DAYLIGHTING SOFTWARE
Daylight design & planning: a picture is worth a thousand ‘nerdy numbers’ The SketchUp suite of 3D modelling software is a popular design tool used by architects, designers and planners all over the world. Ukbased MBS Software offers a low-cost plug in for SketchUp, to make simple yet powerful daylight modelling and visualisation functions available to a wide user group. David Maltby explains the latest updates to the system... MBS Software have recently updated their increasingly popular Daylight for Sketchup plug in which now allows users to test all the compliance metrics outlined in the document entiled “Site Layout Planning for Daylight & Sunlight – A Guide to Good Practice” written by Paul Littlefair and published by the Building Research Establishment. This publication is commonly referred to as the “The BRE Guide” and provides the basis for compliance testing within the planning departments of most local authorities. The guide details what metrics need assessing for both the neighbour impact of new developments, and what to aim for to demonstrate good standards of daylight quality within those new developments.
Existing functions Existing functions within the program include the calculation of the Vertical Sky Component (VSC) and Annual/ Winter Probable Sunlight Hours, 2 Hour
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May/June2020
Sunlight to Amenity Spaces, Façade Analysis and Transient Shadows
New additions The new additions incorporate both Average Daylight Factor (ADF) and Daylight Distribution or No Sky Line (DD/NSL) calculations to complete the package by allowing for “light within” or “self test” studies. Outputs from the program are both graphical and tabular, allowing designers to simply and quickly run many iterations of their proposed schemes, to understand both the external and internal impacts at an early stage. Cutbacks and re-runs using an intuitive visual “traffic light” system to show pass/nearly/fail results, provides further assistance to speed the process of getting to an optimum layout with the minimum of fuss.
“Outputs from the program are both graphical and tabular, allowing designers to simply and quickly run many iterations of their proposed schemes, to understand both the external and internal impacts at an early stage.”
Other improvements to what is a regularly updated program, include tools to allow users to define how the various outputs are displayed. These have proved extremely useful
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