it could be construed as lazy on my part to have simply accepted Chitham’s explorations and idealized interpretation when setting out to make my classical Revit families. However, like Andy points out, with so much variation possible, how can we hope to create a parametric model that accommodates that? I am not sure that we can frankly. So this is not the goal that I set for myself. My goal was to create the “idealized” version of the capital, and make it fully parametric. Where that leads me is still ongoing. When it is finished, I have no doubt that the next logical step will present itself. Also, as has been asked in comment on previous posts and also raised in Andy’s post, level of detail is an important aspect of a project like this. In yesterday’s Vasari Talk; Pumpkin Postmortem, we talked about limitations of this work and file size and the implications of highly detailed and repeated models. So a Course level of detail version and use of detailing and other techniques would be essential to using objects like this in a real project of any significant size. I have already begun to add lower level of detail versions and fully intend to have them in the final products.

One final point, Andy also raised the issue of the volute scrolls and how they meet at the corners. I struggled quite a bit with this. In fact, I have not yet developed the secondary scroll yet. I have however built the leaves (coliuli and flourets) that rise up beneath them. With those I approached them in much the way that Andy discusses. So it is interesting that we are thinking of the same things here. With the main scroll, I was intending to create a void near the top to cut out hollow material and make it appear like two coming together. However, I am not yet complete satisfied with the overall form, so I left it for now. We’ll see how that goes.

So Thank you Andy for disrupting my morning routine.

No seriously, I was due for a post anyhow, so sincerely, thank you for the kick in the pants…

Now off to Mom’s to help her clean up the mess. More to come….

Dataset Update

Oct 17, 2012

We have a minor update to the dataset for “The Aubin Academy: Revit MEP 2013″. The file referenced in Chapter 1 has been updated to address a few items raised by one of our readers. Thank you for sending in your comments. They do help us improve the quality of the books. You can visit the book page and download the update here.

Classic Follow-up

Oct 1, 2012

This is a followup post on my “Revit Does the Classics” post. I have continued to work on the Corinthian capital and I am making some progress. I thought I would record a video to show the process I am using to build the leaves in the Corinthian capital. Take a look:

 

Revit does the Classics

Sep 14, 2012

I have been working on a new book project for several months now. I have always had a strong interest in classical architecture. I especially like the challenge of modeling such traditional forms with today’s modern software. I am also particularly struck by the irony of how such forms actually prove quite challenging to model using computer software.

I actually began my first explorations of this kind of thing back several years ago using AutoCAD Architecture. I have a very detailed Ionic column capital that built using ACA objects. I was able to get a pretty decent results but it suffered from being a very “heavy” model with lots of tessellation. But it was not just an AutoCAD block. I built it as an ACA Style and it had some parametric qualities. I was even able to get a 3D print of it (thanks to Zach Kron of Buildz fame).

   

 

I left the project on the back burner for a while and picked up again about a year or two ago only this time in Revit. My goal was to create not just one column, but all of the major orders and make them fully parametric Families. Since everything in classical architecture relies heavily on proportion, it seemed like a really nice challenge for the Family Editor.

    

One limitation that I ran into early on is Revit’s inability to scale native geometry. It is rather ironic actually, because if import AutoCAD geometry into Revit, there is a scale property in the Type Properties dialog. But no such think for native solids. Therefore, I was forced to instead scale each piece of the sketches individually. This means that scale a simple box, you need three parameters: length width and height. To scale them proportionally, you need to apply formulas to at least two of those dimensions. This is not too big of a deal unless you are dealing with very complex and curvaceous forms. Like say the volutes on an ionic column, the flutes on a column shaft or the acanthus leaves on a Corinthian capital.

I tried to stick with the traditional Family Editor because even though you can change the category of an Adaptive Component, I still don’t like that you cannot copy and paste between them and traditional families and that you cannot nest an adaptive into a traditional family. But despite this, I found that an adaptive was really the best choice for the Corinthian. With access to splines and points, you gain more modeling freedom and things like the leaves were MUCH easier to build this way. Zach Kron was also a big help here in giving me a very useful tip to scale my leaves proportionally without having to create a million parameters. So thanks a bunch for that tip Zach! Basically all you have to do is host your points on your Reference Lines and then scale the Reference Lines with a simple Length, Width and height parameter. Works really well. Couple that with 2013’s new Divide and Repeat feature and we can avoid lots of cumbersome arrays. I like that a lot too.

The project has indeed grown beyond my original scope and become significantly more involved. As a consequence, as I work through building fully parametric models of Tuscan, Doric, Ionic and Corinthian columns and colonnades, I decided that I would like to share a little bit of work in progress to gauge the general interest in this project. My aim is to see what sort of general interest there is in a book and/or videos on the subject. While the focus is certainly on modeling at this stage, I would like to see it expand to encompass more aspects of advanced Family Editor techniques.

Throughout this post have been some images of what I have so far. Everything flexes and can scale to different sizes. Naturally none of it is complete yet, but I am making progress.

Now I should also mention that most of the work so far has been on the high (Fine) detail versions. I fully intend to create a course and probably a medium detail version of each family as well. Here is a simple version for the Corinthian.

If you have any comments at all on the project, I am most interested to hear them. I am curious in the level of interest in an eventual book, but also interested in any other comments or suggestions that folks might have. So please feel free to share your thoughts. Thanks!

Swept blend approach. Form is OK, but not very smooth.

AU Early Registration

Aug 28, 2012

Can you believe it? Autodesk University early registration opened today! Classes are already filling up. I’m flattered to learn that two of mine are already filled. I have a page here on my site devoted to AU. You can learn more at: http://paulaubin.com/au. If you signed up for my AB2083-L – Autodesk® Revit® Families: Step-by-Step Advanced Concepts (Hands-on Lab), (it is one of the two that is already full) PLEASE make sure that you have some experience in the Family Editor already. This is an advanced class and I won’t be covering the basics. I did a lab last year on the basics and I recorded that session. You can find all the materials and the recordings at my AU Info Page. Please watch the videos and review the PDF before attending the class in Vegas this year.

I will try to post this year’s materials closer to the conference. I hope to be able to record the new lab as well, but we’ll just have to wait and see how that goes…

Finally, I was alerted that one of my course descriptions (the one for AB2444 – Things You Didn’t Know Autodesk® Revit® Could Do…or Maybe You Just Forgot) was actually published incorrectly on the AU website. This has been fixed, so now the correct description is published. So for the confusion.

So while you wait for AU, consider attending two other conferences this Fall. I will be speaking at: The first annual Central States Revit Workshop and at three locations for the CAD Americas events. (Indianapolis, Chicago and St. Louis).

Hope to see you at one or more of these events!

Shhhh! It’s a Secret

Aug 26, 2012

Found a “secret” arrowhead in my dimension Type dialog today. Anyone seen this before? Let’s just keep it between us…

All New Revit 2013 Essential Training at lynda.com

Aug 6, 2012

I am pleased to announce the release of my latest lynda.com Revit course. Revit Architecture 2013 Essential Training is a completely updated course covering basic and intermediate Revit skills. The course came in at over 10 hours of video training! It is perfect beginners and has much for seasoned users as well. You can learn more and see a complete table of contents at:

http://www.lynda.com/PaulAubin

The lynda.com library is an extensive online training library providing the highest quality training on a vast array of topics. If you would like to get a free 7-day trial, you can visit:

http://www.lynda.com/trial/paubin

While you are there, be sure to check out my other Revit courses:

• Revit Archtiecture the Family Editor
• Revit Architecture Rendering
• Revit Architecture Advanced Modeling

And the hundreds of other training topics like AutoCAD, 3ds max, Maya, SketchUp, Photoshop, InDesign, MS Office, Programming, Databases, Photography and much more!

Aubin Academy Revit Architecture 2013 is Available!

Aug 1, 2012

I am pleased to announce that my copy of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2013 and beyond is here and sitting on my desk. The title keeps growing as does the page count.

This edition weighs in at 898 pages (compared to the 2012 edition at 850). New features are interspersed throughout and the Stairs and Railings chapter got a major re-write this edition. I also added the new Divide and Repeat feature and many of the other smaller enhancements as well.

New in this edition, you will get access to a new CAD Connect website. There is a card in the back of the book for this with an access code. You can use this code to access new materials as we post them.

You can learn more about the book here. If you have any questions, please contact me. Thanks!

Revit Technology Conference Wrapup

Jul 2, 2012

I have just returned from this year’s Revit Technology Conference in Stone Mountain, GA. Thank you to events management for another fantastic event. RTC is a conference by Revit users for Revit users. They like to refer to it as the ultimate user’s group and it really is. This was the second year for the North American event (last year in Orange County, CA). The event began in Australia several years back and according to the event’s founder Wesley Benn, this was the fourteenth event! Borrowing elements from both user groups and other similar conferences, RTC combines many elements to create a very successful event. There are dozens of classes by industry experts from around the world. The content in the classes tends to be very focused and at a more advanced level than you get at other events. This appeals to RTC’s attendees as they tend to be drawn more from the power user ranks as well. Classes are accompanied by many networking events. RTC is as much about networking as it is about classes. The schedule is designed to provide lots of time in the hallways to talk to piers and catch up on the latest technologies in the exhibit hall. There are also plenty of social events designed to further enhance this face-t0-face interaction. You can find the group quite active online as well. Try the Linked In group.

The only downside to RTC this year was quite out of event management’s control. The temperatures outside were closing in on 110. Stone Mountain is a terrific Atlanta area attraction but most of its draw is its outdoor activities. Sadly with the heat at these levels, we were unable to enjoy many of its offerings.

I don’t think I am scooping anything here when I say that next year’s RTC North America will be in Vancouver! I have never been to Vancouver so I am looking forward to that one. RTC Australasia will be in Auckland New Zealand next year, and there will be a third event in Europe for the first time! This one will be in Delft in the Netherlands. If your job has anything to do with Revit and other related technologies, I promise you that RTC has something to offer you. Hope to see you at one of these events next year!

2012 Transit of Venus

Jun 6, 2012

I took the day off yesterday to witness a rare astronomical event. It was me, four other adults and 16 boy scouts from St. Linus parish in Oak Lawn (southwest suburb of Chicago). We took a field trip down to Chicago’s Adler Planetarium to watch this century’s last Transit of Venus. I work with the boys as the Astronomy Merit Badge counselor. This event gave us a great opportunity to fulfill some of the requirements of the merit Badge and see an event that won’t be repeated in our lifetimes. The next Transit of Venus occurs in 2117! It seems that every time I set up a viewing session for the boys, we have had cloudy skies. But not yesterday! We were blessed with absolutely beautiful clear skies! Add this to the top-notch Adler facility and Chicago’s unforgettable skyline as a backdrop and it was a perfect day.

We arrived early which was good because we were able to visit the museum first and buy some Eclipse Shades to safely view the Sun. You cannot look directly at the Sun, especially through telescopes, binoculars and cameras. You need to use proper solar filtering. Later in the afternoon, the lines to buy these shades became quite long and they ran out, some some folks were disappointed. You could actually see the planet Venus as a tiny spot on the sun through the Eclipse Shades, but the best way to see it is through a properly filtered telescope or binoculars. There were many telescopes setup on the lawn of the Adler for the event.

I decided to bring my binoculars. I have Celestron 20/80 Astronomy binoculars. I fitted my binoculars with a homemade Solar Filter. I bought the Solar Mylar on eBay. It is manufactured by Thousand Oaks Optical. It worked out great. Maybe “too” great because after the boys and I took a look, a long line of patrons to the Adler began to form. There were thousands of people there and maybe a few dozen telescopes, so lines were long at all of them. So, for the next couple hours I was able to host amazing views of the transit from my humble setup. It was really neat seeing all the excited faces, both young and old! Lot’s of “oh wow” and “oh I see it!” and “what are those other spots?” (they are Sun Spots). Very cool indeed.

In the line I met a man named Khalid Rizwan. Khalid had a nice camera on him with a selection of lenses. He made several attempts to photograph the transit through my binoculars and I asked him to email the photo. Here is his result and what he had to say about it:

“Thanks for letting me have a couple of minutes to try to catch this shot from your setup. I couldn’t entirely clean it up, but I think the bit of reflection off the eyepiece just adds to the effect. I think it came out pretty well.”

I completely agree with his sentiment. I think the lens adds a nice moody effect. Venus is the black dot up near 1:00 O’clock. The other two smaller fuzzy black spots down below are Sun Spots. If you want to see more images, just Google Venus Transit and you’re bound to turn up hundreds. BTW, binoculars show the view “right-side-up”, a telescope would show the view “upside-down” or inverted. So if you turn up other pictures that show it the other way, that should explain it.

Clear skies everyone!

Revit Timeline at this year’s RTC

May 20, 2012

What do Doc Brown’s DeLorean and Revit Phasing have in common? Well you’ll just have to come to Revit Technology Conference this June and see!

I just finished my class materials for my session: Revit Timeline: Existing, New, Demo… Future?

This will be a hands-on lab which means participants will get to follow along in a short tutorial showcasing Revit’s phasing features. Here is the course description:

Revit has a pretty ingenious way of dealing with project phasing. You do not manually configure each object as new, existing or demo. Rather, phases in Revit are like points in time. You develop a timeline of your project’s life-cycle and then each object is plotted along this timeline. You can view any point in the past, present or if you are clever, the future as well by creating phase views. “Existing” happened before the project began. Any number of “new construction” phases can be configured after this point. Demolition however is not a phase. Instead it is the point in time where an object’s “life” ends. Sound intriguing? In this session we’ll learn how to set up phases, configure views and display demolition, existing and new construction in appropriate ways. As if that weren’t enough, we’ll even explore a little work-around to overcome Revit’s inability to display future work. Intrigued now? Well what are you waiting for? Sign up today!

I’ll be presenting at session 5, 4:30 PM on Thursday. There are dozens of outstanding speakers on this year’s schedule. So if you haven’t already registered, you owe it to yourself and your professional development to visit the site and check it out.

Another Buildz Echo!

May 17, 2012

I think I’ll just rename my blog: “Buildz Annex”. All I can say about this latest post, is WAY COOL. Check it out.

Buildz and the new Repeat

May 7, 2012

Revit 2103 introduces a new Divide and Repeat feature in the conceptual modeling environment and Zach over at Buildz has done a very cool post showing off some of its potential. You can check it out here.

Echo

Apr 19, 2012

There are a couple good posts out there today:

Over on What Revit Wants:

http://whatrevitwants.blogspot.com/2012/04/materials-in-revit-2013-saga-continues.html

I was glad to see they mentioned the new libraries feature. I think this might be one of the best new features in 2013. This effectively eliminates the need to create “paint chips” and copy and paste between projects. You simply load a material library now! Outstanding.

http://whatrevitwants.blogspot.com/2012/04/percentage-of-item-count-to-total-count.html

This one references an old AUGI post, but a good one.

Over at Revit OpEd

http://revitoped.blogspot.com/2012/04/how-many-worksets-do-i-need.html

Always a good conversation. I think that every project team should think very carefully before creating dedicated Worksets. If you can achieve what you need with borrowing, it is typically easier for the team. My rule of thumb: “have as many Worksets as the project NEEDS, and as FEW as possible”. Naturally this is a little vague, but that is the point. Each project needs to consider all of the issues and come up with a solution that is right for them to avoid the “Tuesday meeting” as Steve mentions.

Finally:

http://revitoped.blogspot.com/2012/04/content-or-content.html

Interesting points made here. I will have to think about that one a little…

 

Installing the Building Design Suite

Apr 14, 2012

I have been waiting to install the latest Autodesk 2013 software because I wanted to install the Suite. The stand alone 2013 products have been out for a few weeks but the Suites (at least the Building Design Suite that I was interested in) only just posted on Thursday this week. I have a few comments on the experience that I would like to share. My main reason for preferring to install the Suite over the individual products is that it is simpler in several ways:

• It is a single download (huge) but a single one just the same
• There is just one installer. You choose the products you want to install. Nice.
• You only have to authorize ONCE. Very nice.

But alas, there is always a downside. So here were some issues that I ran into:

• The download is IMMENSE. 25 GIGs (7 DVDs if you burned it, it was a 7-part archive). Unzipped is over twice this size 66 GIGs!!! Better have a spare hard drive handy to back it up. (I downloaded the Ultimate Suite, so I assume the other “flavors” would be smaller, but probably not much).
• The download is 32 and 64 bit together. It could be just one or the other and therefore half the size. The 2012 suite, I was able to download just the 64 bit. Maybe this is coming later?
• During the download, I had some of the parts fail. I had to resort to downloading them one or two at a time and babysit. Took several hours. This was kind of annoying, though not unexpected.
• I downloaded it to the second hard drive on my primary system (my D drive). Surprisingly, when I copied it to an external HD for backup, it took nearly 4 hours! I know that USB can be slow, but please. 4 hours seems excessive. Thank you Windows…

Once finally downloaded, I could begin the install. The waiting is not over. When you first double-click that EXE to “install” what you are really doing is unzipping. This takes ANOTHER couple hours. (The first time failed, because as i noted above, I had to re-download a few of the archives, never very fun). But when I had everything downloaded, and fired it up, well, the progress bar started and then I hit the first snag:

A bunch of Red error messages started to appear. Issues about QTO and some of its files… At first I watched and wonder how this would affect me, but then decided to cancel and investigate. As you may know, when you unzip the archive, it suggests your C drive in a folder called Autodesk. I usually just change this to D:\Autodesk and leave the rest of the path alone. This time, I was using a folder called _Autodesk Software. This is because I had a few other folders starting with “A” and I recentely renamed my Autodesk folder to ensure that it was first on the list. No issues with BDS 2012 when I did this. But I suspected that due to the length of the path in the red error message above that I was hitting some sort of file name limit. So, I moved the older back to D:\Autodesk and tried again. This time it worked! no errors.

Proud of my cleverness, I let the install continue. Well, the progress bar chugged along for quite a long time and just when it was at the end… it reset itself to the beginning! WTF? Well, remember that message area of the unzip dialog that showed the red error messages for QTO above? Well upon further inspection I noted that it had just completed part 1 of the archive. It was now on to archive 2. <sigh> there are six more parts…

One thing I forgot to mention is that the evening before, when I was downloading, I changed the power settings on my system so that it would not go to sleep and cancel the download. Nothing more frustrating than that. So I left my settings set this way during the unzip too. Trouble is, I had leave for a client meeting and it was only half done. Now, I should have known better than to start this before an appointment. My original plan was to unzip the archive, then cancel and when I came back later, it would be ready to go. I had over an hour before the meeting, so THEORETICALLY it should have been fine… Famous last words…

Well, I had already invested this much time, I did not want to start over. So I just grabbed my machine and took it with me in the car and let it continue unzipping  during my hour commute. I still had the power settings set to not go to sleep. Surly it would be done by the time I arrived? Again my plan would be to simply cancel, and then later run the install from the unzipped folder.

Well, you know what happened next. My screen froze, I had to hard shut down when I got to the client and now I was possibly going to have to unzip all over again. Well in this I got lucky. I had apparently finished unzipping BEFORE it crashed. Luck smiled on me this one time.

 

On to the Install!

So I went into the D:\Autodesk folder, located the Setup.exe file and fired it up. The installer appeared, I configured all of my choices, (selected almost everything, left off a few items) and clicked install. Away it went. There was something like 59 items.

59 of 59 left to install

52 of 59 left to install

40 of 59 left to install

28 of 59 left to install

Icons were appearing on my desktop, it was cranking away and somewhere around 22 items left, an error dialog appears saying something about the installer’s not being able to find some file needed for QTO again. OK, well let me take a look. I manually browse to the location that it says in Windows Explorer and what do I find? Well there’s the offending file. Soooo…

Now get this, there are only two buttons in the dialog that has now stalled the installation. They are “Retry” and “Cancel.” (kind of reminds me of a Revit warning… ouch).

Are you kidding me? You know what Retry did. So feeling defeated, I click Cancel, figuring I don’t REALLY need QTO right now. But wait, it gets better. Do you know what Cancel does? Wait for it…

It REVERSES the ENTIRE installation. That’s right, all of the 37 successfully installed programs up to this point uninstall themselves as I hopelessly watch. Bye Revit, bye AutoCAD, Bye Navis… Unbelievable.

OK, so after some choice words. I try again. This time I will only select Revit, Max Design, AutoCAD Arch, MEP and a few other items. No QTO this time. Off it goes again. After getting much further, somewhere in the teens this time, maybe 15 of XX left, it displays the SAME type of error. This time on some sample project. A SAMPLE PROJECT!!! Really???

So, not about to let it uninstall again and feeling thoroughly frustrated, I click cancel and then kill my machine. I figured, well, if I hard shut down (extreme I know) it won’t be able to uninstall all the programs. Maybe not the most thought out plan, but hey, I was frustrated.

After re-starting my machine, I tested each program. Revit worked, AutoCAD Arch worked, Max Design, Inventor, they all worked.

AutoCAD MEP… totally hosed. (Couldn’t get that lucky could I?)

The REAL issue

OK, well, what about the other programs that did not install? I still did not have QTO, Design Review, Infrastructure Modeler and a few other misc items. So, I tried to install just one at a time. Design Review, no problem. The others not so much. Then it dawned on me. Those errors I got all looked similar.

The issue is the length of the file and folder names. When I downloaded Building Design Suite 2012, the folder of the unzipped file was named: Autodesk_BDS_Ultimate_2012_English_Win_64bit. This time, the folder was named: Autodesk_Building_Design_Suite_Ultimate_2013_English_Win_32-64bit.

Much longer because they wrote out “Building Design Suite” and because it includes the extra 32 bit descriptor in there. I renamed this folder to change the Building_Design_Suite part to just BDS and voila! All products install without fail!

After all of that grief. It is the length of the stinking folder names that caused the trouble. This is really something that should have been tested Autodesk. A few years ago I had a similarly bad experience trying to get my Adobe CS to install. I contacted their tech support and they were no help. Nothing sours the initial experience of a new (and expensive) piece of software like not being able to quickly and easily install it. I am not blaming anyone for the time it takes to download, it is what it is. But folder name lengths are something that can EASILY be tested for and adjusted.

Good grief. Anyhow, I hope that this L O N G post helps someone out there.

So here is a summary of what you want to do:

• Download the archives.
• Run the installer and accept the default location (you can change drives if you like)
• When the actual installer appears, cancel it.
• Browse to the location of the installed folder and rename it to something shorter.
• Double-click the Setup.exe file in the now shortened folder.
• Sit back and wait for it to finish.

 

Revit Room Curiosity

Apr 3, 2012

I just noticed this interesting little anomaly. When you select elements in Revit, the Properties palette reports information on the elements that you have selected. On the Type Selector, you will see the Family and Type of the elements selected unless they do not share the same Family or Type. In such a case, it will say something like “Multiple Types Selected” or “Multiple Families Selected” or even “Multiple Categories Selected” depending on specifically what you have selected. So that brings me to my latest curiosity. Rooms in Revit have always behaved a little differently than other elements. They do not have Families and Types per se. All of the properties are instance parameters. You cannot duplicate a Room Type or create Room Family. When you select a single Room, the Type Selector is simply blank. However, I just noticed that if you have several Rooms selected, instead of being blank, the Type Selector now reports “Multiple Families Selected”. Interesting. Now as I said, you and I cannot manipulate Room Families or Room Types (although I would find it most useful to have Room Types, but that is a discussion for another day). But perhaps behind the scenes each Room is actually a Family? Are these things really In-Place Families? Hmmm. Makes you wonder. Anyone know the inner workings here? Something in the API shed any light? Please feel free to post.

New in Revit 2013?

Mar 30, 2012

I think this is new. I just discovered it, tried it in 2012 and it seems to be new, but I did not see it mentioned anywhere else.

It seems that if you double-click on a Family that it will open in the Family Editor. This is true in the project editor and the Family Editor. Kinda cool? But I can also see this being unintended at times…

Anyone care to comment? What did you find?

My Favorite New Revit 2013 Feature

Mar 27, 2012

OK, officially, I have not been released to talk about the new Autodesk products… But, since the other bloggers got the green light today… I can’t help it, I am going to share my favorite new feature. Click here.

Revit 2013

Mar 27, 2012

David Light has done it again. Terrific and thorough post on what’s new in Revit 2013.

http://autodesk-revit.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/what-new-in-autodesk-revit-2013.html

New Revit video training coming soon

Mar 2, 2012

I am on my flight back to Chicago (literally on the plane – WiFi on planes… wow) from a week of recording in California. My part of the newest Revit course at lynda.com is now complete! I am very excited about this new course. i can’t give all the details yet, but the course is focused on the conceptual massing environment. As soon as I have a green light, I’ll post some screen captures and links to preview videos.

Check back soon and I’ll have more info.

Revit View Range

Jan 28, 2012

I just commented on a post over at the Revit Kid. It reminded me about a video I had posted some time ago on the View Range feature in Revit. I went looking for the link and discovered it had gone missing. So, I decided to repost it here. The video was recorded a few releases ago, but is still relevant to today’s version of Revit. Please enjoy.

Revit Parameters

Jan 19, 2012

I had a client email me about Parameters. They were having a tough time getting their head around the different types, so I thought I would make a quick post about it.

In Revit there are four kinds of Parameters:

System Parameters
Shared Parameters
Project Parameters
Family Parameters

System Parameters which include the two you highlighted are built-in to Revit and cannot be changed, but they are always available. This means they show in tags, schedules, projects, families, etc. Project Parameters are custom parameters you add to a project. When adding a project parameter, it is available to all objects of the specified category throughout the project and CAN appear in schedules but NOT tags. You create them with the command on the Manage tab of the ribbon. Family parameters are only available to the Family in which they are added. They do NOT show in tags or schedules nor to other Families of the same category. However, you can make a custom parameter (Project or Family) available to tags and schedules by making them a Shared Parameter. Shared Parameters are defined in an external text file (a Shared Parameter file) and you can access them also on the Manage tab. It is VERY important that you have a single shared parameter file for the entire firm to “share” thus the name. You do NOT want more than one Shared Parameter file. All this file is used for is to define the parameter. Once defined, it knows how to behave. So ALL shared parameters will be created from this single source file. The end users will not need to have access to, nor do they need to even know about the Shared Parameter file. Kind of like a recipe for your favorite cookies. You need the recipe to get the cookies right, but you don’t need the recipe to enjoy eating them.

If you think there is any chance that a custom parameter will want to be scheduled or tagged, you should make it a shared parameter. So on your titleblock, you need to make those custom parameters at LEAST a project parameter. This will tell Revit what to do with them. But consider making them Shared for additional flexibility down the road.

 

Kind of Parameter	Who Creates it	Where does it live	Appear in Tags	Appear in Schedules	Description
System Parameters	Built in	Project and Family	Yes	Yes	Built-in to Revit, You cannot change it
Shared Parameters	User Defined	Project and Family	Yes	Yes	Custom Parameter created for the highest portability and flexibility
Project Parameters	User Defined	Project	No	Yes	Custom Parameter accessible to all objects in a Project
Family Parameters	User Defined	Family	No	No	Custom Parameter accessible only to the Family

Hope that helps to clarify things a bit.

All Capital Letters – ALT Part 2

Jan 11, 2012

Quick follow-up to yesterday’s post. I found a few decent fonts for this task. In the screenshot here you can see “Arial Caps” and “Tahoma-Capped”. I found both of these at this site. They appear to be royalty free. At least there was no indication otherwise on the site. Also I forgot to mention yesterday that this same approach is effective at capping the headers and the data. Enjoy.

All Capital Letters – ALT

Jan 10, 2012

Steve over at Revit OpEd just posted about making the subtotal at the bottom of a Revit Schedule appear in All CAPS. Traditionally, architectural drawings use all caps for all lettering. As Steve points out, this goes back to traditional hand drafting conventions and trying to ensure consistency between various draftspersons. Consistency in lettering is no longer a problem in the computer age, but some habits linger. When email and posting to online web forums first became popular back in the early 90’s many forums had FAQs explaining rules of “online etiquette”. One of these rules was always: “Don’t use ALL CAPS, IT IS LIKE SHOUTING”. I think in this day and age, most online users know this rule now and you don’t see too much all CAP use anymore… that is unless you are looking at architectural drawings and then the All CAPS thing is quite prevalent indeed. Personally, I prefer mixed case. EVEN on architectural drawings. I rarely use the CAP Lock key on my keyboard. However, it is still a pretty common desire among Architects, Designers and Engineers to use all CAPs in documentation.

That brings us back to the subject of Steve’s post. Steve points out that Revit does not offer us a way to make the automatically created labels on Revit schedules such as “Grand Total” in all CAPs. This is a limitation or “feature” of the software depending on your point of view. Steve proposes a work around. Well, this got me thinking if there was another way to achieve this. I decided to do a quick test with fonts. It turns out that to “trick” Revit into doing this automatically without having to use manual text is to use a font that uses only CAPs. I had a few on my system so I did some quick tests.

As you can see, the fonts I had available were not great examples for this application. The Telegrafico font has really small numbers. The Tonio font does not have a dash character and the PTF Nordic font is a bit too bold and rounded. Therefore, consider them “proof of concept.” If you get an acceptable font, (or create one if you know how to do that), then all you have to do is set the Schedule to use this custom “all CAP” font in the Appearance tab.

Thanks for starting the conversation Steve.

M-six BIM toolset preview

Jan 10, 2012

I am a little late on this one, but I got a message in my LinkedIn box the other day. Other bloggers (What Revit Wants and Revit OpEd) have already shared this, so let’s call this an echo. It was from a company called M-six. They have a video preview of their new soon to be released toolset. Looks VERY interesting and delivers on the stuff many of us in the BIM space have been saying BIM had potential to do. I think it is worth keeping an eye on these tools and how they develop.

Year end reading

Dec 27, 2011

For many of us, this week is a little slow. Maybe you are not fortunate to have it off from work, but just the same, many folks are away or otherwise winding down the year. Sounds like a good time to catch up on reading if you ask me. Now it might be more enjoyable to read the latest novel or perhaps if you are like me, you got a copy of the Steve Jobs book for Christmas. But the boss may not look too kindly on this kind of reading on the job…

But, if you were “caught” reading a copy the latest Revit or AutoCAD training materials, not only would the boss be unlikely to be upset, you might even get an “attaboy” out of the exchange.

So to help us celebrate the New Year, we have extended the exclusive 40% off deal previously offered only to attendees of Autodesk University. Now through December 31st, you can get 40% off the cover price of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP and  The Aubin Academy Master Series: AutoCAD MEP titles. To get the discount, you have to order from the Create Space eStore link.  Just input the discount code: SGESYKP2 during checkout.

Please enjoy the book and the special limited time discount. Thank you and Happy New Year!

Minor Correction in our AutoCAD MEP 2012 book

Dec 11, 2011

On page 81, Figure 2.13, we reversed the descriptions of letters c and d. Thanks to Steve for pointing this out.

#AU2011 Resources Posted

Dec 11, 2011

Did you make to #AU2011 this year? If you are like me, there are too many classes to attend in the short three days we are there at the confernce. Or maybe you couldn’t make it this year. Well, the folks running the conference outdid themselves again with a terrific event. They are also hard at work preparring all the recorded classes for posting to AU online. You can visit right now and find some of the resources such as class papers and PowerPoint presentations (where available). More to come soon.

I have posted all of my class materials right here on my website. You can find the papers for each of my four Revit Architecture classes in both PDF and ePUB format. You can also find all of my dataset files used in demostrations and labs. For my Family Editor Step-by-step Introduction class, I have also posted video recordings of the entire class. I recorded these before AU and they include both the material I covered live in Vegas as well as many bonus lessons I did not have time to present in the short 90 minute lab. You can find all of these items posted here. Enjoy!

Un-BIM-lievable!

Nov 20, 2011

Planning to attend Autodesk University? If so, make sure you check out the class: “Un-BIM-lievable! You Did What with AutoCAD® Architecture?” Class ID: DL5808. This class is presented by my longtime client friend Patricia Wines of Walt Disney Imagineering (WDI). She will be joined by two of her WDI colleagues Michael Ross and Jess Kuncar.

In Patty’s own words:

 “I hope I can count on you all to attend our 8:15 am class on Thursday morning.”

“We are going to be showing some AMAZING models we have created in AutoCAD, and some great imagery from projects in construction. I realize time is limited at AU, and I know we are scheduled at the most inopportune time after a big party, but I promise a great presentation. So if you have customers/partners/users interested in how to execute BIM in ANY platform, I urge you to attend our session. We are really excited about what we’re going to present. We hope you’ll join us.”

 I will echo that sentiment. WDI does some amazing stuff that just “wows” me every time I’m there. Here is the official class description:

This class will demonstrate that sufficiently utilized design software can create beautiful, graceful, complex, and intriguing BIM models. Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) are ubiquitous phrases used in the marketplace today and studied in universities, and they might well be the most overused and misunderstood. The word might more accurately be spelled b*I*m, because the building and the model are second to the information and its consumer. Knowing how much information is required and providing a supply of it equal to the demand makes for the most efficient and useful models. In this class, a number of successful designs will be discussed, focusing on the work created for Disney’s California Adventure in Anaheim, and in particular, the extremely successful Voyage of The Little Mermaid attraction.

 If you are able to attend this session, I am sure you will find it one of the most satisfying sessions of the conference. Come join me in the back to give Patty a big cheering section!

Fixed!

Nov 18, 2011

The book pages are working again! If you are looking for datasets or other information on the either of the following titles:

The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2012
The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2012

The pages are back up and running. Thank you for your patience.

Revit MEP book Dataset issues

Nov 16, 2011

It has just been brought to my attention that the downloads portion of the the Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2012 page is broken! This means that the link to downloading the dataset files is missing as well. I have my web designer working on fixing the problem but in the meantime, I wanted to post an alternate link to the dataset files. You can find them located here. The Readme file is here. My appologies for any confusion. We should have the normal page back up and running shortly.

Book Dataset Updates posted for Metric Architectural Files

Oct 24, 2011

In the Aubin Academy Master Series, I try to provide copies of the out-of-the-box files referenced in the text with the book’s dataset files. They are typically included for convenience in a folder named: “Library”. It seems with the Metric datasets for the last two editions of my Revit Architecture title, I missed a few of the metric files. These include the files named: M_Opening-Cased.rfa and M_Double Hung.rfa. Both of these files are available in the US Metric content packs installed with the software. You can also find them on Autodesk Seek. However, for convenience, I have posted an update to the book datasets for both the 2011 and 2012 editions. You can visit the book pages here:

The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2011:

http://paulaubin.com/books/the-aubin-academy-master-series-revit-architecture-2011/

The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2012:

http://paulaubin.com/books/the-aubin-academy-master-series-revit-architecture-2012/

Look for the download labeled; “Metric Dataset Update”

A self-extracting WinZip file is provided containing the missing files. To install these files, simply run the EXE file and let it unzip to the location of your existing MasterRAC 2011 or 2012 folder. No files will be overwritten, but by unzipping this way, they will be placed in the correct subfolders.

If you use Imperial units, you do not need this update.

New edition of Revit MEP book now available

Oct 16, 2011

The latest edition of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2012 is now available. You can learn more about the book and place orders from this page. Like our AutoCAD MEP title, this book is authored by myself and Darryl McClelland, Martin Schmid and Gregg Stanley. We are publishing this title through the CreateSpace service under the imprint G3B Press. The book is currently available for order directly through the CreateSpace eStore. Be sure to input the coupon code on book page to save $10 off the cover price. The book should also be available soon on Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble and other resellers. It usually takes a few days to as many as a few weeks to get into their systems. The full text of the book will also be searchable on GoogleBooks. The title is not yet live on GoogleBooks, but should be very soon. The GoogleBook service serves as the index for this title. Simply input a serach query into the field on the book page and it will show you all the locations found including page number references in the physical book. The dataset is live and available now for immediate download. We hope to have an ePub version of the book available very soon as well.

Thank you in advance for those that visit the book page and especially those who purchase a copy. Your comments and feedback is also most welcome.

Revit Architecture Rendering at lynda.com

Oct 8, 2011

As promised the second of my two new lynda.com courses: Revit Architecture Rendering, is now live! Revit Architecture like most Autodesk 3D products uses the Mental Ray rendering engine to create photorealistic renderings from 3D views directly in the software. This all new course at lynda.com outlines the entire process from the creation of 3D views, to modeling and materials, lighting and generating a rendering. An overview of the table of contents includes the following:

 

• 1. Introduction and high level concepts: covering the basic rendering process and prerequisites.
• 2. Creating 3D Views: Understanding 3D views, creating axonometric views, creating camera views.
• 3. Modeling: covers approaches to modeling, Walls, Sweeps, imported geometry and modeling tips.
• 4. Materials: explores an overview of materials, material graphics, material appearance, creating custom textures and sharing materials between files.
• 5. Location and Sun Settings: covers geographic location, sun settings, true north and the Sun Path tool.
• 6. Lighting: covers inserting artificial lighting Families, understanding light fixture Families, manufacturer’s fixtures, lighting groups and other lighting tips.

 

• 7. Rendering: explores the render dialog in detail: quality presets, customizing, resolution, lighting settings, output settings.
• 8. Walkthroughs: learn how to set up a Walkthrough, edit a Walkthrough and output a Walkthrough.
• 9. Output and other tips: Output your renderings, create non-photorealistic renderings, create solar studies and more.

 

I am really excited about how this course turned out and I hope you will drop by and give it a look. You can visit the lynda.com site to learn more and sign up for a subscription. While you are there, you can also check out the all new Revit Family Editor course that went live last month and the Revit Architecture Essentials as well.

You can see the intro movie on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUYTbT4nrO0

Full disclosure: I receive a referral for each subscriber to lynda.com from the links on this site. I also receive royalties for my courses posted on the lynda.com site.

 

New Revit Family Editor Course on lynda.com

Sep 22, 2011

I am happy to report that the first of my two new Revit courses on lynda.com is now available. The new course: Revit Architecture: The Family Editor includes an update to my Revit Family Editor Series DVD training and so much more!

The original DVD series covered the basics of the Family Editor for version 2010. This new lynda.com course expands greatly on the material included in the original series and updates the material for 2012. The original series was approximately 4 hours in length. This new lynda.com course is a whopping 6 hours and 44 minutes! In addition, the production quality available at lynda.com is far superior to what was produced in the original series. Given changes made to the Family Editor since 2010, the higher quality and expanded table of contents, I think you will find the new course a very worthwhile update to the original.

Here is a snippet of the table of contents:

• 1. Introduction and high level concepts: covering what a Family is, the Revit element hierarchy, libraries and differences between model and annotation Families. Strategies and course focus are also covered.
• 2. Annotation Families: covering kinds of annotation, creating Generic Annotation and Tag Families and using Shared Parameters in Tag Families.
•  3. Simple Model Families: covering the overall model Family creation process, hosts and hosted, reference planes, constraints, labeled dimensions, work planes, flexing and testing.
• 4. Family Geometry: detailed look at: Extrusions, Blends, Revolves, Sweeps, Swept Blends and void form basics.
• 5. Beyond Geometry: includes coverage of identity data, Family Types, Type Catalogs, material parameters, visibility parameters and subcategories.
• 6. A Family in a Family: covering nested Families, Shared Families, Profile Families and parametric arrays.

 

• 7. Controlling Visibility: explores symbolic lines, element visibility, level of detail display and controlling overhead display in plan.
• 8. Building Complex Parametric Families: begins tying together many of the previous topics to create a more complex whole. Covers planning, reference plane strategies, nesting components, arrays, parameters, formulas driving parameters and <family types> parameters.

 

• 9. Parametric Annotation Family: ties together many previous topics to create a more complex annotation Family. A parametric key plan Family using conditional formulas to drive visibility is showcased.
• 10. Driving Angular Parameters: Controlling rotation and angles can be a challenge. This chapter uses a Door Family as an example to showcase how to parametrically control rotation and angular parameters.
• 11. Advanced Strategies – Control a curve parametrically: Controlling curves can be a challenge. This chapter uses a brick arch Family to showcase how to parametrically control the flexing of curves in the Family editor. It also delves into advanced and complex formulas used to drive circle geometry. Advanced trigonomic functions are utilized to constraint the curve’s flexing behavior.

 

 

 

The This course is designed to get you up to speed with the Family Editor quickly. You can view a YouTube preview of the class here.

lynda.com library is a fantastic resource to learn a huge range of topics. With a large focus on creative software packages and topics, you will find tremendous value in not only the Revit course offerings but programs like 3ds max, Photoshop, MS Office, SketchUp and more. I hope you take a look at my new Revit Architecture: The Family Editor course today, and while you are there check out the other terrific courses that lynda.com has to offer.

Full disclosure: I receive a referral for each subscriber to lynda.com from the links on this site. I also receive royalties for my courses posted on the lynda.com site.

New Revit courses coming soon to lynda.com

Sep 7, 2011

I spent this past week in Ventura, CA recording two new courses for lynda.com.

Paul in the Booth

I already have the Revit Essential Training course on lynda.com that covers all the basic skills you need to get up and running with Revit Architecture. The essentials course was recorded for Revit 2011, but remains applicable to 2012 as well. I cannot yet disclose the details of the two new courses, but the overall topics will include the Family Editor and Rendering! The courses shoudl be ready very soon, so please stay tuned for more details. Thanks!

 

Full disclosure: I receive a referral for each subscriber to lynda.com from the links on this site. I also receive royalties for my courses posted on the lynda.com site.

The Rise of the Planet of Revit

Sep 4, 2011

Just playing around and whipped up Ceasar’s window as a Revit Family.

Under new management!

Jul 19, 2011

I am happy to announce that the newest edition of The Aubin Academy Master Series: AutoCAD MEP 2012 is in the final proofing stages. We are just days away from release now. This year the book will be published under a new imprint and publisher: yours truly! Our previous publisher Cengage Learning has transfered the rights to us. We are publishing the newly revised and updated for 2012 title under the imprint G3B Press. (There is a back story to this name, but I will save it for another day). Books will be manufactured on-demand using the CreateSpace service. CreateSpace is an Amazon company providing print on demand services for books, CDs and DVDs.

Learn more about this book.
***UPDATE: Ordering is now LIVE for this book! Click the link on the book page above to learn more and place an order. For a limited time, use discount code: YPTMBGMF at checkout to save $12.00 off the cover price! This code will be valid for a limited time only. You must use the CreateSpace eStore link on the book page to input this code. Thanks for considering our new book.

Read more

Revit 2012 Book Dataset Files

Jul 14, 2011

It has been brought to my attention that the dataset files for my latest edition of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2012 have not yet been posted to the CengageBrain website. I am of course dismayed by this situation and I am working closely with the publisher to rectify it. However, I have ALL datasets for ALL of my books posted on this website. You can simply click the Books link at the top, click the book you have and then scroll down to find the downloads. The 2012 Revit Architecture book dataset can be found here.

Thank you!

Digging

Jul 11, 2011

Have you ever tried to dig a hole in wet soil? You dig in and lift out your shovel of wet earth, only to have the soft slushy soil surrounding it simply fill in and impede your progress. Take another shovelful, and soon there is more there to take its place. You never seem to get done… Can’t seem to get to the bottom.

This is my email inbox…

RTC Dataset Files

Jun 5, 2011

For those of you who attended my sessions at RTC Australia, I mentioned that I would be posting the dataset files from those classes. I am not sure when the RTC folks will publish them to their site, but I thought I would get them posted here in the meantime. If you didn’t attend RTC Australia, there is still time to attend RTC North America! Hope to see you there.

RTC Top CAT and KnowledgeSmart

Jun 1, 2011

RTC featured many exhibitors in its exhibit hall and among them was KnowledgeSmart, a company providing knowledge assessment skills tests for Revit and many other CAD and BIM applications. I have done work for the folks at KnowledgeSmart providing a bank of questions for their Revit Architecture exam. This year at RTC, they decided to run a little skills competition that they called Top Cat. The results are in. You can see a complete break down over on the KnowledgeSmart blog. Rory has done a very thorough job compiling these results and included many charts and graphs. Check it out!

If you are interested in a testing solution for your organization, the KnowledgeSmart approach is very well conceived. (I am not just saying this because I wrote some questions). I use their assessment for my college class final exam. The entire exam is web-based, so conceivably you can take it anywhere you have an Internet connection, (but you do also need the software: Revit or whichever tool you are testing). Questions can be knowledge based (true/false, multiple choice, fill in, etc) or can be hands-on. In a hands-on question, you are asked to download a file, perform a specified task and then answer a question based on the task completed. Everything is automatically scored and you see results immediately. Best of all administrators can customize the test to suit the needs of your users. You can learn more about KnowledgeSmart at their website.

RTC Austrailia

May 28, 2011

After a very challenging travel experience I finally made it to Australia for the Revit Technology Conference. This is my first time to the land down under and my first time speaking at RTC! My original flight was scheduled to go through Dallas/ Fort Worth on Monday and due to extreme weather pummeling the Midwest was cancelled. This left me stranded before I even began my journey and wondering if I would make it to the conference at all. After several hours of phone calls to the airlines and two days of delays waiting for an available flight I rebooked on a flight through Los Angeles and made it to the conference. I got off the plane, got through customs and headed straight for the hotel and was on stage shortly thereafter (with 20 minutes to spare) to give my first presentation. Jet lag would have to wait!

The terrific RTC hosts and planners rearranged the schedule to accommodate my missed flight. I had been scheduled to speak the first day of the conference, but with my delayed arrival, this was not possible. Instead they rearranged everything so that I could still give all three of my sessions! Thank you to the RTC team and all the attendees who also rearranged their planned sessions to attend. It was terrific to have such a wonderful turnout.

I quite enjoyed the conference. It is smaller than Autodesk University and has a much more intimate feel, but it is every bit as informative. Everything is well organized, the venue has nice amenities and is very convenient to the conference. The RTC committee pays attention to many small details which give the conference a very personal feel. They have assembled a great bunch of speakers and I was able to attend a few sessions when I was not speaking and they were quite enjoyable. A very nice touch at the end of the final day is the Glorious Gadgets and Conference Wrap up Session. Here they get everyone together, to a fun and informative final session that is light and informal – almost conversational. They show some cool tech, summarize highlights from the conference and many sessions and end with a discussion of things to come. Overall, well done.

Naturally I wish my stay would have been longer, but alas, I am back on my flight back to the States early tomorrow morning. However, in just four short weeks I get to participate again; this time in RTC USA! If you haven’t signed up yet, please consider coming out to Huntington Beach, CA this June for an information packed three days with many of the industry’s best known Revit experts. Having experienced the kind of show they put on here in Australia, I can say that you won’t be disappointed! Hope to see you there.

New Revit Book Almost Here!

May 17, 2011

I am happy to report that the newest edition of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2012 is nearly complete and will be shipping soon. Current estimates put publication date at mid to late June. That’s about a month and a half away! Considering that we did not pub till September last year, I would say that is a nice improvement.

Once upon a time, this blog was devoted to the process of producing CAD books. I have gotten away from that in recent years for a variety of reasons. However, this is a good post to revive a little of that original flavor since this edition of the Revit Architecture book marks a first for this title.

This year, we produced the book with an entirely new process. In the past, the process would begin with Microsoft Word files extracted from the previous edition’s page layout files. I would edit those files, pass on to various editors. There woudl be some back and forth reviewing and accepting revisions, and then it woudl go back into page layout software. PDF proofs woudl come out of this and I would get a final review of the proofs before moving off to the press. This time, we are using new software that enables us to eliminate the Microsoft Word files entirely! I work direclty in the files using software that enables me to edit the live page layout files without being able to change the layout nor having to even understand how. Using a VPN connection, I am given access to the text and images. I can type edits directly in the software. All edits are tracked and when I am complete, there is a built-in sequence in the database, so that I check in the file and the next person in line gains access to do their part. Using this new process has allowed us to shave considerable time off of the schedule. So, the benefit to all of you is that we get a book out sooner! There have been some hurdles to overcome, but overall the process has worked quite well.

There are actually lots of other things happening behind the scenes this year. But I will save some of those for future posts. Meanwhile, on the book page the dataset files are currently live. So feel free to download early. If you have comments or questions, I would love to hear them.

Next week I fly to Australia to speak at the Revit Technology Conference (RTC) and next month I’ll be speaking at the first RTC here in the US. It is not too late to sign up, so if you would like to attend, you can learn more here. I wil be teaching my sessions in Revit 2012, and while the Australia conference is a little too soon for me to have 2012 books, I hope to have a few to give away at the US one, so there’s a little extra incentive to register today!

Revit Technology Conference

May 14, 2011

In just a few weeks, the Revit Technology Conference debuts in North America. (This conference is entering its seventh year in Australia this year, and the Australian counterpart is just a week away!) I am fortunate to be joining a large group of the World’s leading Revit experts in speaking at both of these events this year. Are you planning to attend? If you have not yet registered, it’s not too late! You can find complete details at the conference’s official page. You can find a complete list of speakers, classes, dates, rates and information on lodging. This is a terrific event geared completely around Revit and Building Information Modeling.

Hope to see you there!

Update to Dataset for Revit MEP book

Mar 17, 2011

We have posted an update to the datset files for The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2012.

You can visit the book page and scroll down to the downloads section to find it. It shoudl be posted to the CengageBrain site soon too.

When we prepared the files for the book, we really wanted to emulate the real life experience as much as possbile. Therefore, we created many of the chapter datasets using Worksharing. We assumed that since our files are installed to your C Drives, that Revit should be able to find the Central Files OK and all would be well. Alas this has not proven to be the case. It seems that Revit is looking at the actual machine name for the Central File rather than simply the C Drive. So if you wanted to use the datasets as originally published, you would need to detach them from Central and then resave them as a Central File. To save you the effort, we have produced non-Workset versions of the files for Chapters 4, 5 and 7.

The need for this update came from comments by one of our readers. So your comments are most welcome and much appreciated. Please keep them coming and thank you to all who have commented and offered suggestions.

Looking for a recommendation

Mar 9, 2011

I am in the market for a new headset and webcam. I woudl like the headset to be wireless and work with my phone. It woudl be nice if it also worked with the computer, but I am more interted in the phone. For the webcam, there seems to be a million of them out there. Anyone care to share their experiences or make a recommendation?

Thanks.

At long last…

Jan 29, 2011

I am pleased to annouce that The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2011 is officially released. I have a copy right here on my desk. Here it is:

It took WAY too long to get this one out on the street. As Steve Stafford pointed out, it is thinner than the other books, but hopefully you will find like Steve that it is packed with useful information nonetheless. Thanks for your very kind review Steve.

****Update – Jan 30****

To celebrate the arrival of the book, I gave away three FREE copies from this post. They were snatched up fast! I have disabled the order page and the books are on their way to the three lucky winners who waited in the cold and snow… (just kidding, they just clicked their mice, but the books are on the way). Leave a comment on this page if you missed out and I will try to get some more free copies soon… Thanks.

****

We have gotten lots of good requests and feedback so far. So thank you to everyone who has sent messages and please keep them coming. If you are interested in purchasing the book, you can find complete details here. (Full disclosure: Amazon pays me a referral fee for all sales generated through the links on this site – Thank you!)

If you like the book (or any of my books) your positive reviews on Amazon are most welcome. (5 star is greatly appreciated).

Aubin Academy Revit MEP Dataset

Jan 23, 2011

It appears that there is a techincal issue with getting the dataset for the Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2011 up on the CengageBrain website. I was informed that they were re-posting the files but it seems it is taking a bit longer than anticipated. In the meantime, I have posted them to my site.

You can get the entire dataset as a single Winzip executable file here.

eBooks

Jan 21, 2011

Many people have emailed me over the years about digital versions of my books. Digital versions are starting to become available for some titles like The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2011. This title (and a few others) is available for purchase and rental as an eBook from three outlets. Many of you may prefer a good old fashioned paper-based book. But for those who prefer a digital edition, these are three options: 

Amazon Kindle:

With Amazon Kindle, you have three options: use an actual Kindle device, download the Kindle for PC application or download the app for iPod, iPad and iPhone. Kindle has search, highlighting and note taking features. Another nice feature is that all figure references are hyperlinked back to the images.

Barnes &amp; Noble Nook:

You will need to set up an account with Barnes &amp; Noble. You can use an actual Nook device, or you download their Nook Study application. This application will allow you to download the digital version of the book to your computer, read it onscreen, add notes and highlight sections. You can even make links between areas of the text and of course it includes full text search. I was able to download the entire book for a 7-day free trial.

CengageBrain eChapters:

I do not have a sample of this. (Amusing since this is my publisher’s site). They have rental options of 6 mo, 1 yr and 2 yr. You can also buy individual chapters. This is the only one of the three that offers individual chapters. Also, my understanding of the CengageBrain option is that these are PDF files unlike the other two which are digital editions that must be read in the appropriate reader applications.

Anyhow, if anyone is interested in digital versions, there are all your options. Enjoy.

New book for Revit MEP

Jan 21, 2011

I usually wait till I have actual copies of the book in my hand before I post to say that they are available, but it does appear that the new book: Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2011 is starting to become available at the various sales outlets. It is listed on both Amazon and Barnes and Noble, but Amazon seems to have a VERY long ship time listed currently. Meanwhile, Barnes and Noble claims it ships in 24 hours!

I will post here when I do

Holiday Wishes

Dec 22, 2010

Hello all. As we wind down the week and the year, I hope that everyone gets some time to spend with friends and family and recharge the ol’batteries.

My kids are off from school now and enjoying their winter break. We almost ready for Christmas morning and looking forward to a nice day with the family.

Please accept my warmest wishes for a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and a Happy New Year. Most of all, wherever your travels take you on and around Dec 25th, please be safe and take some time to remember what is most important.

Thanks. See you all in the new year.

Autodesk University – Day 3

Dec 2, 2010

Well that came quick! Hard to believe it is day three and I am sitting in my last class. I am done teaching. My fifth and last class was an hour ago. Today I taught Make a Strong Finish! Revit® Interiors and Finishes at 8 AM! Not cool. I got there just a few minutes before and without coffee! First hour was tough. I was not running on all cylinders. I got some coffee at break and it got better from there. Feedback from the class was good though. I also taught The Ultimate Door Schedule in AutoCAD® Architecture. This was a smaller class, but the group seemed to enjoy it.

I did get a chance to attend some classes today and David Fano’s Parametric Design Modeling with Autodesk® 3ds Max® was awesome. I have not used Max in some time and some of the stuff he was modeling was just awesome.

At the exhibit hall, I got my head scanned (photographed actually) and it will be converted to 3D! Cool. This is an Autodesk Labs project mentioned on the main stage. Looks awesome.

Not sure what is on tap for tonight. There is no party this year, so we’ll see what folks do. That’s all for now…

Autodesk University – Day 2

Dec 1, 2010

Hard to believe it is already December 1st and the second day of AU! It was a good day today at AU. I began the morning with Robert manna and Zach Kron’s Au Bon Panel: Baking Your Own Adaptive Components and Panels with Autodesk® Revit® Architecture. This was a hands-on lab where we got to build curtain panel families and adaptive components in the Conceptual Modeling Environment in Revit. Good class. They covered a lot of ground in a short time. Congratulations on the new baby Robert. I also attended Revit® Interiors: Thinking Outside the Box, Inside the Building by Amber White and Jacalyn Pollock. They are co-workers and showed how they have used Revit on many interiors projects in their firm. Pretty interesting stuff. I also taught two classes today. Another “ask the experts” with my three co-authors Darryl, Gregg and Martin and an AutoCAD Architecture class on sections and elevations.

Tonight I will be at the Cadalyst booth 309 at the beer bust in the exhibit hall at 7:30. Hope to see some of you there.

Autodesk University – Day 1

Dec 1, 2010

First full day of sessions. AU is in full swing. The last two years I missed the general session. This year, I made sure to get up early and attend. Having missed last year’s i had no idea that there is a stadium-like event center here at Mandalay Bay. Pretty cool, it was like the main stage presentation was in a concert venue. They had several presenters from various industries present their innovations, passions and projects. It was pretty impressive. From cool totally electric cars, to microwave powered commercial space craft to cloud computing and sexy cyborgs. This session had a little of everything. And let’s not forget Tron. We saw a cool demo reel that was used to pitch the movie to the execs. Nice!

There are definately more people here this year than last year. I am seeing lots of familiar faces and plenty of new ones too. Today I only taught one class, it was a panel discussion on Revit MEP including me and my three co-authors for our upcoming Revit MEP book. The class was well attended and produced a very productive discussion with lots of audience participation. I am pretty pleased with the outcome. We got some homework from the class and will post the materials we promised soon. We have another class like this tomorrow for AutoCAD MEP and I am also solo teaching a class on AutoCAD Architecture Elevations.

I attended several classes today as well. My favorites were: Creating Advanced Parametric Content in Autodesk® Revit®: Kiss Dysfunctional Families Goodbyeby Desirée Ratley and Combine 3D Models with Live Footage Using 3D Tracking Techniques by Louis Marcoux.

Desirée presented a nicely rehearsed expose on creating parametric families with many useful and innovative features. Her passion for the software really came through and it is clear from here presentation and delivery that she really put some effort into preparation. As an instructor myself, I appreciate it when an instructor is well prepared, provides useful content and tries hard to provide the attendees with the most value they can in the time allowed. Speaking of time allowed, this year’s classes are only 60 minutes instead of the traditional 90 minutes of past years. Both Desirée and Louis tried real hard to pack as much useful information into that short amount of time. Louis’s class was flat out amazing. he managed to pack more info into that 60 minutes than many instructors can achieve in 90 or more. What made this more impressive is the near perfect balance between theory in PowerPoint and hands-on demonstration in the live software. I can’t wait to get back home and try out his technique and then show my son. (My son wants to be a film maker and this technique could be of great use to him).

I was a little bummed that I missed half of the Introduction to Photo-Based Reality Capture: Turn Photographs into a 3D Model in AutoCAD®by Dominique Pouliquen. (I was chasing down a lost package at the USPS). The software he showed is on Autodesk Labs and lets you take a series of photographs and turn them into a 3D model. I definitely want to learn more about this.

Overall, very good first day. Looking forward to tomorrow and my two sessions.

Autodesk University – Day 0

Nov 29, 2010

I am here in the speaker ready room at Autodesk University. Arrived late last evening after a smooth flight in. Today is all the pre events, culminatining in various welcome parties this eveing. I am teaching 3 classes on my own and 2 others I am co-presenting with my authoring team from my MEP books. Five classes in all, so it will be a busy week. You can learn more about the conference at www.autodesk.com/au.  If you are here in attendance, be sure to drop by one of my classes and say hello.

I’m in a gift giving mood

Nov 27, 2010

Autodesk University 2010 is quickly approaching, and as part of each session, I’ll be providing participants with the first three chapters from each of my books from the new Aubin Academy Master Series. Since I’m feeling festive, I thought I’d extend these downloads to guests of my blog. Please feel free to download any (or all) of the chapters below.

Also Available for download
Advanced Implementation Guide – Chapter 7

New AutoCAD Books have arrived

Nov 16, 2010

Last week I received copies of the latest edition of  The Aubin Academy Master Series: AutoCAD MEP 2011 and today I received my copies of The Aubin Academy Master Series: AutoCAD Architecture 2011. Course|Notes for each of these titles and Revit Architecture are also available leaving only The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit MEP 2011 book and Course|Notes outstanding. We have suffered some unfortunate delays this year, but I am pleased to finally have the books out on the street and ready to go. If you wish to learn more, you can visit the book pages for each above.

And now an apology:

David Koch has been a longtime contributor to the AutoCAD Architecture book. He has assisted me in at least the last three editions. This year, I worked on four books and David took on the lion’s share of the work for the AutoCAD Architecture book. David is compensated for his efforts, but I had intended to also reward him by placing his name as a contributor on the cover of the book.

Alas, it appears there has been an oversight at the publisher and this did not occur. My apologies David, you really deserve the recognition. I will make certain that this does not happen again next year.

Hey, I won the “goodest”

Nov 1, 2010

Having entered the  2nd Annual Parametric Pumpkin Carving Internationale! it appears my entry made the list! I was awarded the title of “goodest”. Now there is a funny back story here. Growing up, my dad always used to say “goodest”. He always said it with a smile. “Well son, that’s becuase you’re the goodest” or when refering to his company, “here at CRS we are the goodest”, that sort of thing. I am sure he will get a chuckle out of my new accolade… You can read the complete post and see all the awards here at Buildz:

http://buildz.blogspot.com/2010/10/happy-halloween-ii.html

Don’t forget to Vote!

Nov 1, 2010

Tomorrow is election day. I am not here to promote a particular candidate or agenda. I just want to be sure that everyone votes! Please get out there and vote. It only takes a few minutes and your boss MUST allow you the time off.

Thanks.

Airplane spotted in Google Maps

Oct 25, 2010

Another off-topic post. I was searching Google Maps today for a location on the east side of Chicago when I noticed that the satalite photo captured a plane flying overhead. It is pretty cool and as you can see, the satalite must capture the image in several passes, as there is a version for each clor as the plane passes by.

If you want to see this for yourself, click here. Very cool.

The Book is here!

Sep 30, 2010

After a VERY long wait this cycle, I am happy to announce that today I received my copy of The Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2011.

This is the 2011 edition of my Revit Architecture book: Paul F. Aubin’s Mastering Revit Architecture 2010. This year we have re-branded this and other books under the new banner of “The Aubin Academy Master Series.”  This was done for a few reasons. First, there was already (and has been for some time) another title called “Mastering Revit Architecture.” It is by another publisher and by different authors. So part of the re-branding is an attempt to eliminate some of the confusion caused by having two different books with essentially the same title. The other reason for the switch is to help group all of my books (4 titles this year) under a single banner.
Read more

VICO Software is hiring

Sep 24, 2010

VICO Software is fast growing company offering 4D and 5D solutions to the AECO industry. And, they are hiring! VICO is actively recruiting Project Engineers in both northern and southern California. Please read through the job description.

Aubin Academy Master Series: AutoCAD MEP 2011

Sep 17, 2010

It has been an interesting summer. The exciting news is that all of my books are rebranded this year as the “Aubin Academy Master Series” – Exciting! This includes AutoCAD Architecture, AutoCAD MEP, Revit Architecture and new this year: Revit MEP! (need to get that one finished, but more on that later).

The disappointing news is that we have experienced delays at the publisher and all the rebranded books are LATE. Arrgggg. Well, to try to soften the blow a little, I am going to post some sample chapters. Let’s start with a sample from the new edition of the AutoCAD MEP book. You can find the complete text of Chapter 6 here.

Please enjoy!

Custom Revit Elevation Tags – Part 2

Sep 7, 2010

Sorry it has taken me a while to get back to this post. In a post a couple weeks ago, I shared the steps to create a custom elevation tag with a PDF excerpt from the soon to be published Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2011. (Sorry the book is slow to store shelves. I am assured by the publisher that it will be here soon…)
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Teaching Revit at Moraine Valley this Fall

Aug 11, 2010

I’ll be teaching MDT-292 at Moraine Valley Community College again this Fall. The course is Tuesday and Thursday evenings 6:00 to 8:15 PM. I’ve included the course description below:
Read more

Aubin Academy Master Series: Revit Architecture 2011

Aug 4, 2010

The 2011 edition of Paul F. Aubin’s Mastering Revit Architecture is almost here. The book is being re-branded this year as part of the Aubin Academy Master Series. As we do every year, the entire book has been revised, new material added for 2011, existing content enhanced to reflect current best-practices and techniques and where found, errors and omissions fixed. This year’s edition will be a little larger than last years reflecting new features for 2011.
Read more

Revit Architecture 2011 Essential Training now on lynda.com

Jul 23, 2010

I am pleased to announce the availability of my first course for lynda.com. lynda.com has been providing high quality video training for creative software for many years. There are thousands of courses to choose from including Adobe products (Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Flash), Microsoft projects (Office 2007, Office 2010), portable devices (iPhone) and much more.
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Book Updates

Jul 3, 2010

So its summertime again and that means trying to get book updates finished! We have four books slated for release this year and some re-branding as well.
Read more

Workset Crash Solved

Jul 1, 2010

Thanks to some folks who left comments here on my previous post, I have figured out the reason for my Revit Workset Crash! Thanks very much.

Here is a cross-post of the solution. This is my response to the AUGI thread that ultimately led to the solution.
If you want to read the entire AUGI thread, you can find it here.

–

I was having a similar issue. I placed a post about it on my blog and got some comments back, one of which directed me to this thread. Steve’s reply about the factory post (and disabling addons) did the trick! (Isn’t the Internet great? Blog post > Comment > Link to AUGI > Post > Link to Factory > Success! )

Anyhow, here is the summary: In Revit Arch and MEP 2011, I could create a Workshared project, but the next time I tried to open the Worksets dialog, I would crash Revit. STC worked, Save worked, just if you click Worksets, poof.

So, I dragged all Addins to my desktop, tried it, it worked fine. SOOO, I began adding them back to the folder one at a time.

Worksharing monitor – check
Batch Plot – check
MEP Space Naming – check
Revit DB Link – check
Model Review – check
Google Link – check
Avatech Utilities – check (so glad this wasn’t it. I use these tools all the time – great stuff).
Revit Extensions – POOF – This is the one!

When I launch, I get the following error:

Revit cannot run the external application “ARECRevitStart” contact the provide of this external tool with the information below

System.IO.FileLoadException
System.IO.FileLoadException: Could not load file or assembly ‘AREXManager,
Version=2011.0.0.1408, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null’ or one of its dependencies. The
parameter is incorrect. ﴾Exception from HRESULT: 0×80070057 ﴾E_INVALIDARG﴿﴿
File name: ‘AREXManager, Version=2011.0.0.1408, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null’ ‐‐‐>
System.ArgumentException: The path is not of a legal form.
   at System.IO.Path.NormalizePathFast﴾String path, Boolean fullCheck﴿
   at System.IO.Path.GetFullPathInternal﴾String path﴿
   at System.IO.Directory.InternalGetFileDirectoryNames﴾String path, String userPathOriginal,
String searchPattern, Boolean includeFiles, Boolean includeDirs, SearchOption searchOption﴿
   at System.IO.Directory.GetDirectories﴾String path, String searchPattern, SearchOption
searchOption﴿
   at System.IO.Directory.GetDirectories﴾String path﴿
   at 16X1KUK4svrrlwHMOP.vhGAR3PPbtEL1aD7bU.7KsIl5cW4﴾Object , ResolveEventArgs , String ,
Assembly ﴿
   at System.AppDomain.OnAssemblyResolveEvent﴾String assemblyFullName﴿
   at REX.Common.Start.REXStartProxy.OnStartup﴾﴿
   at REX.AREXRevitStart.AREXRevitStart.OnStartup﴾UIControlledApplication application﴿
   at revitManagedAppStartup﴾MFCApp* pMFCApp, AString* assemblyName, AString* className,
AString* exceptionName, AString* exceptionMessage﴿

You can click CLose and continue. Now admitedly, this is not the first time I have seen this error. I just figured, well, until I need that addon, I won’t worry about it. Silly me. Well, I have uninstalled it, submitted the report to Autodesk and all systems seem to be a go now.

Thanks to the folks who posted on my blog and helped out here.

Mastering MEP Dataset omission

Jan 7, 2010

Hello all. A reader recently sent me this in an email:

“Page 239 Step 13 refers to a folder and file that is not included on the CD included with the book.”

Upon inspection, the reader is correct, the file is indeed missing, as is the folder that it should be in. We consolidated the dataset late in the process and looks like we missed a few references in the text. I believe that the file is now located at:

C:\MasterMEP 2010\MAMEP Commercial\constructs\Mechanical

However, to be certain, we are uploading it here as well. The file should be placed in MasterMEP 2010 directory under the Chapter04 sub-directory if that does not already exist.

Master the Family Editor Series available on DVD

Dec 5, 2009

Upon my return from AU, I was very pleased to find the proofs for the Mastering the Family Editor Series DVDs sitting on my desk.

Earlier this summer I conducted this five-part course online using GoToMeeting and presenting to a live audience. I have since used the recordings of those sessions to produce a high-quality five DVD series. You can buy each individually if there are only certain topics you wish to see, or buy all five to view the entire course. A download link to a PDF course handout and a collection of Revit files is included with the purchase of the DVDs and includes complete step-by-step instructions accompanying the video lessons.

The videos are distributed via Amazon CreateSpace and will also be available on Amazon’s Video On Demand service as well. Stay tuned for further details on availability. I have other courses in production and hope to have them ready soon. Please be sure to let me know how you like the Family Editor Series and post any questions or requests for future sessions.

You can learn more about the titles and find links to order here.

Celestia!

May 6, 2009

Welcome St. Linus fourth grade!

 I did a presentation at my children’s school today on this terrific piece of software called Celestia. The software is free and provides a complete simulation of the solar system and in fact the entire known universe. You jump aboard your virtual space ship and can literally fly anywhere! It gives you some astounding views and a REAL sense of just how BIG the universe is. Very cool. i highly recommend it. It may not run on every computer, it does require some horsepower and decent video card, but its free, so download it and try it out!

I gave the kids a bunch of web links and as promised, here they are:

Astronomy Web Sites:

 Celestia

The free space simulation that lets you explore our universe in three dimensions. Celestia runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X.

 http://www.shatters.net/celestia/

The Celestia Motherlode

A repository for various add-ons like textures, models or celestial objects for Celestia.

 http://www.celestiamotherlode.net/

 Celestia Educational Activities

You can just download the free version of Celestia and start to explore, but I HIGHLY recommend Frank Gregorio’s excellent educational resources. Basically the presentation I did today was one of his lessons. Whether you are teaching an astronomy class, or just prefer a self-guided tour, you can’t go wrong with these resources. You can download them individually or purchase a CD from Frank at nominal cost which installs everything you need.

 http://gregs-educational.info/

Images

Interesting diagrams of the solar system

 http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/HBASE/Solar/solill.html#c1

 Google Earth

Amazing free interactive model of the earth with high quality aerial satellite photography, 3D buildings, the sky, the oceans and more.If you haven’t heard of Google Earth, really, where have you been?

 http://earth.google.com/

 NEW – Google Moon

Online only, similar to Google Earth, but showing the moon.Very cool.

 http://www.google.com/moon/

 Sky and Telescope

Probably the premier Astronomy magazine

 http://www.skyandtelescope.com/

 Interactive sky chart from Sky and Telescope. Use it to see what objects are in the night sky where you live on any day and time.Print a chart and take it with you in the backyard.

 http://skychart.skytonight.com/observing/skychart/skychart.asp

  Microsoft Worldwide Telescope

I haven’t explored this much yet, but it looks very cool. Check it out.

 http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/Home.aspxNASA Image of the Day

Vast archive of photos from NASA missions, Hubble and you name it!

 http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/index.html

 Scale model of the Solar System on the web

An interesting model of the solar system. Don’t scroll too fast, you might miss it…

 http://www.phrenopolis.com/perspective/solarsystem/index.html

 Build a Solar System

This tool lets you plug in the desired size of the Sun, and it tells you how big and how far apart everything else needs to be. Neat. In the session, I showed the kids a schematic based on this tool of creating a Solar System model at St. Linus. The long dimension of the St. Linus campus is 1,300 ft (from 103rd to 105th). If we place the Sun at the corner of 105th and Lawler, the Sun would be about the size of a softball (3 1/2″ in diameter) and Pluto (yes I know it is no longer a planet, but I still like to include it – poor Pluto) be the size of the haed of a pin and would be right at the corner of 103rd and Lawler. WOW!

 http://www.exploratorium.edu/ronh/solar_system/

Powers of Ten

Forgot to show this one to the class, but it has always been a cool one. I think it was Charles Eames in the 60′s that did a movie on this concept. This website has lots of items devoted to the idea. Amazing how similar things at the micro and macro scale start to look… Hmmm, divine design?

 http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/

World’s Largest Solar System Model

One more – I mentioned the Solar System Model in Peoria, IL. It is listed in the Guiness Book! Here is the link:

http://www.bradley.edu/las/phy/astronomy/about_solar.html

Well, that’s all I have for now. It’s a big universe out there. Enjoy it!

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