Thinking of cheating on my AutoCAD with that hot new Revit program.

[Jack_O'neill]

Well that's part's easy. File > Export > DWG.

True, and most of the time, that would be adequate, but not always.

[StykFacE]

Why wouldn't it be?

[Jack_O'neill]

Why wouldn't it be?

Layers, linetypes, colors, text styles, etc...if you're doing this for somebody else, you gotta do it like they want it.

[Lee Roy]

I know it's been talked about many times, but, just for an update:
1) How many of you have made the switch now, and are you happy you did?
2) How important do you feel that it is to know Revit to be valuable in the work force?
3) Do you feel that Revit will become, and continue to be the industry standard over Autocad Architecture, Archicad, Microstation & Bentley Architecture etc.?

1) I absolutely despised Revit when I first started with it, going from vanilla ACAD. Since, I don't draw in ACAD unless my hand is forced.
2) Knowing Revit, with my portfolio and skills, I've been hired on the spot, twice.
3) I don't know, I've met a lot of contention from Google Sketchup. Even if it doesn't become/stay a standard, it's a skill set that can't be replaced, imo. Whether it becomes/stays a standard will not change what I can do with it and how fast I can get it done. When used properly, it's VERY powerful.

[Brands]

What an awesome post! I learned so much by reading your experiences.
But I still stand before a big set of questions.
I work for a small drafting company, with a view exceptions each year we only draw small changes to a residential buildings and houses.
We make plans for say, a small living room extension, topping a house, change houses to apartments and visa versa. The small stuff.
I've been looking into the whole BIM-ing business for a wile now and I really have a hard time seeing how a program like Revit can be the future for my company.
I want to, I really do. But I am afraid it will cost us more time to create the drawings we need. All your stories seem to point out that you make drawings for new projects, big projects. And not the small changes to an existing house or building. Am I wrong?
I've been working with ACAD sins 2004. I draw say an exiting house (3 floor plans, sections, elevations) in a day, draw the changes the day after and do the detailing and finishing the day after. Every project we do is always different to projects we did before, it's all 'tailor made' (there are always similarities of course, but you get my point). I want to make the step (i'ts the future after all), but I can't justify the step to my boss if it'll mean that i will do a project in 3 days in ACAD and 6 in Revit...
Does anyone have any experience with small projects and Revit?

[Lee Roy]

I have a lot of experience with Revit, and if I had it I'd use it. I can crank out a house within an hour, then proceed with the changes for the contract documents.

In your instance however, I would forego Revit and stick with ACAD. There is a steep learning curve that your company budget needs to take into account time-wise along with the purchase (and subscription?) of Revit. If you don't have a skilled Revit user in your office right now, I would pass on it.

I love Revit and would like to spin all my ACAD discs on a dremel (look for a video on that)...but sometimes it just is what it is and Revit would not be beneficial in every possible situation.

...all imho, of course.

[Jack_O'neill]

What an awesome post! I learned so much by reading your experiences.
But I still stand before a big set of questions.
I work for a small drafting company, with a view exceptions each year we only draw small changes to a residential buildings and houses.
We make plans for say, a small living room extension, topping a house, change houses to apartments and visa versa. The small stuff.
I've been looking into the whole BIM-ing business for a wile now and I really have a hard time seeing how a program like Revit can be the future for my company.
I want to, I really do. But I am afraid it will cost us more time to create the drawings we need. All your stories seem to point out that you make drawings for new projects, big projects. And not the small changes to an existing house or building. Am I wrong?
I've been working with ACAD sins 2004. I draw say an exiting house (3 floor plans, sections, elevations) in a day, draw the changes the day after and do the detailing and finishing the day after. Every project we do is always different to projects we did before, it's all 'tailor made' (there are always similarities of course, but you get my point). I want to make the step (i'ts the future after all), but I can't justify the step to my boss if it'll mean that i will do a project in 3 days in ACAD and 6 in Revit...
Does anyone have any experience with small projects and Revit?

I have Revit 2009, but none of my current customers use it. They are all still on Autocad. Even at that, many times I use Revit to create the floorplans and elevations, then export them to Autocad.

The interesting thing about this thread is that if we were to wind the clock back a few years, we could take this discussion and almost without editing anything, globally substitute "drawing board" for "AutoCAD" and "Autocad" for "Revit". I remember the same discussions when CAD was becoming a widely used tool. People were concerned about how much time it would take to do on a computer as opposed to drawing by hand, the learning curve involved, the whole bit. Wave after wave of new technology washes over us and we go through the same struggles.

[fostertom]

Going to post on all the AEC 3D forums I can find, might as well start here.

I am free to choose what AEC 3D program to get - what's this forum's advice? Familiar with Acad 2006 2D, tried hard with Sketchup but hate it - that's the sum of my solid experience, and I work solo - no handy guru so I've taught myself - slowly and painfully.

Going slowly mad in 2D because my buildings are not grand but have lots of detail and funny angles and my head bursts with all the manual trigonometry to draw elevations, sections correctly so they tie up, maintaining near-copies at different scales of detail.

2011-08-19 040.jpg2011-10-31 012.jpg

I have a vision of placing and intersecting shaped objects in 3D space, then seeing what the elevations sections etc look like - at whatever scale of detail.

Perhaps I don't need the clever tricks of Revit, Archicad, Bentley Architecture etc, but just a solid modeler like Acad 2010, Turbocad Pro, Microstation etc - or what? I don't want to install walls, roof planes etc as slabs - I want to be able to accurately model the finest detail of the interior of said slabs, with all junctions, birdmouth cuts done by boolean etc.

Advice would be appreciated.

[Jack_O'neill]

Going to post on all the AEC 3D forums I can find, might as well start here.

I am free to choose what AEC 3D program to get - what's this forum's advice? Familiar with Acad 2006 2D, tried hard with Sketchup but hate it - that's the sum of my solid experience, and I work solo - no handy guru so I've taught myself - slowly and painfully.

Going slowly mad in 2D because my buildings are not grand but have lots of detail and funny angles and my head bursts with all the manual trigonometry to draw elevations, sections correctly so they tie up, maintaining near-copies at different scales of detail.

Attachment 32771Attachment 32770

I have a vision of placing and intersecting shaped objects in 3D space, then seeing what the elevations sections etc look like - at whatever scale of detail.

Perhaps I don't need the clever tricks of Revit, Archicad, Bentley Architecture etc, but just a solid modeler like Acad 2010, Turbocad Pro, Microstation etc - or what? I don't want to install walls, roof planes etc as slabs - I want to be able to accurately model the finest detail of the interior of said slabs, with all junctions, birdmouth cuts done by boolean etc.

Advice would be appreciated.

Thats the $64,000 question my friend. The intricate details of which you speak might best be done with Inventor, but if you are drawing architectural plans as well, Inventor is probably the wrong tool. I haven't used it in years myself, so I don't know what the newest version is capable of. Autocad Architecture might fit the bill better. I use Revit and while its probably possible to do those types of details with it, Revit would drive me insane trying to draw that stuff. I have never come up against anything I couldn't draw in plain old vanilla Autocad, at least not yet, but it's always possible. I've told many people that Autocad is the crescent wrench of cad programs. Might not the be the best and fastest tool, but it will get it done.

You ask a dozen people this question you'll get at least a dozen answers. All will be good, all will have reasons why. You'll have to decide on your own which is right for you.

[Dadgad]

As you are obviously quite adept at visualization and execution of compound miters and nonrectilinear shapes, you will be thrilled once you start modeling in 3D. I should think that given a foundation working with Autocad LT, it would be quite simple for you to make the leap to 3D within the autocad environmnent. Model it once, and after that the program can generate your orthogonal perspective views, isometrics and details using about half a dozen different commands and approaches. You might want to download a 30 day free trial of whichever of the Autodesk products you find interesting. If you are mostly doing remodels and small jobs, and don't have access to good instruction in your area, then I should think that you might just want to go with Autocad 2012, building on your previous experience with Autocad LT.

It is certainly worth mentioning that there are free programs (none of which I have ever used) which frequently get high marks on this forum, from those more knowledgeable than me.

Just remember that you can take an Autodesk program for a month long test drive at no cost, which is pretty great. No point in buying something you don't want, right?