AEC Magazine November / December 2020

Building Information Modelling (BIM) technology for Architecture, Engineering and Construction

Laser guided Spot You can teach a new dog old tricks

BricsCAD BIM v21

Autodesk University

KPF on Omniverse

Making dumb things smart

From concept to construction

Visually rich virtual collaboration

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Building Information Modelling (BIM) technology for Architecture, Engineering and Construction

editorial

MANAGING EDITOR GREG CORKE greg@x3dmedia.com

CONSULTING EDITOR MARTYN DAY

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MANAGER ALAN CLEVELAND

Spot in construction 10 We explore the impact the quadruped robot is having on the construction site, from laser scanning to setting out

Autodesk University 16 From AI-based conceptual design to Construction Cloud there was plenty for AEC firms to get their teeth into at AU

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CHARLOTTE TAIBI charlotte@x3dmedia.com

FINANCIAL CONTROLLER SAMANTHA TODESCATO-RUTLAND sam@chalfen.com AEC Magazine is available FREE to qualifying individuals. To ensure you receive your regular copy please register online at www.aecmag.com about AEC Magazine is published bi-monthly by X3DMedia Ltd First Floor, 226 Trysull Rd Wolverhampton WV3 7JR, UK T. +44 (0)20 3355 7310 F. +44 (0)20 3355 7319 © 2020 X3DMedia Ltd All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part without prior permission from the publisher is prohibited. All trademarks acknowledged. Opinions expressed in articles are those of the author and not of X3DMedia. X3DMedia cannot accept responsibility for errors in articles or advertisements within the magazine.

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The new cloud-based tool from Xinaps for organising model data, and validating, checking and generating reports

NXT BLD Virtual 38 All 16 inspirational presentations from our annual NXT BLD conference are now available to watch on-demand

Can digital twins improve BIM workflows? 22 Kohn Pedersen Fox As Bentley bangs the digital twins drum, explores Omniverse 42 it may be missing an opportunity to help optimise fragmented BIM workflows

Digital twins: the next frontier 24 Keith Bentley, CTO of Bentley Systems, on why machine learning is so important to digital twins and why we’ve only just scratched the surface

Vectorworks 2021 26 This year’s major update to the suite of solutions for BIM, landscaping and stage set design

Bricsys digital summit 28

FREE SUBSCRIPTIONS

Verifi3D: model checking in the cloud 36

The latest developments in the DWGbased BricsCAD BIM, plus lots more

Nemetschek: improving structural workflows 30 A drive towards integrated digital workflows with SCIA and BIMplus.

Cobus Bothma, director of applied research at KPF, on why he’s so excited by Nvidia’s virtual collaboration platform

Design viz 46 The futuristic setting in this visualisation for the Central Bank of Iraq only increases the drama of its curving form

The road to digitisation 50 Technology is playing a transformative role within the fabrication business of one UK steel framed building specialist

The golden age of beer 53 The NavVis M6 mobile mapping system plays a key role in a scanning project to help bring an old brewery back to life

Fujitsu Celsius J5010 58 A quiet, well-built and compact workstation that also packs a punch Also this month: 6, 8, 9, News 54, Viewpoint November / December 2020

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Š 2020 Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. All rights reserved. AMD, the AMD Arrow logo, Radeon, and combinations thereof are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Autodesk and Revit are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., in the USA and other countries. Other product names used in this publication are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective companies.

Nvidia Quadro P1000 cost of $339.00 on Amazon.com viewed on 14 April 2020. AMD SEP of $199.00. All pricing in USD and may vary regionally. AMD SEP pricing correct as of 01 August 2020.

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News

New SketchUp service offers insight into early stage design

Enscape adds custom assets + video textures nscape 2.9, the latest release of the realtime rendering and VR software, now works directly inside CAD/BIM tool Vectorworks 2021.

The new release also introduces custom assets, so architects can use a much wider range of content within their scenes. Support for video textures means video can be replicated on digital displays.

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■ enscape3d.com

reDesign is a new conceptual stage design service for SketchUp which enables architects and designers to test design strategies and understand how a site’s climate and environment might impact design proposals.

“PreDesign provides useful information that we need to position our projects for better design outcomes from the start,” says Adam Osterhoff, principal architect at Heartwood Studio. “Its compelling visual outputs and intelligent talking points also help us clearly communicate the value of our proposals to clients.”

According to Trimble, the developer of the software, PreDesign reduces the need to navigate multiple platforms to obtain local weather information, such as average temperatures and predominant winds, by gathering climate data about a site and delivering insights into a variety of design aspects.

For example, by connecting the dots between the climate and building type, the software might suggest an appropriate architectural response, such as larger

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openings to take advantage of outdoor conditions or shading to control solar gain.

To help designers effectively position a building, sun path diagrams can highlight areas that receive warming sun and those that might be exposed to overheating sun or overcast by cloudy skies.

The software also allows designers to adjust glazing type, framing insulation, solar control and external shading to better understand the impact of glazing specifications, while daylighting provides ‘inspiration and clear guidance’ on the suitability of a range of lighting options.

There’s also a focus on outdoor spaces, to help designers propose strategies such as windbreaks, fans, rain covers, fire pits and solar-powered lighting.

PreDesign comes with a SketchUp Pro, Studio or Enterprise subscription.

Meanwhile, with the release of V-Ray 5 for SketchUp from Chaos Group, SketchUp users can now have access to real-time rendering capabilities, as well as photoreal rendering capabilities, inside SketchUp. ■ sketchup.com/products/predesign ■ chaosgroup.com/vray/sketchup

Procore introduces Artificial Intelligence onstruction management software specialist Procore Technologies has added new artificial intelligence (AI) features to help customers make better use of data within its Procore platform.

The company has also announced two

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new product features in Procore BIM. Dynamic Wall Elevations and Follow Me, a location-based user collaboration feature, are designed to make it easier to leverage 3D models during the construction phase of a project.

New Trimble integrations rimble has announced new integrations for Microsoft 365 and BIMcollab with its Trimble Connect cloud-based collaboration platform.

The integration with Trimble Connect provides users of both platforms with a common data environment for connecting project stakeholders with datarich models and schedules

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■ trimble.com

Nvidia unveils pro RTX GPU he new Nvidia RTX A6000 workstation GPU promises to deliver more than double the GPU rendering performance of its predecessor, the Quadro RTX 6000. In the product design-focused rendering software Luxion KeyShot the performance increase could be 255% or even more, says Nvidia.

Professional users can also expect a significant boost in graphics, VR, and AI workflows.

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■ nvidia.com

■ procore.com/bim

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WHEN

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NavVis mobile mapping systems quickly capture high-quality point clouds rich in detail and color, and ideal for BIM modeling. It's time to optimize your scan-to-BIM workflows with technology that delivers, when it's quality that counts.

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ROUND UP Faster 3D printing

Autodesk unveils new tools from concept to construction AUTODESK’S NEW DIGITAL TWIN PLATFORM TANDEM

3D printing bureau Fixie has received £100,000 from Innovate UK to help build an automated online platform to cut the time it takes for architects to create physical models from digital designs.

Fixie’s platform looks to simplify the 3D printing process by eliminating the need for arduous remodelling ■ fixie3d.com

Drone partnership Esri UK has teamed up with drone specialist Heliguy to offer an ‘end-toend’ drone solution for the AEC industry. The partnership will provide drone hardware, pilot training and flying services from Heliguy, adding to Esri’s existing drone flight planning, data capture, data processing and GIS software ■ esriuk.com ■ heliguy.com

Revit automation Ideate Automation for Revit is a new scripting tool for use with Ideate BIMLink that lets repetitive, timeintensive, low-value BIM tasks run silently in the background, freeing up designers and engineers so they can focus on higher-level work ■ ideatesoftware.com

VR collaboration Dimension10 has added a new cloudsharing feature to its D10 collaborative VR solution. According to the Norwegian developer, it will greatly reduce the work required prior to having virtual meetings by automatically transferring files to project participants ■ dimension10.com

Solving issues in VR A new partnership between Vixel and BIMcollab enables users of Vrex, the cloud-based virtual workspace, and BIMcollab, the issue management platform, to collaborate and work on 3D models inside VR ■ bimcollab.com ■ vrex.no

VR for BIM 360 VRcollab has released a new integration for Autodesk BIM 360 which allows users to connect their VRcollab account and BIM 360 account together, with a view to creating a more seamless workflow for efficient VR-based collaboration. A free seven day trial is available ■ vrcollab.com

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utodesk made several big announcements at Autodesk University this month — introducing a new digital twin platform called Tandem, a major new update to its Construction Cloud, and new artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities for urban planning and site design, obtained through the acquisition of SpaceMaker for $240 million.

With the cloud-based Tandem, currently in beta, Autodesk is making its first foray into the world of Digital Twins.

It has used the Forge API to develop an environment in which BIM project data can be loaded from many sources via multiple formats to create a rich data model to be used in multiple phases of a building or infrastructure asset’s lifecycle.

Construction Cloud, the construction management offering that Autodesk

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announced this time last year, now includes three new products.

Autodesk Build unites PlanGrid and BIM 360 with new functionality to create Autodesk’s field and project management solution; Autodesk Quantify enables estimators to automate 2D and 3D quantification from BIM models; and BIM Collaborate enables project teams to work together by handling the whole design collaboration and coordination workflow.

Meanwhile, the SpaceMaker acquisition gives Autodesk new urban planning and site design capabilities. The cloud-based software uses AI to aid rapid conceptual design, with a view to helping urban designers, developers and architects make more informed design decisions.

Turn to page 16 to for our in-depth report from Autodesk University.

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autodesk.com

Epson launches low-cost 3-in-1 printers pson has launched two ‘low-cost’ multifunction large-format printers, designed to fit into small workspaces.

The CAD-focused 3-in-1 devices, which offer print, copy and scan capabilities, come in two sizes: the 24-inch (A1) SureColor

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SC-T3100M and 36-inch (A0) SureColor SC-T5100M. The new printer series features a top loading 600dpi scanner that can ‘accurately replicate’ documents in various formats - PDF (standard

and encrypted), JPEG or TIFF – and then send them to a USB drive, mail server or network folder, as well as scaling original copies (25-400%). A tray supports scanned documents to avoid valuable originals being damaged on the floor.

Prices start at £1,346 without the optional stand.

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epson.co.uk

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News

BIM streaming service for Unreal Engine coming soon

Virtual desktop AEC platform steering committee of architects, engineers and consultancies have helped refine a new virtual desktop platform specifically calibrated to help AEC firms collaborate.

The Inevidesk platform, launched by Inevitech, can be integrated into existing site infrastructure or hosted in the cloud via datacentres powered 100% by renewable energy.

A free trial is available.

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■ inevidesk.uk/try

ridify is developing a new BIM streaming service that enables AEC firms to view interactive BIM models rendered with Unreal Engine streamed to a mobile device.

Designed to improve collaboration at all stages of the construction process, the service is designed to make existing workflows more efficient and increase the quality of the viewing experience, when

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sharing large BIM models remotely.

With all the graphics processing done in the cloud, the service works with ‘any size of model on any device’. Previously, firms would have had to deal with the processing limitations of mobile phones and tablets.

Tridify’s new service automatically publishes any IFC file to Unreal Engine and streams it to users via a URL.

such as the Core i9-10900K. The new CPU lineup is led by the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, which offers 16-cores and a 4.9GHz boost clock. There’s also the 12-core Ryzen 9 5900X, 8-core Ryzen 7 5800X and 6-core Ryzen 5 5600X. BOXX, Scan and Workstation Specialists are among the first workstation manufacturers to offer the new AMD CPUs. Look out for a full review soon.

ricsys enlisted the help of HOK for the development of BricsCAD BIM v21, the latest release of the DWG-based BIM authoring tool. The global design, architecture, engineering and planning firm helped analyse workflows in other BIM products in order to optimise the BricsCAD BIM user experience.

BricsCAD BIM v21 includes a number of enhancements designed to reduce time spent on ‘boring and repetitive tasks’. The new release also reinforces the software’s ‘end-to-end’ workflow, so instead of creating and recreating a model for different stages of the design process, it allows users to model ‘once and continuously’, adding Levels of Development (LODs) as the design progresses.

The new release also extends the software’s AI capabilities. A new ‘QuickBuilding’ tool, for example, automatically converts geometry into a BIM model, shelling ‘almost any solid’ and creating walls, storeys and slabs automatically.

See page 28 for more info.

■ amd.com

■ bricsys.com/bricscad-bim

■ go.tridify.com/bim-streaming-signup

Partnership to streamline issue tracking IMcollab and Xinaps have developed a link between their products – Xinaps Verifi3D and BIMcollab – to integrate issue management and model checking in the cloud.

BIMcollab is designed to manage issues during the design and construction phases where BIM is used. Verifi3D provides designers and general contractors with tools to validate their

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BIM data, automate hard clashing checks and mitigate risks during the model checking process in real-time.

According to Xinaps, bringing these two workflows together helps bridge the gap between BIM tools and targets the multidisciplinary cooperation needed on construction projects.

See page 36 for more on Verifi3D. ■ bimcollab.com ■ verifi3d.xinaps.com

AMD takes Intel’s single-threaded crown ccording to several independent benchmark results, AMD’s new ‘Zen 3’ Ryzen 5000 series CPUs have finally taken Intel’s crown in single threaded performance, which is critical for CAD and BIM software.

With the previous generation ‘Zen 2’ CPUs, AMD could only boast a performance lead in multi-threaded workflows, such as ray trace rendering, when compared to an equivalent Intel CPU,

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HOK helps drive BricsCAD BIM forward B

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Spot in construction

Covid-19 has not stopped Boston Dynamics from working with AEC hardware and software developers like Trimble, together with advanced users like Foster + Partners.

Martyn Day explores the impact the quadruped robot is having on construction

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hen Boston Dynamics Talking with Brian Ringley, construc- Trimble unique and I think the preferred agreed to come and talk at tion technology manager at Boston partner for Boston Dynamics is that in AEC Magazine’s NXT Dynamics, it was interesting to hear how the construction world we already have a BLD event in 2019, the Spot has developed to become a construc- very heavy investment and focus on company was just about finalising the tion worker. autonomy. And whether it’s an excavator, design of its quadruped robot Spot before The chassis design has been continual- or a 40 pound Spot robot, for us it’s it moved to mass production. This was a ly refined to offer better protection and another automated vehicle in the mix. major move for Boston Dynamics as it weather sealing and firms like Tesla are “In a Trimble world we have the full 3D had spent decades developing robot tech- using Spot to help with the rapid con- model of what should be built, as well as nology with no obvious plan to produc- struction of its ‘Giga factories’ for batter- information coming out of say, a laser tise its innovations, funded by bodies ies. The need for extended operation, scanner or other sensor tool, that can rapsuch as the US Defense Advanced beyond the 90 mins operation of the idly augment the understanding for a Research Projects Agency (DARPA), then onboard battery, has led to an update robot of what’s around it — how to best Google, which helped it create Atlas, coming soon, which will allow Spot to navigate it, but also things like how it Petman, BigDog, Wildcat and Spot robot- automatically head to recharge itself. At should position itself to optimise the ic platforms. Founded in 1992, Boston the same time, the much-seen articulating value of this scan. So there’s a lot of AI Dynamics was bringing its first robot to arm will be available next year, allowing and kind of next level intelligence that we the mass market. new interactive applications of the robot. can bring to the workforce and we intend While talking with Boston to bring Spot both to the Dynamics, it was clear that civil construction sites, the while they had designed earthmoving sites, but also Spot will will expand and drive further Spot, it was certainly a techto indoor environments. digitisation of the profession. It will drive nology in search of an appliWith Spot’s size and its agilDigital Twins and deployment of 4D and will ity, it’s is a really good fit for cation. As a quadruped robot, Spot should be able to us both in and outdoors.” also help in spotting errors on site quickly handle construction sites, After hours areas of danger, repetitive tasks like site survey, so the company was With that, Boston Dynamics has been Automated anything on a construction reaching out to firms in that space to see working on the controller software APIs site comes with health and safety risks what they could do with the platform. allowing developers to interface with which, at the moment, limit the mixing of Fortunately, at NXT BLD, the laser scan- Spot’s sensors and even tap into its power people and heavy automated devices, but ning companies sent over their develop- in the payload bay. After a bunch of there will come a time when that will be ment teams and they had even asked for refinements, Spot is ready for duty. the norm. I asked Holmgren if Spot the payload bay specifications to 3D print changes that concern, or if it was going to platforms for their scanners. Both Topcon The Trimble partnership be a limiting factor in its deployment? He and Faro were carrying out live scanning The first major developer to announce a replied, “If you had a laser scanner on tests on the show floor! partnership is Trimble. The company has Spot’s back, when everyone’s left for the Roll forward a year and a half and extensive experience in construction day, there’s no human obstructions.

Boston Dynamics has just announced a robotic automation featuring ultra-pre- You could have Spot walk every floor major partnership with Trimble and cise GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite of your building, during the off hours Foster + Partners, with more to follow. System) and machine control to full auto- of the construction side, collect a comThe irony here is that the chances of see- mated vehicles, such as grading systems. plete set of point clouds that are ready to ing robots in the wild has increased draWe talked with Martin Holmgren, the go, available in the computer of the projmatically, while the chances of seeing company’s general manager for buildings ect manager when he arrives at the site humans outside their houses has dropped field solutions. He explained what in the morning. dramatically. Thank you Covid.

Trimble brings to the party, “What makes “It actually doesn’t require anyone to be

‘‘

’’

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Spot, the quadruped robot, equipped with a Trimble X7 scanner for autonomous laser scanning

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there. Digital design, digitise the construction site, that’s where we add value.”

The earth moves Looking at outdoor examples, Holmgren outlined one concerning the digital terrain model, which needs to be monitored each day, or every three or five days, so they can know how much material has been moved and how much material needs to be moved to achieve the features of a specific site. “This ties back to cash flow for these companies, because the subcontractor wants to be paid quickly as possible. So, there’s tension in the construction process between determining the right time for an investment and for payments.

“On smaller construction sites, you may need to achieve a certain terrain model using a total station and Spot with a Prism or GNSS, we can use it for layout, essentially meaning we could even place stakes in the ground with Spot’s arm.”

Power in reserve Trimble’s equipment already comes with onboard batteries that outlast Spot’s 90 minute duration so it doesn’t need to tap into the robot’s power supply, maximising it’s longevity. Trimble is looking at perhaps tapping into Spot to get a charge boost when it goes back to the recharge station.

I asked Holmgren about reliability, as this is Boston Dynamics’ first prosumer product and construction sites are exposed and a potentially unfriendly place for precision electronics and servos. “We have, of course worked with Boston Dynamics for quite a while now we’ve seen the evolution. While Spot looks identical to what you saw in 2019, performance and capabilities have evolved tremendously.

“The reliability is not at the same level as you would expect from mainstream construction technology but I would say they’re getting there. Trimble is very, very careful with putting our brand and our reputation behind a product. We have units in North America, New Zealand, India, testing them in different climates, different temperatures. Like any brand new technology you bring onto a construction site, whether that’s robotics or something else, it will be improving over time, but we have determined that we’re comfortable bringing 12

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this to market and that the benefits by far outweigh the challenges.

“Of course, we offer Trimble support and we’re comfortable with all of European Union, US, Canada, Australia, Japan, Singapore, as starting markets and we will have local service centres at each of these locations, with a level of service capability to provide continuity of operation for users.”

Pricing for Spot through Trimble has yet to be set but they are looking at both outright purchase and monthly hire.

Foster + Partners As part of Boston Dynamics’ Early Adopter Program, Foster + Partners Applied Research + Development group (ARD), has been exploring the use of Spot on construction sites, by laser scanning on a regular basis to easily compare the ‘as-designed’ models against the ‘as-built’.

The team used its Battersea Roof Gardens mixed use project (the third

phase of the Battersea Power Station development, as a testbed). Spot followed a designated path on a weekly basis, scanning as it went, which generated a sequence of highly comparable, consistent models.

Martha Tsigkari, partner, Foster + Partners explained, “The ability of Spot to repeatedly and effortlessly complete routine scans, in an ever-changing environment was invaluable, not only in terms of the consistency but also the large amount of high-quality data collected.

“Through this process we developed a sequence of scans that may help us track the project progress against timeframes as well as facilitate regular comparisons against the BIM model.

“Our scans can ensure that very quick and accurate changes to the newly

designed system could be made to accommodate the differences captured by the scans – all in a matter of days. This could result in savings both in terms of time and money.”

Foster + Partners has also used Spot to construct a digital twin of its own campus in London. The team built up a fourdimensional model, showing how the space changes over time. Adam Davis, partner, Foster + Partners, said, “Combining temporal and spatial information with data from sensors that read environmental conditions and occupancy, we can construct an intricate model of how people, furnishings and environmental conditions interact. This, in turn, helps us to operate our premises more efficiently and to anticipate how new designs will perform.”

Conclusion While Spot may be a novelty as it’s the first roaming robot in construction, the reality is that it brings real business cases with it and will expand and drive further digitisation of the profession. It will drive Digital Twins and deployment of 4D and will also help in spotting errors on site quickly.

While talking with Holmgren, we discussed the development of swarming technology and the interaction of robots on site. It’s too easy to just wonder at Spot as a singular device but imagine a construction site as a network of machines, each carrying out their task, all feeding back to a centralised system, as they sculpt, position and place everything in the right place, in the optimum sequence, pausing only to recharge.

There will be robots surveying the site to watch over the work of other robots and add additional layers of geometric feedback and data to the cloud, where AI can auto recognise building components, ensuring the next ones arrive on site just in time. Construction sites of the near future are going to be very different places, if we ever manage to leave home again.

SPOT will cost $74,500 for a base model and obviously increases with payload and selfcharging stations, articulated arm.

■ bostondynamics.com ■ construction.trimble.com/spot

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BIM for Everybody An end-to-end BIM workflow for design, construction documentation and manufactured building products

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3rd Party Applications The BricsCAD Runtime eXtension (BRX) API enables top application developers to build industry-specific tools and workflows for BricsCAD. We offer over 400 third-party applications on the Bricsys Application Store to help users get their work done easier, faster and more accurately.

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Bricsys builds BricsCAD for people who build things. For the last two decades, our singular focus has been making cost-effective, mission-critical CAD, BIM and CDE products. Now a part of the global technology giant Hexagon AB, we are reinforcing our commitment to help our customers achieve more, in less time, for less money.

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Feature

Autodesk University 2020 From AI-based conceptual design and digital twins to the evolution of Construction Cloud and a new ‘open’ approach, there was plenty for AEC professionals to get their teeth into this at virtual event, writes Martyn Day

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eing in the middle of a Covid-19 pandemic, we were forced to work from Collections next year. In many respects, lockdown is probably the fur- home, adapt and create a new normal. All Docs is the gateway drug to a lot of the thest away from being in Las at once we realised how fragile our econo- new functionality of Autodesk Vegas for Autodesk University mies, processes, supply chains and ecosys- Construction Cloud.

(AU) that I could ever imagine. This year, tems were. Practices had to think differentDuring the keynote, Anagnost gave sevno cacophony of slot machines while dash- ly to meet the demand changes and be able eral real-world examples of firms adapting about to catch key sessions. No corri- to suddenly become virtual organisations. ing to the new normal. Of special interest dor chats or bar hopping, just a global While the near-term outcomes are was James Hepburn, engineering princiaudience of designers and builders, sat at unknown, Anagnost had a positive and ple of BDP, who explained how his team home in front of a computer, wondering if optimistic view on what will happen on rapidly evolved the plans for the first they have enough coffee, toilet paper and the other side of the pandemic. By rolling Nightingale hospital in London, using saying ‘you’re on mute’ a lot to colleagues. with the punches and adopting increas- Revit and team collaboration to pull off a ‘What happens in Covid stays in Covid’, ingly digital workflows to cope with remarkable turnaround of converting the doesn’t quite have the same ring as the remote working, he feels that the con- Excel Conference Centre into a 4,000 bed Vegas equivalent. struction industry will not go back to its Covid centre. If only we had the same level The good news is the Autodesk event old processes and workflows. Instead, it of planning and foresight in Government team has done an excellent job of main- will be permanently digitised providing to get enough trained staff to run it. taining the breadth and mix of talks, productivity benefits.

Anagnost also announced that they had classes and activities as best as is possiObviously a mass digital construction acquired Spacemaker for $240 million. ble online and you can dip in and out at migration is good for Autodesk’s busi- The Norway-based software company will, to catch-up on litdevelops a cloud-based erally hundreds of urban planning and hours of videos given Autodesk has started a mass engagement with Revit site design tool, which by topic experts. artificial intellicustomers on hearing what features they would like uses For the past few gence (AI) to aid rapid years, while the cloud, to see and what needs fixing. We will have to wait and conceptual design. automation and To date, the firm has see what changes this makes to the Revit roadmap machine learning have tended to find its bigbecome key topics for gest traction in the AU keynotes, this has tended to be ness. By giving away extended access to developer community, as opposed to focussed on future promises that the tech- Autodesk BIM 360, the company both architectural design practices. Autodesk nologies hold, as opposed to an actual helped firms deal with going virtual dur- hopes this will prove popular with design connected and integrated deliverable. ing Covid, as well as giving them a free firms. It also inherits a 110 strong developThis AU saw Autodesk double down on taste of what was possible by relying on ment team, which has been deploying AI last year’s launch of ‘Construction Cloud’ the cloud as a backbone. Anagnost to aid design decisions. More on this later. and start to expand capabilities signifi- explained how Autodesk was building on There was a lot of talk about openness cantly beyond just storage, model sharing the services which continued to be fleshed and industry data standards. Anagnost and document distribution workflows. As out within its Construction Cloud plat- explained that he was a massive fan of you will read, the AEC division has added form from design, planning, building and breaking down traditional interoperabilia lot of meat to its bones this year. through to operations. ty problems. Autodesk’s new memberThis year, Autodesk announced three ship of the Open Design Alliance (ODA), CEO keynote new platforms, Build, Quantify and taking a seat at the table of The main keynote was delivered by Coordinate, as well as a new Digital Twin BuildingSMART for IFCs and becoming Autodesk CEO, Andrew Anagnost. In a platform called Tandem. With Autodesk a founding member of the US-based wide-ranging talk, Anagnost commented Docs underpinning most of this extended Digital Twins Foundation, were commiton the challenging year we have just had. functionality, Autodesk announced that ments from Autodesk to enable data to With firms thrown into turmoil by a global it will be giving Docs away as part of its flow within federated workflows.

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1 Autodesk CEO, Andrew Anagnost, gives his Autodesk keynote from slightly smaller stage than normal 2 The first Nightingale hospital at London’s Excel was built to cope with the feared pressures on the NHS in England from Covid-19

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Anagnost also specifically stated the company’s commitment to better support IFC and to certifying ISO 19650 workflows in its Construction Cloud.

Autodesk has also teamed up with Nvidia to support Omniverse, which uses Pixar’s USD ‘collaboration’ format for models, texture and environments. While Nvidia provides the GPU backbone on the cloud, Autodesk is adding support to its AEC and Media and Entertainment products and platforms. More on this later.

AEC keynote Since 2015, Autodesk has been preoccupied with building its cloud offerings and SaaS business. Much of the early work was spent creating Forge, a technology layer which would enable it, its third-party developers and customers, to rapidly develop design tools in the cloud.

To do this it created modules of capability, such as a DWG engine, a model viewer etc., which could be used as building blocks to create new on-demand applications, such as BIM 360. This methodology would also allow Autodesk to quickly absorb and re-purpose acquisitions to add to its cloud platform. And here, Autodesk has acquired a lot of technology in the last three years. It’s been on quite a journey and has ultimately led to the Autodesk Construction Cloud portfolio, which continues to be augmented with further additions.

As Anagnost announced in his keynote, there are three new modules: Build, Quantify and BIM Collaborate.

Build unites PlanGrid and BIM 360 with new functionality to create Autodesk’s field and project management solution.

Within Build, teams can handle workflows such project management, quality, safety, cost and project closeout.

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ties for field workers. PlanGrid Build mobile app offers features such as RFI creation, issue tracking, always up-to-date drawings and a markup capability. As Autodesk acquires new technologies, sometimes there is duplication and here, while BIM 360 was first, the data backbone of PlanGrid was deemed to be the most adaptable for mobile, which is essential for the capabilities Build provides.

Quantify does what you would expect and enables estimators to automate 2D and 3D quantification from BIM models in a single platform. Features include: 2D take-off count and area take-off, together with automated 3D take-off from BIM components. The platform supports predefined or custom classification systems with customised formulas. Built-in document version control provides notifications of changes to models or drawings.

BIM Collaborate enables project teams to work together by handling the whole design collaboration and coordination workflow. This features a broad tool set for model review, markups, issue man-

agement, change analysis, and clash detection. Non-authoring collaborators are also now invited, making it easy to see in-progress changes on desktop and mobile devices without being a subscriber to Autodesk products.

BIM 360 Design is being rebranded BIM Collaborate Pro and will also offer users Revit Cloud Worksharing, Collaboration for Civil 3D and Collaboration for Plant 3D. Customers will have access to model coordination and Insights and connections to the Autodesk Construction Cloud.

All these capabilities are underpinned

by Autodesk Docs, which provides the underlying common data environment, delivering an integrated platform and familiar interface across workflows.

Autodesk Insight also delivers analytics from the models, as well as the ability to export that data. It encompasses Construction IQ artificial intelligence to identify and mitigate risk to data added to workflows.

Autodesk also announced a Docs plug-in for AutoCAD to allow CAD drawings to be published as a PDF directly from November / December 2020

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3 Spacemaker - cloudbased AI software for urban designers, real estate developers and architects

AutoCAD through Docs or BIM 360. its beta testing early in 2021. easily extend revenue streams from the Autodesk’s AEC Collection is not only It’s well worth looking at Project data maintenance of old projects. Till now, getting Docs added but also project dash- Dasher which is an Autodesk research Digital Twins have tended to be in the boards, reports all built from the project that analyses data from live sensor realms of large portfolio owners, like oil Construction Cloud platform. There will inputs in the actual asset and displays refineries, or universities. With Autodesk be a new ‘bring-your-own subscription’ them in a dynamic and live way.

Tandem functionality being located in the model to allow project owners to invite Tandem provides Dasher with the same place as all of the Revit project data, other subscribers (internal or external to Digital Twin geometry and live paged this could potentially democratise Digital the company) to join a project. data from sensors, and runs real time Twins. It will all come down to price and Autodesk is including Autodesk Docs analysis across all sorts of use cases and educating clients as to the benefits of as part of the AEC Collection next year gives really beautiful rendered feedback post-construction data usage. and all these new modules will be availa- live within the Digital Twin model. ble in early 2021.

In anticipation of entering the market, On openness Autodesk’s AEC Collection is not only Autodesk became a Founding Member of Throughout this whole Autodesk getting Docs added but also project dash- the Digital Twin Consortium in October University, the majority of company execboards, reports all built from the 2020, a US-based organisation whose utives talked about Autodesk’s openness, Construction Cloud platform. There will members are committed to establishing the need for openness in AEC and about be a new ‘bring-your-own subscription’ digital twin best practices. Here, the UK the company’s commitment to being model to allow project open. As cases in point, owners to invite other Autodesk has joined the subscribers (internal or board of buildWhile Autodesk hails its latest acquisition as a external to the company) ingSMART, an organisabig boost to architecture and design, it is true that tion it help set up (then to join a project.

Spacemaker has tended to focus on developers known as the Autodesk Tandem International Alliance for and other areas of traditional prop tech Autodesk is making its Interoperability (IAI)), as first foray into the world well as signing up with of Digital Twins with the ongoing beta of seems to be a bit ahead of the US, with our the ODA for its IFC toolkit (a format initithe cloud-based Autodesk Tandem. Here, own National Digital Twin programme, ated by Autodesk) to improve its IFC Autodesk has used the Forge API to devel- run by the Centre for Digital Built Britain fidelity. Autodesk has also joined forces op an environment in which BIM project (University of Cambridge), based on the with Nvidia to connect its design and rendata can be loaded from many sources via founding Gemini Principles. dering products to Nvidia’s Omniverse multiple formats to create a rich data The Digital Twins market is set to be which leverages Pixar’s USD (Universal model to be used in multiple phases of a huge and with Revit having a dominant Scene Description) format. building or infrastructure asset’s lifecycle. role in the creation of structured asset Autodesk watchers would at least raise Digital Twins provide an opportunity data, a cloud-based system that could an eyebrow at this new-found conversion for the designers, fabricators and owners automate the collation of all project data, to promoting interoperability. Despite setto share all the project data (electrical, for handover to clients, is a very exciting ting up the IAI in 1994, and being a drivcooling, escalators, anything) from design prospect. ing force to produce IFC coming out in to decommission.

There are whole new business models 1996, Autodesk’s IFC capability has left a Tandem does not yet support laser scan to be had for architectural firms who cre- lot to be desired, probably aided by data to capture the as-built but this is in ate consistent, detailed models of their Revit’s native RVT file format dominating development, together with connectivity projects. The data that was generated dur- the BIM landscape. to IoT sensors – which is the bedrock of a ing the BIM process, augmented with as The poor quality of IFC in Revit was true Digital Twin. Tandem is due to finish built information and IoT sensors could one of the many complaints raised by the

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Open Letters Group. Autodesk’s commit- was purchasing Norwegian developer, solution is aimed to fill gaps in BIMment has certainly been lacking vs the Spacemaker. The cloud-based AI soft- based workflows enabling load distriburest of the industry. ware helps urban designers, real estate tion mapping, power balancing, equipAutodesk has also had a longstanding developers and architects make more ment sizing, and single line diagramming. battle over the years with the ODA which informed design decisions. The software essentially only existed to reverse engi- generates many iterations of workable Certification neer DWG for Autodesk’s competitors to alternatives for the best sustainability Following up on a previous keynote open and save native DWG. In the past and quality of life outcomes. The soft- promise of Anagnost’s (2017) to offer Autodesk successfully sued the ODA over ware has a great interface and looks easy training to customers to adapt to future its emulation of ‘Trusted DWG’. to use. It’s currently limited to rectilinear changes in working, Autodesk has updatToday, the ODA not only reverse engi- geometry, but more than adequate for ed its Certification Program. It has added neers DWG but also Revit’s RVT format simple massing and data projections. eight new industry-aligned, role-based, and provides the industry standard IFC In the example given, if you’re interest- self-paced certifications. The company toolkit. Autodesk’s membership of the ed in a plot of land for new apartments saw an 800% increase in traffic to its ODA only applies to IFC and my under- Spacemaker can explore in real time what learning resources during Covid-19 lockstanding is that this negotiation started the rentable area is, how many apart- down. It’s great to see some people put before the Open Letter was released. ments are possible and what the lines of that time to good use.

Autodesk’s newfound passion for sup- sight might look like. Users have the abiliporting open formats may well come from ty to assess as many criteria as they need The Open Letter response CEO Andrew Anagnost and the compa- right in the cloud, combining generative An article about Autodesk in 2020 would ny’s focus on cloud, as well as services design to analyse factors like noise, wind, not be complete without an update on the such as Digital Twins, which need to be and sightlines, just to name a few.

Open Letters group and Autodesk’s able to pull in data from multiple sources.

It has been said that Autodesk plans to response. There was precious little Customers also need assurance that keep Spacemaker as a separate entity and acknowledgement within the keynotes, they are not trapped in any one vendor’s not to interfere, which would be great, as but the topic of the open letter came up a cloud. However long-term, files are on the Autodesk is ‘early in’ to this formative site number of times in Revit sessions and way out and openness will be defined by analysis market, which features other talks with the executives of Autodesk. The API access to cloud repositories, as files great developers such as Hypar.io, Testfit. week before Autodesk University, Amy will not be emailed or transBunszel published an update acted and it will all happen on where Autodesk was at, through the interconnected- It’s now evident that Autodesk sees desktop concerning their responses ness of the cloud. activities related to Revit products as in transition, that will, in time, and Perhaps with the death of development and community become part of the cloud architecture. The engagement. files being inevitable, it makes doubling down on open file The first ‘wins’ for the Open big question is how long will that take? formats at this point an interLetter Group have been esting, if very late, decision.

Autodesk’s decision to allow One could argue Autodesk is just out- io and Digital Blue Foam. Gensler has also access to software five versions back (up sourcing its IFC development but it is developed its own conceptual generative from three) and an extension of a year for certainly turning that into a marketing site/urban planning solution called Blox. Network licences before users have to opportunity.

Other AEC firms have done the same. move to named user licensing (this was Nvidia Omniverse is a cloud platform, While hailed as a big boost to architec- attributed to Covid relief by Autodesk). powered by Nvidia’s GPUs which aims for ture and design, it is true that Autodesk has also announced an acceluniversal interoperability using Pixar’s Spacemaker has tended to focus on devel- eration of its Pay Per Use (PPU) licensing USD format, across most of the major 3D opers and other areas of traditional prop development, which will work a little like design platforms, from BIM to rendering tech. Autodesk will need to assist in the Network licences. This is expected to and VR. The platform is designed to act as development of features and marketing of arrive mid next year. a hub, enabling live collaboration between Spacemaker and its solution, and broaden On Revit functionality, Autodesk has users of different applications with real its appeal to architectural firms. It will started a mass engagement with Revit custime ray tracing and offering capabilities also need to be rewritten using Forge to tomers on hearing what features they such as virtual simulation. Autodesk has play nicely with the Autodesk cloud eco- would like to see and what needs fixing. It bought into this 100% and USD will system. With 110 employees, Autodesk has been more open with its roadmap and appear in Maya, Max and Revit, as well as also gets a great team of AI/ML and gen- has hired a person specifically to engage other Autodesk applications. It’s currently erative programmers in with the deal. with users. We will have to wait and see in beta and we don’t yet know what the what changes this makes to the Revit subscription cost will be, or if there is a Schneider Electric roadmap and at what velocity the developtoken usage for processing. Read Greg Autodesk and Schneider Electric are ment team can redress the woeful lack of Corke’s write up on KPF’s usage of the working to develop a new cloud-based development over many years. Some custechnology on page 42. service for electrical designers, leveraging tomers have pointed out to me that the Autodesk Forge APIs to provide users acquisition of Spacemaker would typically Spacemaker acquisition with an environment which connects equate to 2-4 years of Revit development.

The big surprise of Autodesk University designs from concept, through schematic It’s interesting that Autodesk has opted was the announcement that Autodesk design, and into detailed design. The new to cast its net wide for feedback on Revit.

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4 Autodesk Tandem – Autodesk’s first foray into the world of Digital Twins 5 Autodesk Quantify can automate 2D and 3D quantification from BIM models

Anagnost was proud that the team had connected with the silent middle-tier of Revit users. From what I can see, the real gripes are coming from Revit’s most advanced users, who push Revit to the max. These include many signature architects.

Surely, by addressing the needs of the most demanding users, everyone can benefit? The problem is, these demanding users want deeper redevelopment of Revit’s code; they want what’s already delivered to work better, while the general masses may be more interested in having additional new features. By casting the net wider, Autodesk dilutes the request of power users. While perhaps fairer to all customers, it also benefits Autodesk’s aim to limit how much core redevelopment is actually requested. It’s not easy having millions of customers or a mature product.

What doesn’t seem to be being addressed is the pricing and ratcheting up of cost of ownership, which Anagnost clearly dismissed in his various public statements on the issue. Also, Autodesk’s aggressive approach to non-compliance, as well as what exactly is the long-term future of Revit and architectural design beyond the desktop. Revit is the on-ramp to Autodesk’s Construction Cloud, with no architectural BIM to feed the process, no cloud business model. We will revisit this topic in the next edition.

Conclusion For the last three or four years at AU, Autodesk has been building its cloud infrastructure and capabilities. A lot of these have come from acquisition, leading to integration work and a paced roll out of integrations. There has also been a fair amount of talk about collaborative design systems, such as Project Quantum/ www.AECmag.com

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Plasma. To date, this elusive next generation design system has proven to be vapourware. Anagnost was even quoted as saying Quantum was little more than a Powerpoint (tinyurl.com/architosh) or is still deep in the software labs.

Earlier in the year, Anagnost promised that AU would provide a sneak peek of what Plasma had become. This was not self-evident in the mainstage talks; it may, of course, have been shown in one of the many other sessions (at the time of writing AU is still in full swing).

Autodesk seems to have accelerated development of its cloud offerings and in 2020 that means we have seen a bumper crop of new capabilities added to Autodesk’s Construction Cloud. As the technology stack builds, it’s looking more like an interesting destination.

Autodesk cloud facilitates collaborative design, hosts and manages designs and drawings. It checks for errors, allows quantity take off, gives cost insights, distributes the right data to site and now is

stepping into post construction with CAFM and Digital Twin – all with a lessening need to send and manage files in the messy federated way the industry has worked for years, despite digitisation.

However, if you’re a dedicated user of Autodesk’s desktop applications, and not so cloudy in outlook, there were slim pickings on show in the keynotes. It’s now evident that Autodesk sees desktop products as in transition that will, in time, become part of the cloud architecture. The big question is how long will that process take? I am already hearing rumours of Autodesk experimenting with delivering VDI instances of its desktop products.

This is inevitable, we just don’t fully know the timeframe.

An interview with CEO Andrew Anagnost will also available on aecmag.com soon and all the AU talks are available at autodesk.com. There are plenty of interesting talks to see, and to keep you occupied in the current lockdown.

■ autodesk.com/autodesk-university

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Can digital twins improve BIM workflows?

As Bentley Systems continues to bang the digital twins drum, it may be missing an opportunity to engage with the wider AEC industry and help optimise their fragmented BIM workflows, writes Greg Corke

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s regular readers of this magazine will know, Bentley Systems has bet the farm on digital twins. And for the last couple of years, infrastructure digital twins have been at the heart of all of its messaging.

With its powerful iModelHub backbone, which focuses on change, and an open strategy which acknowledges that no single vendor could ever supply everything needed for a digital twin, Bentley is certainly making all the right noises.

However, while the company’s digital twin messaging may resonate with forward thinking infrastructure owners and the larger AEC firms, in its quest to establish itself as a digital twin technology leader, it has perhaps forgotten the importance of using language that will resonate more with the wider AEC industry – firms that simply continue to struggle with fragmented workflows.

The fact is, in the early stages of development, a Bentley ‘digital twin’, which it calls a ‘project digital twin’, is essentially a hub for the BIM process. It brings together data from a variety of cross disciplinary 3D tools – architecture, structural engineering, civil engineering and more - and other sources, into a federated model that resides in the cloud.

As the model evolves, new data can be streamed in, and every change that was made throughout every phase of the design process is tracked, giving insight into how it came to be.

This is not just from Bentley products, such as MicroStation, ContextCapture OpenRoads, and OpenBuildings Designer, but third-party products as well, including Autodesk Revit and AutoCAD Civil 3D. The constantly evolving model can then be used to seamlessly feed other processes such as design review, planning and construction. In the most opti22

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mised workflows, manual file-based transfer is a thing of the past.

From desktop to cloud To get CAD, BIM or reality models into the Project Digital Twin, data can be streamed from desktop applications to the cloud, where everything is represented by a common data schema stored inside an iTwin (iTwin.js).

Most of Bentley’s desktop modelling and simulation tools are now ‘iTwin Enabled’, so models can be automatically synced to the cloud. Any subsequent changes made can be continuously ‘pushed’ to the iTwin to keep it up to date.

And each time this happens, only the deltas are sent, not the entire model.

It’s not all one way traffic. MicroStation and Bentley’s open modelling applications can also consume and reference digital twin content, just as they can consume reality meshes produced by ContextCapture.

At the moment, syncing is largely a manual process, and even when it is automated, the end user will still have control.

To keep the data flowing, users will be able to schedule when this happens or let the system choose, by detecting changes in the BIM model.

Once inside the iTwin, design changes are recorded in a timeline, providing an audit trail of who changed what, when, which is unique in the industry. Team members and project stakeholders can also view, validate, and analyse the data from any location using a web browser.

For team collaboration, Bentley offers iTwin Design Review, a browser-based 2D/3D design/review environment that provides tools for comments, clash detection and version comparison, as well as workflows to help resolve issues that can be assigned to individuals. For Bentley’s engineering simulation applications like Staad, there are design/review capabili-

ties to measure quantities, areas, volume, geometry, and cost.

To explain how this might work in practice Raoul Karp, Bentley Systems VP of engineering simulation, gave an example of an engineer collaborating with an architect or a geotechnical engineer around an issue. “From their desktop product they can create a design/review session, create an iTwin, create a cloudbased collaboration session, invite the other attendees directly through inbox email notification, and then collaborate in the cloud directly.

“And what’s great about it, at the end of those sessions (and those sessions live in perpetuity until closed) you can actually go back into your desktop product and you can see the session issues directly in the desktop experience.

“You can start to see if there’s action items that are decided in the review session, and they can kind of pull that session back up directly and then see what actions need to be taken.”

Not all Bentley desktop products have this level of integration yet and, at the moment, the focus is very much on geometry and collaboration between disciplines. However, as capabilities build in the future, we could see iTwin Design Review extended to handle other data types, such as structural performance data, including deflections and stresses.

Of course, Bentley takes a pragmatic approach to collaboration and acknowledges that it’s not only data from Bentley tools that need to contribute to the iTwin.

With the iTwin Synchronizer, models can also be fed in from third party applications, including Autodesk Revit and AutoCAD Civil 3D.

Data propagation The beauty of an iTwin, is once the data is in the cloud, it can be used to feed other workflows. A good example here is camwww.AECmag.com

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A multi-disciplinary iTwin model in the cloud can act as a central hub for BIMbased workflows

pus and city planning, enabled through Bentley OpenCities Planner, a web-based tool that combines GIS, reality, and BIM data to create 3D city-scale digital twins for collaboration and public consultation.

To bring in 3D CAD models, OpenCities Planner used to rely solely on file-based workflows. This was a manual process and did not include metadata. If metadata was then added in OpenCities Planner, but the design subsequently evolved and an updated 3D CAD model was reimported, then everything had to be redone. Now that the software is ‘iTwin Enabled’ data can stream in direct from an iTwin, enabling architects and engineers to seamlessly bring in their BIM models to give them a city context.

A great example of this technology in use is the City of Dublin, which adopted the web-based tool to carry out public consultation on a project in the Docklands area. Due to Covid-19, the traditional Town Hall engagement model of gathering people together to view development plans was not possible, so Dublin went digital. Not only did it solve the problem, but it managed to get an incredible 160,000 views of the project, with feedback gathered digitally via polls and comments.

From design to construction iTwins have also enabled Bentley to dramatically improve the flow of data from design to construction. Synchro, Bentley’s construction management software, was recently ‘iTwin enabled’ to not only allow ‘as-designed’ BIM models to be brought in more easily, but for 4D models and fully detailed schedule simulations with animation and sequencing to be viewed entirely in a web browser.

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operations, explains. “Within the Synchro Pro session, rather than saying, ‘I’m going to open from my [desktop Synchro] .SP file’ I simply connect to my Synchro project, which is managed in the cloud, and I stream that BIM data in.

“One of the great benefits here is, because it’s in the cloud, we can now take it onto our Synchro Control Web app, so we have a web view of the of the 4D model, and we also can take it to our Synchro Field mobile app.”

If issues are identified on site, these can be logged in the Synchro Field mobile app. Then, if the project team decides it needs to go back to design, any changes made inside the 3D design tool can be automatically fed back through into Synchro via the iTwin.

The beauty of this workflow is the software can give the project manager insight about what has changed, as Hattersley explains. “That’s the magic of the iTwins database – [it] tracks every change. It’s what they call a change set, so it’s basically every difference that has been published, is recorded and so what we’re actually seeing is a collection of differences. And that allows you to roll back and roll forward and see [and compare] what it used to be, to what it is.”

“We actually show a report that lists those changes, but also visually shows the changes,” adds Rich Humphrey, Bentley Systems vice president construction. “So, you’ll see the model and it’ll highlight like a clash detection, that tells you ‘hey the geometry changed’. And that either impacts or doesn’t impact what you’re doing with the construction model,” adding that with this information the project manager can then decide the most appropriate action.

“You’re no longer really importing and exporting anymore, you’re just live streaming and live connected to the cloud. That’s a default for us,” concludes Humphrey.

Conclusion It’s hard to fault Bentley for going hard after digital twins. It wants to be to infrastructure digital twins what Autodesk is to BIM, and with its technology and open strategy it certainly has a good chance of achieving this. But one can’t help but wonder if it’s missing a trick by not hammering home the message that it can simply help AEC firms that are still struggling with fragmented workflows.

In many ways, what Bentley is offering AEC firms is an optimised BIM workflow, built around a sophisticated Common Data Environment (CDE) that looks to eliminate traditional file-based workflows, with live streaming of data.

While Bentley customers might get it, there’s a huge number of AEC firms that could potentially benefit from iTwins, including those looking to better connect design with construction.

What’s more, by solving current challenges around data interoperability and data flow, AEC firms could be creating a digital twin without even knowing it. So, in the future, if the decision was made to add more value to an asset once in operation, by connecting real-time IoT data or using AI-based analytics, then the foundations have already been laid. And with seamless integration with Microsoft Azure Digital Twins, Azure IoT Hub and others, this doesn’t have to exist solely in the world of Bentley Systems.

However, while openness offers countless possibilities for customisation, it also brings potential complexity and a need for consultancy. Autodesk Tandem (see page 16) is the complete opposite; it’s a much simpler concept for architecture and construction firms, with the onus on them to seek out new business opportunities by repurposing their Revit BIM data to clients as a digital twin. The same can be said for TwinView (tinyurl.com/tw-AEC).

■ bentley.com

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21/11/2020 08:12

Interview

Digital twins: the next frontier Greg Corke caught up with Keith Bentley, CTO of Bentley Systems, to find out why he thinks machine learning is so important to digital twins and why we’ve only just scratched the surface

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n 2018 Bentley Systems acquired Keith Bentley highlights one AIworx machine learning and IoT develop- project that automatically recognises all ment company AIworx. At the time, the tags on a scanned Piping and CTO Keith Bentley described it as Instrumentation Diagram (P&ID) drawan ‘acqui-hire’, ‘just for the talent’. After ing, then relates that into the 3D model. all, the Canadian firm didn’t actually Another example is the automatic object have any products. classification of reality capture meshes Two years later and it’s through analysing the input starting to become clear of photographs. exactly why Bentley brought Smart thinking in that talent. The team has been playing a key role in Digital twins are fundamendeveloping new technologies tally about big data: collectfor Bentley’s Digital Twin ing old, new, live, and future platform, as the company data, geo-referencing it, looks to establish itself as the finding out what has leading force in this emergchanged, displaying it, and ing sector. doing something meaningAccording to Keith ful with the data. It’s in this Bentley, the AIworx team has last part that machine learnbeen split into two groups: Ten years from ing can be used to great one is looking at ways to effect, studying patterns in now, all the make smarter, better quality the data, to help AEC teams demos will be and infrastructure owners input to the digital twin, about how while the other is trying to assess the impact of past analyse the dynamics within decisions to help make more smart your the digital twin. design, business digital twin is informed and operational decisions — smart, Feeding the twin moving forward. meaning your If all digital twin projects were Keith Bentley shared some created for brand new assets, specific examples of what the machine then the development of a digteam are exploring, including learning can ital twin would be much simstudying what makes a good recognise pler. The reality is, most digidesign or what makes sometal twins are likely to be built thing fail frequently by anapatterns in for existing buildings or infrayour data that lysing maintenance records. structure, for which the quali“Recognising patterns you didn’t ty and format of data can be and being able to analyse know were extremely varied. the contents of a digital With this in mind, the domain or the digital twin there AIworx team has been workecosystem, combining the ing out how to ‘up-level’ the design, the reality data, the content that goes into a digital twin, as IoT data, and trying to put that all togethKeith Bentley explains, “So we have paper, er to give better informed kind of busiwe have pictures, we have CAD files, and ness input. You know, should your neesometimes BIM models, and when you dle look red, if you’re headed for disaster combine all that together, you find that or something like that. And there’s no there’s a lot of inconsistency.” end of that...”

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Knowledge sharing Of course, the more data that’s collected, the better the insight. A few years ago, Bentley floated the idea of engineering firms sharing analysis data from their projects so they could be compared against others. Could machine learning be used in this way for the greater good?

“When you get to things like trying to recognise P&ID documents, there’s a lot of patterns that are the same across everybody’s P&ID,” explains Keith Bentley. “So, if you could study the Universe of all P&IDs and have that go into the model, the results would be way better.

“Asking people ‘hey, would you be willing to donate the analysis of your data into the machine learning model that will then give back to you?’ that hasn’t happened yet, but I still hold out hope that people will be motivated by that, if we could show them value at the other end.

“But I have to confess so far, it’s just we do it on each user’s data in isolation.”

The future It’s still very early days for the use of machine learning in infrastructure digital twins, especially when it comes to recognising patterns. There have been several examples of the technology used for predictive maintenance, but in reality, we’ve only just scratched the surface.

Keith Bentley explains that one of the reasons it hasn’t happened yet is that the data just doesn’t exist or isn’t available.

But this will change over time.

“Ten years from now, all the demos will be about how smart your digital twin is smart, meaning your machine learning can recognise patterns in your data that you didn’t know were there,” he says.

“Digital Twins will be the input system to the machine learning system that I think can revolutionise the concept of designing, operating, building, and maintaining large scale assets in the decades to come.”

■ bentley.com

www.AECmag.com

22/11/2020 15:28

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23/11/2020 16:35

Feature 1

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Vectorworks 2021

In September, Vectorworks released this year’s major update to its suite of BIM, landscaping and stage set design solutions: Vectorworks 2021: Architect, Landmark and Entertainment. Martyn Day reports.

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oftware and CAD brands are about evolution with the occasional revolution. In the AEC BIM-space we are lucky to have really mature players: Autodesk, Graphisoft, Allplan, Bentley Systems and Vectorworks.

These firms have all survived as brands and thrived through thick and thin from the early 1980s. Sure, there might have been various name changes, acquisitions, operating system changes, code-base swaps, moves from 2D to 3D to BIM… but it just occurred to me that our little BIM bubble of the software world is incredibly stable; we all benefit from a lot of software development heritage Looking back at the history of Vectorworks, it started in 1985 as Diehl Graphisoft which produced MiniCAD, which became the bestselling CAD software on the Mac. The year Diehl launched MiniCAD, AutoCAD was at v 2.1 and Keith Bentley had just started Bentley Systems. In 1999, the first release of Vectorworks replaced MiniCAD. Nemetschek acquired Diehl Graphisoft in 2000 and Mac users were worried the Mac would be dumped. Roll forward 20 26

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years and Vectorworks is still available on PC and Mac and despite Nemetschek buying Graphisoft in 2006 and now owning three distinct BIM brands.

Vectorworks has continued to grow to over 685,000 customers in architecture, landscape and entertainment (stage and set design). As a Nemetschek brand, it seems to be blazing its own trail.

In the past two years, Vectorworks has added some sizable chunks of functionality to its yearly releases – GIS integration, walkthrough animations, historybased solid modelling, sub-D surfaces.

Vectorworks 2021 seems like a much more pared-back release, not so much with the big new all-singing and dancing features, but lots of crowd-pleasing workflow enhancements. Perhaps, during a pandemic, focussing on what users are asking for, rather than pushing boundaries is the right way to go.

There are three core versions of Vectorworks, which are pretty selfexplanatory: Architect, Landmark (landscape) and Entertainment (stages and sets). There are core features that go into the Fundamentals product and then a sprinkling of vertical-specific enhancements.

Enhancements Starting off with the 3D engine, Vectorworks push / pull modelling now supports additional drawing tools like the line objects, 3D polygons and NURBS curves. Other modelling enhancements include simplification of editing solids created with fillet, chamfer, shell solid and more. Rather than navigating through layers of history, you can simply highlight a face or edge for direct editing and speed through your 3D modelling process.

Multi-core processors will get better used by the Vectorworks Graphics Module (VGM) as it has been optimised to better use cache. Vectorworks, the company, estimates that users will see load times boosted by 5x. Also claimed is zero wait when flipping between 3D views, manipulating layers or navigating in 3D with the Flyover tool.

A totally refreshed tool for automating the generation of gridlines creates customisable structural grid lines. Simply draw grids in plan and any changes automatically appear in all views. Multiple configurations of grids can be made for every need or building orientation. The new structural grids are also IFC compatible, aiding collaboration. www.AECmag.com

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1 Quicksearch helps you find and activate any command by typing in what you think you need 2 Cache enhancements to the Vectorworks Graphics Module (VGM) could see load times boosted by 5x 3 Vectorworks 2021 includes several 3D modelling enhancements

With maturity and years of enhancement come a lot of commands and tool palettes. With the new Quicksearch you can find and activate any command by typing in what you think you need.

Vectorworks will make suggestions based on the text and the most common tools. I wonder what the results are for ‘thingumy?’ Simply hit the F key, the spyglass icon top right or in the Tools menu at the top of the screen. Results are given as either tools or menus. It also remembers the last tool searched for.

Vectorworks 2021 has a new resource called Materials, which, as you would expect, lets you define materials on 2D and 3D views and sections on objects that support fill. It always shows the correct material in whatever representation style is generated. It eliminates the need for setting extensive property components.

Materials can be compound and are also used to define construction properties and physical properties including specific product data, allowing users to assign any custom properties as needed.

This also feeds into material quantities, which can be taken off.

Materials can be applied to hardscape, landscape, walls slabs, roofs, stairs, structural members and more. Data visualisation sets can be created to go through different finish options.

Smartmarkers – drawing labels, section markers, elevation markers and detail callouts now use ‘Object Style’ option. A load of default graphics come with the software but you can design your own from scratch. You can really make your drawings your own.

Site design has seen grading improvements for those who use slope-oriented or www.AECmag.com

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point-to-point grading. Networking grade objects automatically update if edits are made to part of a network.

Lighting designers can add pan, throw and tilt for each device. A new Focus Lighting Devices command provides control over visualisation without having to set a focal point for each light, which is time consuming. Additional enhancements to multi-circuit devices make reporting, circuit management, and communication with consoles easier.

Microsoft Excel file formats can now be directly imported and data and formatting transferred between Excel and Vectorworks worksheets. It’s also possible to export Vectorworks worksheets to Excel to share information with your collaborators.

The release All in all, a very functional release with some useful performance and productivity enhancements across-the-board. The direct model enhancements increase flexibility when creating Parasolid geometry and the complete rewrite of the structural grids is excellent. The new materials implementation will be a boon to WYSIWYG display and material choice for rendering.

Future directions Vectorworks CEO, Dr. Biplab Sarkar has been CEO since 2016 and prior to that was CTO for seven years where he would have overseen the implanting of Siemens’ Parasolid solid modelling kernel into the heart of Vectorworks (2009), the same technology that’s used in high end aerospace and automotive design.

Vectorworks has been the main

Parasolid customer that has been demanding the Siemens kernel team jumps through hoops to provide architectural modelling features, multi-threaded / multi-core and better Mac support.

Why is this important? Because the next revolution in AEC will be connecting to digital manufacturing systems and most of the current BIM leaders by volume don’t have solid modelling at the core, which is a considerable benefit.

Vectorworks is ahead of the game here.

We talked with Dr. Sarkar around the launch and we discussed how difficult it must be to develop for both PC and Mac, and to get the same functionality on both.

At the time the new M1, ARM processors had not been seen. While having to cajole Siemens into advancing its solid model kernel for architectural use, and then also hassle them for more consistent multithreaded and multicore access, the new M1 processor would need a port of Parasolid to aid development of both Mac to keep up with PC. At the time the Vectorworks team was also evaluating moving the entire graphics pipeline to Apple Metal, which would be required in any move to Apple silicon.

All the benchmarks I have seen to date show this first generation of M1 absolutely trouncing this year’s entry-level Intel processors and doing so without generating much heat. It was also a shock to hear that the RAM is built into the actual processor, which is one of the reasons for the speed benefit. We look forward to seeing what Vectorworks will do with the iMac and if it manages to get important components ported over to aid the continuation of the Mac application.

■ vectorworks.net

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Feature

Bricsys Digital Summit The DWG-based BricsCAD BIM has deservedly earned the reputation of the most rapidly developed design authoring tool in BIM. Martyn Day reports from the Bricsys Digital Summit on the latest features in the V21 update, plus other news

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hile 2020 has been the oddest of years, the Internet has managed to save us from sitting at home wondering what to do with ourselves. All the major software developers have moved their conferences online, and complex new products have continued to be released, on time, even though we can’t find toilet paper, flour and dried pasta in our local stores.

Bricsys Digital Summit provides five hours of design technology entertainment and they even have a house-band of employees that occasionally pop in to entertain.

Before I jump into what was shown, a little about Bricsys. Based in Ghent, Belgium, the company has been developing since 2002 and the founder, Erik de Keyser sold the company to the process plant division of Hexagon in 2018.

Hexagon had previously ported its AutoCAD-based plant application onto BricsCAD and were so impressed they bought the company. Bricsys continues to be a brand within the Hexagon family and actively markets and sells BricsCAD and its vertical products.

The best way to think about BricsCAD is that it’s a 2D/3D DWG-based CAD platform that has a Swiss Army knife of vertical applications built on top. For people who need a draughting tool, it’s a powerful CAD system moulded to replace AutoCAD, and even supports the development APIs ARx, Lisp etc.).

For architects and engineers, it’s a design-centric BIM modeller with automated associative 2D take offs, with support for generative design with McNeel Grasshopper and real time viz with Enscape. For civil engineers, as of last year, it now has terrain/grading tools, road and pipe design. For mechanical engineers, it’s a full 3D ACIS-based solid modelling application with amazing sheet folding capabilities. It also handles point clouds, VR, runs on Mac, Windows and 28

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Linux and comes with a perpetual licence or on subscription and in single or network licence configurations. There is also a cloud collaboration document manager with automated workflows.

As AEC Magazine is primarily about BIM, it’s worth explaining why BricsCAD BIM is a little different. In products like Revit and ArchiCAD, users select components to model their designs. Each of these components is predefined and comes with many options that need to be configured.

This is the ‘Lego’ approach to modelling.

BricsCAD BIM presents the designer with a blank sheet and starts by modelling the envelope of the building using solids. This can be expressive and freeform and the designer does not have to worry about anything except sculping the form. For openings, simple Boolean commands punch holes. Invoking the ‘BIMify’ command then sets the AI loose to automatically recognise walls, windows, slabs, columns etc. and automatically assigns IFC tags to each. From there on the refinement can continue.

The software also offers a whole host of other tools to rapidly get from a solid model to a BIM model. The one thing that Lego CAD gets wrong is sweating the

details too early in the process, where what needs to happen is the act of experimentation and design.

The digital summit This is the third year in a row that we have followed the developments from Bricsys.

Each year has brought leaps in expanded functionality. 2020 is no different.

The foundation for all Bricsys tools is BricsCAD. While it started out as an AutoCAD clone, it has surpassed that functionality and has been on its own trajectory for a number of years. While it’s based on DWG, the DWG engine is designed for modern processors and is multithreaded, so it’s fast.

This year BricsCAD has had improvements to image handling, meshes, direct modelling, conversion from mesh to solids, auto mapping of layers in a drawing to those set out in a reference drawing and DGN export added (it already did DGN import).

There have been some truly amazing parametric features added – it can make 2D or 3D parametric blocks simply by selecting geometry and auto-constrains the geometry, giving the user control over which dimensions can be parametrically www.AECmag.com

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controlled. At the virtual event, this was shown on a 3D i-beam structural model.

One beam was selected, auto constrained, and the software then found all the other elements in the structure that were the same and turned them into parametric 3D blocks.

Sometimes you import a drawing from hell that has an exploded polyline that is made up of many smaller vertices – they are pigs to edit and they make files huge.

A demonstration was given of a new ‘Simplify’ command. It took a polyline from a map that was made of 350,000 vertices and reduced it down to 450.

columns in a semi-automatic process.

This is the start of a process that will eventually deliver the elusive scan-toBIM automation. For now, this is a great workflow tool for those needing to turn point clouds to IFC, much better than tracing as a reference.

Greg Schleusner, director of design technology, HOK explained how they were working with Bricsys to experiment, improving drawing automation. In this instance, the laborious process of creating fire safety drawings was automated.

Fire-specific components can be identified and specified; properties mapped for style definition. Theses are reflected in the drawings and are completely customisable, and reusable in other projects. In fact, BricsCAD BIM lets users create hundreds of sheet-sets automatically and cre-

high level of integration. This year Epic Games also joined with Twinmotion, which creates ArchViz environments for rendering and animations and also feeds into Unreal Engine for real-time VR experiences.

Conclusion

If I had to say BricsCAD had a superpower, it’s in its the ability to recognise patterns and shapes and then perform automation. Blockify, Simplify, BIMify, QuickBuilding, Propagate, DetectFloor are all examples of how the software can search through its database, across all entity types, in 2D or 3D, recognise Infrastructure shapes, patterns, or building components, Up until last year, BricsCAD was not a and then do something quite magical civil design application. Within 12 months make dumb things smart. so much work has been done, it’s now With every release there is something tackling road layout across 3D added to the feature set to topology. Last year TIN (trianassist in recognising or identigular irregular networks) surIf I had to say BricsCAD had a superpower, fying geometry and then faces were added. In V21 it applying intelligence, should it’s in its the ability to recognise patterns now has powerful tools to genthat be creating a block, conand shapes and then do something quite erate topology maps and TIN straining geometry, convertsurfaces, overlay satellite ing 300,000 polylines into magical - make dumb things smart imagery, create 3D alignments 400, identifying a door in a and extract 2D profiles from solid model or now getting the terrain. Corridor templates can be ate exactly what they look like. Sheet sets temptingly close to converting point applied and roads modelled and drawing are a background process, leaving the clouds to BIM elements. It’s an authoring sets created. Impressive stuff. system free to carry on working. tool with intelligence.

The most important feature this year is Bricsys is maintaining its development BricsCAD BIM BricsCAD BIM’s ability to import filtered velocity, it’s fleshing out its offerings at QuickBuilding is a new command that RVT models as underlays or as solid speed in multiple verticals and adding appears to be BIMify on steroids. While lump of geometry. In this release, only intelligence in a way that nobody else in using BricsCAD BIM to perform massing the geometry from Revit is imported but this industry is doing. I always assumed studies — which can be done with direct because the software has BIMify, it can that having a solid modelling engine modelling, generatively with Grasshopper be used to turn the Revit geometry model underneath a 2D CAD tool, or BIM modor imported geometry — the new Quick into identified IFC components - walls, eller was a liability - solids are heavy and building command will automatically doors, windows, spaces etc. This RVT is overkill. Time and again Bricsys developproduce a shelled solid, with automatic once more an intelligent BIM model. ers use it to their advantage, from importplacement of walls and slabs, storey segOne wonders if this might even be useful ing Revit models, doing scan-to-BIM or mentation, as well and identified spaces. to Revit users who can’t access their old going from mass model to BIM building Using a quantities dialogue, users can models. model in one click. configure how the Quick Building comMulti-user collaboration is mand implements these intelligent con- now possible through a Check out the demonstrations versions. In seconds, it is possible to go GIT-based version control given in the Summit from a shaped mass solid, to the shell of a (open source manage■ summit.bricsys.com multi-floor intelligent BIM model. ment tool) which records Last year in Sweden, Bricsys announced changes to files over an initiative to further refine its capabili- time which works online ties, intelligently turning dumb point and offline. As this For massing clouds into IFC BIM models, partnering develops, expect to studies the new with global design, architecture, engineer- see some gameQuickBuilding ing and planning firm HOK and Leica. changing, collaboracommand will automatically In the demonstration, the start point was tive, granular workflows produce a a 98 GB laser scan of a building, both inside coming to market. shelled solid, and exterior. Smart algorithms were used with automatic to identify BIM elements within the point Design visualisation placement of walls and cloud, identifying multiple planar surfaces, Last year Enscape joined slabs, storey which then define a space. the ‘Bricsys Collective’. segmentation, In addition to surfaces, it’s also possible These are developers as well and identified spaces to identify solids, such as walls, slabs or with whom Bricsys has a

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Interview

Improving structural workflows Nemetschek Group, perhaps best known for its architectural BIM brands, is looking to leverage SCIA and Allplan to move away from manual processes and to drive integrated digital workflows for structural design, writes Martyn Day

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emetschek occupies a unique that exists between the various disciposition in the BIM market. It plines in federated projects and different is an AEC-focussed holding applications. Much of this is driven company which owns no less through the company’s adherence to IFC than three global BIM brands: and OpenBIM and core benefits of cloudVectorworks, Graphisoft and Allplan, as based workflows. This approach helps it well as thirteen other industry-related connect applications within its own ecocompanies which are driving the digitisa- system and ultimately plays well with tion of many different aspects of the con- the fact that, in the real world, applicastruction industry. With the launch of tions used in any one project don’t come ArchiCAD 24 earlier this from one single vendor. year, Graphisoft introduced AEC Magazine caught a file-less and instant workup with Nigel Rees, busiflow between architectural ness strategy manager at BIM tool ArchiCAD and Allplan and Viktor multi-material structural Varkonyi chief division analysis software SCIA officer at Nemetschek Engineer, as well as a new Group to discuss Allplan’s open format (structural BIMplus platform, along analysis format — SAF). It with SCIA AutoConverter was clear that Nemetschek which can automatically was looking to extend its convert any structural focus beyond architecture model from any CAD systo improve digital workinto an analysis Engineers are not tem flows for other industry dismodel in an OpenBIM comfortable with workflow. ciplines, as well as connectjust clicking a ing up its own technologies.

In truth, Nemetschek Nigel Rees: Before I startbutton because through its Allplan brand, with Nemetschek, the then it becomes a ed has always been in the conway structural engineers black box and we work is a very manual struction side of BIM, but the company’s past lack of wanted to steer processes, which potenintegration between its away from ‘black tially means data is lost brands and technology, has along the way — or, box’ solutions tended to keep Allplan to its because it’s a manual proNigel Rees core geographies, namely cess, you get people recreGermany, Austria and ating what someone else Switzerland (the DACH has already modelled. region). Now a broader vision is emerging Over the last 20 years, people have been from Nemetschek’s Bavarian HQ which trying to do this, but never really conwill enable technology from its brands to vinced the engineering profession that play better together and it’s mainly they needed to change, because there was thanks to the smart use of the cloud. always an element of manual rework. We While Nemetschek has not gone down recognised that there was an opportunity the route of creating suites of products to do things better for engineering, in (like Autodesk Collections), it has opted particular, the civil and structural engito work on filling in the digital divide neering profession.

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So how do you do that? Technically we’re in a fairly fortunate time at the moment with cloud technology, with algorithms and cloud being more accepted in the industry. We thought, a very nice and very effective workflow for engineers would be if we could have all the data in one place. We can take it from anywhere, and we don’t care where it comes from.

BIMplus is a data environment which can deal with the federated model. We can pull data in from all the CAD and 3D modelling systems within the group (Nemetschek) or outside group — it doesn’t matter where it comes from.

Our job within BIMplus is to actually neutralise that ‘file’ problem and democratise that data. We can bring in a model, or part of a model from Allplan, Revit, or from ArchiCAD. From an IFC perspective, we join it all together in BIMplus, and it is representative of the 3D model in any one of those BIM programs. We then send it to AutoConverter.

AutoConverter The SCIA AutoConverter is a plug-in for BIMplus that can convert any imported structural model from any CAD system, into an analysis model without having to start the model from scratch, using a controlled, automated process that applies recognition algorithms to the data.

The combination offers integrated change management and revisioning.

Adjustments made to the structural model are then automatically updated to the related analysis model without the loss of data, such as loads. This drastically reduces the time spent on rework.

Nigel Rees: In its simplest form, if you think of a column and a beam intersection, a [simple CAD] system doesn’t know that it’s a column or a beam, it just happens to be ‘something vertical’, ‘something horizontal’. [Using SCIA AutoConverter] we www.AECmag.com

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SCIA AutoConverter 1 Original structural model 2 Recognised analysis model

walk around the perimeter of that section — that could be an I-section, could be a square or whatever it may be — and the algorithm recognises it. The system then stores that information and associates that with a database of sections.

After it has analysed the whole model, it goes from a state of dumb geometry to an engineering model and because it knows it’s an I-section or a rectangular section, it can do the alignment. It then does another pass over the model and it looks at offsets to beams onto the base of the column, for example, or it may need to shift it up to the surface/ floor plate.

At that point, the engineer can enter into a process that they’re familiar with. They can either take control of that analytical model themselves and really drill down to where they’re concerned about the master lines. Or they can click the button and have AutoConverter do it all for them. For simple to medium complexity structures, that’s often good enough, but for more complex structures, it’s important that the engineer can take control.

The important thing is that we don’t just keep that in as data for our own tools, we allow that to go to any structural analysis tool. So yes, you can use SCIA and AutoConverter but it can also go to any other structural analysis system.

AEC Magazine: How accurate is SCIA AutoConverter?

Viktor Varkonyi: I think it’s a balance of the quality of data that is flowing in.

Nigel Rees: The quality of the model coming into BIMplus is critical. If it’s a real jumbled-up mess coming in, then you would get the same issues using AutoConverter that you’d have anywhere else. AutoConverter would do a lot of the cleanup for you in the first pass over the model, but every engineer needs to do a www.AECmag.com

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manual check on the data that they are sending through, such is the critical nature of that data. Downstream you always have to do an initial run on your analysis to check whether this is working.

That’s just due diligence on the engineering side. Actually, if you click a button on AutoConverter it will join everything together with hundred percent right, but the question always is - is that what the engineer wants? We introduced many controls into AutoConverter, because the engineers are not comfortable with just clicking a button because then it becomes a black box and we wanted to steer away from ‘black box’ solutions. It needs to be open, it needs to be configurable, and it needs to be editable for engineers.

The thing about passing information through the analysis tools, is that there are so many different types of analysis and use cases where a linear static model is, by definition, different to a dynamic model. You need different components acting in different ways, if you’re going to do a dynamic model analysis. Effectively, you end up with two completely different models. But in terms of ‘does a column

connect up to a beam?’ Yes, AutoConverter does that 100%.

I think this is new to the engineering process. What people are realising at the moment is that they can actually create models a lot quicker now, than they were [previously] able to. Look at model creation, what would have typically taken two to three days in the past, now it can be done in minutes - literally ten to fifteenminutes to get that geometry pass through.

What this enables the engineer to do is a lot more of the optioneering — what if we changed part of the model to steel, what if we did it in timber? And then presenting those options back to the client.

Maybe it’s still a linear workflow from that perspective, but the fact that they can bring different options and cost benefits to the client that they were too timeconstrained to do before [is a big benefit].

For this all to work, it’s very important that you can actually do version control.

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Interview 3

3 Allplan BIMplus is an open BIM platform designed to allow all disciplines to collaborate efficiently on building projects

clients can see what work has been done.

Not only does it provide that speed, it actually allows engineers to get the validation process for the client.

BIMplus and AutoConverter speeds up the process while minimising the errors.

A traditional workflow may have someone building a model, and then you have the engineer reading that model or visually inspecting it and then recreating it in another tool. It may also then be the case that you need to go from one structural analysis tool to another to perform different types of analysis, e.g. linear static or dynamic analysis. With BIMplus and AutoConverter you can now push that from one centralised managed environment to different analysis tools with no data loss.

BIMplus, then you don’t just have the geometry model anymore, you have multiple versions of the analysis model, sitting within that BIM environment.

Cloud strategy AEC Magazine: With BIMcloud for ArchiCAD, BIMPlus for construction, and BlueBeam Studio, is there a single cloud strategy for Nemetschek?

Viktor Varkonyi: Obviously, the Graphisoft ecosystem and the Allplan Nigel Rees: The other part of the project ecosystem are serving slightly different was to develop a neutral customer profiles and cusfile format which anyone tomer segments. can read. We came up with Graphisoft has strengths a concept we called SAF early in the design process, (structural analysis forin very iterative workfows, mat), which actually writes while the design is still data into an Excel format. very agile in the architecThe reason why we did that tural processes. Allplan is is because virtually every a little bit later in the proengineer is going to have a cess. BIMplus is software copy of Excel on their desk agnostic and based on IFC It can then be hooked up to open standards. We have a products like Robot, Staad lot of projects where and any other analysis tool AutoCAD customers are For the like Frilo from the sharing IFC files to Nemetschek Nemetschek Group as well.

BIMplus and then Allplan Group, cloud is is using AutoConverter.

When we send the data out of this managed BIM The Nemetschek stratenot ‘the goal’. I environment, it exists in gy is that we are building think companies these solutions together, multiple forms, in the varithat make going but keep the innovation ous structural analysis tools, but now we actually very close to the market to the cloud a have a system that can with that brands having goal are too bring back that data into the on certain markets. financially driven focus managed environment. So For the Nemetschek Viktor Varkonyi Group, cloud is not ‘the that’s where we differ a little bit as we are sending goal’. I think companies data out, but actually bringthat make going to the ing it back in and managing it again. It’s cloud a goal are too financially driven. For managed, to unmanaged, and back into Nemetschek it’s about the deployed cloud managed again. That gives us an edge, when it delivers some customer value. certainly in the structural engineering With BIMplus, being in the cloud, it’s to world because once it comes back into liberate data access, in any form. That’s a

SAF Files

‘‘

’’

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real and definite customer value.

This is why BIMplus is cloud-based and based on open standards. Actually, I think this is one of the only platforms out there that internally uses open standards as the core data structure. So, we are not converting data. On top of that, we have a powerful API, again, liberating data access but, as Nigel mentioned, the complex functionality that SCIA AutoConverter is doing is also fully built on public API services. So, I think that gives you the impression of strengths that how powerful the system is.

On the analysis solution, the Nemetschek strategy for the cloud is that we have put a strong focus to build our data structures into the cloud, this is what BIMplus is doing in the open engineering environment. This is what Graphisoft is doing with BIMcloud, for the building design space, also what BlueBeam is doing with BlueBeam Studio but these are all related to the cloud but whether the SaaS solutions are thick clients, thin clients or a desktop product, it’s a decision as to what best fits each customer.

Conclusion Nemetschek is still dedicated to having its individual brands. However, as it seeks to expand and connect to generate workflow-based solutions, we can expect to see more data flows between them.

Typically software firms that do this are looking for expansion into the federated construction market and don’t necessarily play well with the competition. On this matter, it’s good to see the Group’s commitment to OpenBIM and IFC remains, recognising that in AEC ecosystems, the product mix is highly varied.

For all BIM workflows, BIMplus and AutoConverter can help limit the amount of unnecessary rework and remodelling that happens between architects and structural engineers.

■ nemetschek.com ■ scia.net

www.AECmag.com

23/11/2020 09:53

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Vectorworks, Inc. Licensing Philosophies

W

ith the recent and dramatic change in economic climate due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), it’s important for designers to have access to flexible and cost-effective licensing options to meet their constantly evolving needs.

purchasing options to our customers around the world allows us the flexibility to challenge our competitors who have limited offerings.

2: When did Vectorworks begin doing subscriptions? Where have they been rolled out?

Davison: In April 2018, subscriptions first rolled out in Australia, followed by New Zealand in August 2018, the U.S. in April 2019, Canada in September In light of this major current event affecting the 2019, in India, China, Vietnam, South Korea, business world, Vectorworks CEO Dr. Biplab Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines in Sarkar and Vice President of Sales Nicole Davison November 2019 and the U.K. in March 2020. explore the ins and outs of their current licensing structure for their global design products.

Sarkar: We chose to roll out subscriptions in What sticks out most? The importance of Australia first and then New Zealand soon after offering our customers a choice. Read on to see because we have great partners interested in what they shared. testing subscriptions due to their economic climate at the time. The other benefit for us 1: Some software companies limit their options was to kick off subscriptions in the Englishto forced subscriptions. What is Vectorworks’ speaking countries. Now, all of our main office philosophy when it comes to licensing, and why locations — U.S., Canada, and U.K. — offer has Vectorworks chosen a different path from subscriptions, too. its competitors?

3: What prompted the decision to launch Davison: At Vectorworks, we value our subscriptions? customers, so we prioritize offering purchasing options and solutions that make the most Sarkar: Subscriptions offered an opportunity sense for them. With this in mind, we’ve to serve our community of users who weren’t chosen to offer perpetual, perpetual with necessarily best served by a perpetual license. maintenance, network, single-user options This could be someone who is just starting a for perpetual licenses, and subscription with business or freelancers who only need their single-user options, so that we can customize design software for a few months at a time. a solution that’s best for our customers and Having a subscription is a much better solution their varying needs. for these individuals.

Additionally, our philosophy is to reward customers for their longevity commitment. A 4: What types of licensing options do you offer customer who commits to the long-term by to users? purchasing a perpetual license and staying on our maintenance plan always receives the lowest Davison: Our software offerings boil down to price for our product. three main license options: See how Vectorworks is helping customers during COVID-19 (tinyurl.com/vw-covid)

Sarkar: Historically, our goal has been to maintain cost of ownership lower than our primary competition. Vectorworks is a valuepriced product over time, and we find that these cost savings allow us to best support our customers. Continuing to offer versatile

pXX_AEC_NOVDEC20_Advertorial.indd 2

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2.

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Our E Series license is an individual license that is activated over the internet.

Our B Series license is an individual license that gets activated through a hardware key, that the customer owns.

Our Network license is maintained on

a server and allows multiple users to share seats. The server can be activated through the internet or a hardware key.

Our Network option allows customers with 10+ seats on their license the flexibility to float our different product offerings.

Our E Series can be activated globally and there’s never a risk of losing a hardware key like with our B Series. This factor is why we are seeing many customers migrating to our internetauthenticated solutions.

5: What is the difference between a perpetual and subscription license?

Sarkar: A perpetual license means customers own the software forever and can always use it, as long as your operating system remains compatible.

You will be able to upgrade your license for up to three years at a discounted price. Current version perpetual licenses are eligible for enrolment into our Vectorworks Service Select maintenance plan (tinyurl.com/ServiceSelect), where you will receive free upgrades to the current version, exclusive training opportunities, and more.

Since Vectorworks Service Select is a maintenance program and not a subscription program, our customers own a perpetual license of their Vectorworks software and can continue to use it regardless of if they stay enrolled in Vectorworks Service Select or not.

While subscription licenses are the exact same Vectorworks product as perpetual, they are rented on either a monthly or an annual basis. If subscription is the route for you, and you plan to use the license for a year, we offer a discount to purchase an annual subscription license.

Davison: For perpetual and subscriptions, there’s the option to request up to three versions back in case a customer isn’t ready to upgrade to the latest version because they’re in the middle of a project or collaborating with others on a different version.

6: Can you break down the benefits of Vectorworks Service Select vs. the benefits of subscriptions?

17/11/2020 10:40

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At Vectorworks, we value our customers, so we prioritize offering purchasing options and solutions that make the most sense for them Nicole Davison, Vectorworks, Inc. Sarkar: Vectorworks Service Select is the best way to get the most out of Vectorworks software for the most cost-effective price over time. Our members receive an immediate upgrade of new product releases including Service Pack updates, priority technical support, early release of all content through our Resource Manager (tinyurl.com/vw-resource-manager), and our constantly growing library of on-demand learning tutorials. Further, Vectorworks Service Select members receive special member-only features in Vectorworks Cloud Services (tinyurl.com/vw-cloud) such as Photos to 3D Model, cloud rendering, and more.

While subscription licenses don’t have the same early access to content or all of the training available in Vectorworks University (tinyurl.com/vw-university), they do always have access to the most recent Vectorworks version.

And, these customers have the flexibility of paying for the software when they need it.

Davison: Your work is always yours, and you keep your project files. You must have an active subscription or perpetual license to update, edit, or use your files. Once your subscription period has expired, your access to Vectorworks will end unless you renew for another term or purchase another license type. We always offer our Vectorworks Viewer which allows users to open and view their files.

8: Are you allowed to convert your subscription license to a perpetual license?

Davison: Yes, you can easily convert your subscription license to a perpetual license. Since the product is the exact same, once you have purchased a perpetual license you just need to update your serial number for your license to automatically convert to a perpetual license. We often offer promotions and discounts that subscribers can take advantage of to make the conversion.

7: Do you lose access to your work if you cancel 9: What’s types of products do you offer? Where a subscription? How can someone access their can customers learn more about pricing and buy work if they cancel their subscription?

Vectorworks software? Any closing remarks?

Davison: Vectorworks Fundamentals is our basic CAD software package, while Vectorworks Architect, Landmark, and Spotlight support the AEC, landscape and entertainment industries, respectively. Vectorworks Designer encompasses our entire suite of technology in one interface with Architect, Landmark, and Spotlight. Finally, we offer Vision, a pre-viz software; Braceworks, an add-on rigging analysis module; and ConnectCAD, a signal flow add-on as part of our entertainment offerings.

Sarkar: We seek to be the go-to software choice for designing anything and this encompasses a vast group of designers with varying needs. Not everyone can make the same pricing or license options work. It’s important for our customers to always have a choice when it comes to their software, and we’ll continue to prioritize this goal like we have before and during the coronavirus pandemic and even when things go back to normal.

You can learn more about our product offerings for architecture, landscape, entertainment, and interior design at vectorworks.net

Image credit: Ülemiste Rail Baltic Terminal | Courtesy of 3+1 Architects

pXX_AEC_NOVDEC20_Advertorial.indd 3

17/11/2020 10:40

Software

Model checking in the cloud Now out of beta, Verifi3D from Xinaps is a cloud-based application, a collaborative common data environment, for organising model data, validating, checking and generating reports. Martyn Day reports

A

EC projects have always been collaborative. While BIM gave the design process benefits like coordinated drawings, the added complexity of sharing design data in 3D, from different proprietary systems, from firms with different inhouse standards and, let’s face it, different levels of competency, has driven the demand for validation and checking.

Due to the size of coordinated models, this can’t efficiently happen in the design authoring applications. Thus a whole market has built-up of third-party applications to fulfil a variety of model checking tasks. Historically, the most popular of these have been Navisworks from Autodesk, which is desktop-based and Solibri from Nemestchek, which has different applications based on usage type.

With the move to the cloud, Dutch developer Xinaps has a fresh take called Verifi3D, which came out of beta at the end of summer and should have already had a major update by the time you read this.

Essentially Verifi3D does model collating / viewing, classification, geometry and data validation, clash checking and reporting, aiding ISO 19650 compliance.

As it’s in the cloud, Xinaps has been busy hooking up the application to the most used cloud repositories for design data.

With Revit being the most popular BIM tool, it speaks RVT and comes with a plugin for Revit for seamless integration. For open standards, IFC lies at the heart of Verifi3D and can pull together models from multiple sources to check a project. It also hooks into Autodesk BIM360, BIMCollab and BIM Track, with automatic versioning update and simultaneous model linking. Models can, of course, be uploaded from the desktop too.

One of the key benefits of Verifi3D is speed. With a modern cloud infrastructure it certainly shows up older desktop products like Navisworks. File opening, upload from the desktop and filtering can provide substantial benefits in time saved.

In some cases customers have said they saved literally hours on some projects.

This performance boost is also seen in model syncing. File linking can be auto36

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mated and removes the need for a lot of manual work to stitch together document sets.

It’s possible to set-up project access based on roles of members in a team. This could be by job function and / or discipline. Users can also share models, classifications, rule sets and filters between projects and reuse them on any BIM model through project templates that can be built up from previous libraries (stored filters, checks rulesets).

BIMcollab tie-up As we were going to press, Xinaps announced that it had co-developed a link between Verifi3D and BIMcollab services, to integrate model checking with issue management. As both applications are SaaS, this can happen seamlessly in the background. BIMcollab is a BCFbased web app used to assign, track and manage issues during the design and construction phases.

This has really exciting possibilities, as when the two systems work in tandem, issues found in Verifi3D checks can be published to BIMcollab in real-time. The user or model owner will be automatically notified of the issue so they can change the design. This opens up all sorts of new possibilities which I don’t think any other model checker can do. This is almost Minority Report ‘precog’ levels of check, verify and solve!

The December update is bringing a pile of goodies: even more speed with IFC engine optimisations, multiple files can

now be uploaded at once. Project access can be shared between users via e-mail, there are various improvements to first person navigation and you can zoom to each filtered object in succession.

Conclusion Xinaps has been working in beta with several really large multi-disciplinary firms over the last two years. This has clearly helped refine the feature set and speed of Verifi3D. As more firms start storing their data in the cloud, desktop-based verification will make less sense, as all the federated drawings will just be an API call away. Verifi3D is already there.

Xinaps has done a good job of persistence of filter and rule sets, throughout all project work, saving time and effort when checking future projects.

It’s kind of hard to work out what’s going on with Navisworks, as Autodesk was rumoured to be no longer developing the product but then recently built a desktop connector for it to work with BIM360 Glue, to augment the features (still) missing from Glue. This workflow, however, still requires Navisworks to be running on the desktop as a client, with all that that entails.

Verifi3D is a single environment that was designed to be in the cloud, connected to model libraries stored in BIM360.

Pricing for Verifi3D is € 400 per month per seat and this is a floating licence. As of 1 January 2021, Xinaps will be setting up a UK office, maybe one of the few European firms setting up in post Brexit UK! ■ verifi3d.xinaps.com

www.AECmag.com

23/11/2020 15:17

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NXT BLD Virtual 2020

NXT BLD Virtual 2020 AEC Magazine’s annual conference went virtual this year with a truly global event with 16 inspirational presentations, all of which are now available to view on-demand

I

t’s fair to say that 2020 has thrown us more than its fair share of curve balls. And the ever changing situation with Covid-19 has meant we’ve all had to adapt, and adapt quickly.

NXT BLD, our annual one day event, was originally scheduled to take place in London in June 2020, but the pandemic forced our hand in taking the event completely virtual for the first time.

While we were naturally disappointed as mixing with our readers in person is

one of the true highlights of the year, NXT BLD Virtual also gave a real opportunity to connect with our wider community — from New York to New Zealand, via Cape Town and Colombia, we welcomed a truly global audience of close to 1,500 AEC professionals. Some of you tuned in for breakfast, others for bedtime, and when the eyelids got too heavy, the kids needed feeding or work too demanding, there was always the option to catch up, on-demand.

The good news is, NXT BLD Virtual

isn’t yet over. All 16 presentations are still available to watch on-demand, so if you couldn’t find time to tune in last month, or missed a key talk, then simply go to tinyurl.com/NXTBLD20.

NXT BLD Virtual was split into six sessions, each comprising three talks and running for approximately 60 minutes.

All sessions were followed by a live Q&A where the audience put their probing questions to the presenters, and these are also available to watch on-demand.

Next generation of digital design workflows The Open Letter to Autodesk group In this unmissable panel discussion hosted by AEC Magazine’s Martyn Day, the ‘Open Letter to Autodesk’ group discussed the future of Digital Design workflows. Topics included conceptual design, architect-friendly analysis tools, interoperability, open source software and lots, lots more...

Panelists included Iain Godwin, Nick Dunn (PRP), Aaron Perry (Allford Hall Monaghan Morris), Jonathan Carthy (Corstophine + Wright), Dave Moyes (SimpsonHaugh), Kevin Fielding (Sheppard Robson Architects) and others.

Automating architecture Mollie Claypool, Automated Architecture In one of NXT BLD’s most highly rated presentations, Mollie took us on a journey through the design and tech practice and research laboratory Automated Architecture (AUAR). AUAR’s recent work radically rethinks the barriers of privilege, money and power in the housing system by creating opportunities for wider groups of stakeholders to get hands-on with new forms of architecture and housing utilising automation.

Architecture & robotic fabrication: design-through-collaboration Elif Erdine, Architectural Association Elif gave a fascinating glimpse into some of the research projects coming out of the Emergent Technologies & Design (EmTech) Post-Graduate Programme at the Architectural Association (AA) London. EmTech focuses on the evolution of traditional fabrication technologies through the employment of digital fabrication, with an emphasis on robotic production paradigms.

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21/11/2020 08:10

See the session topics below.

• • • • • •

Generative Design / Robotics Conceptual / Collaborative Design Digital Fabrication and 3D Printing Digital Construction / IT for advanced AEC workflows Real time viz / VR / AR Future Digital Design Workflows

We’ve had such positive response to NXT BLD Virtual that now the adrenaline has gone we feel quite overwhelmed. We want to say a huge thank you to our speakers, delegates and sponsors - especially Lenovo, Nvidia and AMD - for making it all possible.

NXT BLD is due to return to London next year for a physical event on 16 June 2021.

There will still be a virtual element for our overseas readers, so stay tuned.

VIR

L TUA

Watch now on demand

Digital fabrication, construction 3D printing, architecture, real time viz, VR, plus lots more

Tune in at tinyurl.com/NXTBLD20

■ tinyurl.com/NXTBLD20 ■ nxtbld.com

Roboticore - exploring human-robot interaction Fernando Garcia Blanco, Foster + Partners + Elena Casini, MOST Architecture Fernando and Elena gave a thought provoking presentation on Roboticore, an exercise of imagination of how the building of the future might be.

How will humans and robots interact in our living environment? How will this relationship succeed in a daily routine that simplifies all the aspects of our everyday life?

Data-driven design – an unrealised opportunity Nate Miller, Proving Ground Nate kicked off our conceptual session taking us on a whistle-stop tour of ‘simple and accessible’ data-driven workflows that build on the existing ecosystem of popular CAD and BIM tools. From his ‘home office’ virtual studio he discussed how technology – in parallel with change management and healthy business practices – can equip AEC businesses to take advantage of their data for designing a better built world.

Giving designers superpowers Hilmar Gunnarsson & Johan Hanegraaf, Arkio + Ernesto Pacheco, CannonDesign CannonDesign’s Ernesto Pacheco joined Arkio’s Hilmar Gunnarsson & Johan Hanegraaf for a unique presentation delivered from within VR using the AEC-focused collaboration tool Arkio. Topics discussed include collaborative design, workflows with Revit, and how Arkio has helped CannonDesign communicate with clients remotely during the Covid-19 pandemic.

www.AECmag.com

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NXT BLD Virtual 2020 The future of drawing Julie Dorsey, Mental Canvas Julie wowed the NXT BLD Virtual audience with a completely new type of conceptual design tool. Mental Canvas reimagines digital sketching with a new product that lies between today’s 2D digital draw-and-paint systems and 3D CAD tool, combining the ease and fluidity of sketching with expansive 3D capabilities.

Bridging the gap between BIM and the supply chain Bruce Bell, Facit Homes We were honoured to welcome back Bruce to NXT BLD for our first virtual event. In 2018 he introduced his highly optimised BIM to fabrication process for bespoke wood framed homes. His new project, Confacta, aims to create a framework that allows organisations and individuals to make the link between the products in their designs and the suppliers.

Digital manufacturing in construction Mark Taylor, Royal BAM Group Mark took us on a journey through the typical manufacturing approaches being applied by main contractor BAM, leading on to exciting new developments in additive manufacturing. This included a look inside Europe’s first industrial production facility for 3D printing of structural concrete elements, and the world’s longest 3D printed bridge.

Will shotcrete save the world or at least construction?

Alexander Türk // Aeditive Alexander shared his thoughts on the “why” of construction and on Aeditive’s journey as a young technology provider. With its Concrete Aeditor, a shotcrete-based 3D printer for concrete elements, Aeditive aims to address the challenges of productivity, sustainability, design & functionality, and speed.

From parametric architecture to digital construction Tal Friedman Tal explored how AI algorithms, robotics and other new technologies can be used to bring down costs of advanced manufacturing, create iconic architectural designs and improve energy efficiency of buildings. It is time to re-examine our very basic axioms of construction and blur the boundaries between the designer, the software and the machine, he said.

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21/11/2020 08:10

Navigate the path ahead Chris Ruffo, Mike Leach & Scott Ruppert, Lenovo Workstations Lenovo’s team delved into some of the top trends and technologies influencing how those within the AEC industry work today and into the future. This includes advances within simulation and digital fabrication, real time rendering, AI, IoT and more. In addition, we learnt what pain points and challenges professional users are experiencing based on insights collected from Lenovo customer feedback during the global pandemic.

Groundbreaking hardware developments that enable leading edge AEC workflows Michael Katz and Rob Jamieson, AMD With the introduction of AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro, AEC professionals are now able to deploy workstations that not only excel with today’s mainstream software but offer the ability to tackle the intensive workloads of the future without resorting to the data centre for compute. This includes reality capture, real-time visualisation, generative design, and simulation.

How VR helped us design a theatre from the inside out Alex Coulombe, Agile Lens Alex brought real theatre to NXT BLD Virtual, both in terms of the subject matter and his engaging presentation style. He took us on a exciting journey showing how the use of VR evolved during the design of Brockman Hall for Opera in Houston, Texas, from its simple beginnings in 2015 right through to the latter stages where the model became increasingly sophisticated, with a virtual audience, performers, set designs, and nuanced lighting and colour.

Overcoming collaboration challenges in architectural design Andrew Rink, Nvidia Andrew introduced Nvidia Omniverse, a new platform technology poised to transform how architectural design teams work together, locally or globally, to improve collaboration, accurately simulate virtual buildings, and help keep project teams on track.

Real-time transformation of AEC Ken Pimentel, Epic Games, AEC Magazine’s Martyn Day sat down with Ken Pimentel to chew the cud and explore how real time visualisation is impacting all corners of the AEC sector. Topics discussed include virtual collaboration, digital twins, real-time ray tracing, point clouds and future workflows from CAD/BIM to Unreal Engine and Twinmotion.

www.AECmag.com

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Feature

KPF explores the Omniverse Greg Corke caught up with Cobus Bothma, director of applied research at KPF, to find out why he’s so excited by Nvidia’s new virtual collaboration platform

T

he future of architectural design will rely on the collective accessibility of all design data and geometries, in one accurate visualisation and simulation application. Those are the words of Cobus Bothma, director of applied research at global architectural firm Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) who has been exploring Nvidia Omniverse, the new virtual collaboration platform which 42

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places a big emphasis on real-time physically accurate visualisation.

Bothma is excited by how the platform could help bring together KPF’s global offices to work simultaneously on projects. “It shows great potential to allow multiple contributors, from across the entire design team using an array of applications, to collaborate effectively wherever they’re currently working.”

Omniverse is built around Pixar’s

Universal Scene Description (USD), an open source file format with origins in visual effects and animation. With the ability to include models, animations, materials, lights, and cameras, it can be used to share a variety of viz-focused data seamlessly between 3D applications.

In the AEC space, Omniverse works with several 3D design tools, including SketchUp, Revit, and Rhino, and viz tools 3ds Max, Unity, Maya, Unreal Engine, www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 08:06

Houdini and (soon) Blender. Importantly, it replaces traditional file-based import / export workflows, with data flowing freely from each 3D application via a plug-in ‘connector’, which creates a live link to the Omniverse ‘nucleus’.

Once the link is established, and the initial model is synced, the connectors only transmit what has changed in the scene, allowing everything to be ‘real time and dynamic’. Move a wall in Revit, for example, and it will update live in Omniverse, along with any other connected application. It means teams can use whichever tool best suits the design or modelling task at hand and switch seamlessly between them.

“With this sort of technology, and the way we are connecting the tools together, it changes our view of the workflows,” says Nicolas Fonta, Sr. Product Manager for AR/VR/MR at Autodesk, who sees www.AECmag.com

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Omniverse as a way of breaking dering with global illumination, Omniverse View (left) being fed live down the barriers between reflections and refractions. data from 3ds max, Autodesk products and others. Revit and Rhino with View includes libraries of “It’s no longer a waterfall file Grasshopper (right) materials, skies, trees and furniconversion from one tool to ture, and painting tools to scatanother down the line. ter large amounts of assets like trees and “All of those tools are sharing this com- grass. Dynamic clouds and animated sun mon representation of the project. studies are also included, along with secOmniverse is one view of it, which is tion tools. More functionality will be beautiful, but as you’re tweaking things added as the platform evolves and it’s also in Revit, it’s one common project that’s possible to create custom features using sitting on this USD foundation that is C++ or Python extensions. exchanged between the different tools.

Importantly, to help speed decision “It’s no longer about ‘I need to take my making at any phase of the design proRevit file, send it to Omniverse, send it to cess, Omniverse View allows all project [3ds] max’, they’re all just the common participants, and not just users of 3D representation.” authoring tools, to navigate the model, as Aggregated models can be viewed in well as modify and render content.

Omniverse View, an Omniverse App with “Things happen much quicker and rapa toolkit designed specifically for visual- idly in the boardrooms, in the meeting ising architectural and engineering proj- rooms, at design phases, especially now,” ects using physically-based real-time ren- says Bothma. “We get to a point where November / December 2020

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Feature

things have to happen within a click. And this is kind of one of those things that does allow that to happen.”

Kohn Pedersen Fox

automatically on the server side and it does it quite cleverly where it actually names the file names and the application, and then the .USD, so you always know where the source was coming from, and you can keep this up to date.”

KPF is one of Nvidia’s ‘lighthouse’ accounts and Visual intelligence has been exploring the potential of Omniverse for Omniverse isn’t just several months. However, about optimising the as the technology is curflow of design data to rently in beta and, as improve interoperability Bothma explains, undergoand team collaboration. ing a ‘rapid rate of developBothma believes there’s a ment’, it’s not currently huge value in giving being used on live projects. teams much earlier To demonstrate how it access to models rencould help optimise KPF’s dered using an accurate collaborative workflows, physical representation Bothma showed AEC of light, “It’s getting to It shows great Magazine an example from potential to allow see exactly what the its 52 Lime Street project, project is going to look multiple also known as ‘The like much quicker, from contributors, Scalpel’, a striking new probably applications office tower in the heart of that didn’t always play from across the the City of London. together.” entire design team nicely Rhino (with Grasshopper) Scenes can be viewed in using an array of Omniverse ‘View’, which was used for the design of applications, to the canopy and immediate includes a real-time ray landscaping; 3ds Max to tracing mode as well as an collaborate provide some context using RTX path traced renderer, effectively a section of KPF’s London which can be accelerated wherever they’re by multiple Nvidia RTX model’ and Revit for the construction document currently working GPUs and coupled with model, including the façade ‘physically accurate’ MDL and full internals of the 42 materials and lighting. storey building. “The Revit file could be The path traced stills that Bothma sitting in a London office and the Rhino produced for his presentation are quite model could be in the New York office, simple but were rendered in seconds says Bothma. using a workstation with a single Nvidia “When you publish, it starts collating Quadro RTX 6000 GPU. “We didn’t do

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much on materials, we didn’t do much on lighting, I literally opened up the sun, dragged the slider a little bit, and then screen grabbed it, and that’s what you kind of get straight out of the box as a designer’s working model.”

But Bothma says there is potential to take things much higher, describing the render quality from Omniverse as ‘top of the line’, also noting that it works with Substance Designer for advanced materials. “We can now actually use Substance Designer with Revit and Max and Rhino at the same time, in Omniverse environments.”

Bothma envisions Omniverse scenes could become dynamic assets used throughout the entire design process.

“This would be where I’d do my final renders, this would be where I do design discussions, possibly streaming in the future, testing variations, looking at shadow studies, whatever the case may be even running my animations and so forth, that’s kind of where you want to go.”

“We don’t like hopping around too much, so the idea is really like what some of the CG and VFX companies are doing; they’re running into one pipeline where all the data and the geometry is aggregated and that’s the pipeline that then will produce the images - at whatever level you want in whatever format you kind of want.”

Streaming to any device Omniverse View can run on an Nvidia RTX powered desktop or mobile workstation, allowing users to get an interactive viewport into the shared scene. However, the real power of the platform comes into play when using Nvidia RTX Server, a www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 08:06

To test out Omniverse, KPF is using data from 52 Lime Street project, also known as ‘The Scalpel’, a striking new office tower in the heart of the City of London

reference design available from a range of OEMs with multiple Nvidia RTX GPUs. RTX Server can perform multiple roles. It not only provides buckets of processing power for path tracing, but with Nvidia Quadro Virtual Data Center Workstation (Quadro vDWS) software users can access the Omniverse platform using GPU-accelerated virtual machines.

It means all collaborators can view projects in full interactive ray traced quality on low powered hardware – be it a laptop, tablet or phone.

For Bothma this is one of the most exciting developments, and he’s looking forward to being able to stream Ominverse projects live to any lightweight device.

“We can’t put a big [GPU-accelerated] machine in everybody’s face, the whole time,” he says.

One might presume that Bothma sees this an opportunity to improve communication with clients, but this isn’t the priority. “When I look at technology and the use of it at KPF I always look at team collaboration first, team communication, and the second thing is clients,” he says.

“We don’t have a top down design necessarily, we enable everybody to give their feedback and design input, and so forth,” adding that Omniverse streaming will allow principals, directors, or project managers that are not au fait with 3D applications, to look themselves. “It’ll give them the ability to go and say ‘well if a designer says the sun is going to shine on this, for example, and the glass is not going to be too blue’, they’re going to be able to say ‘well let me have a look quickly and open my iPad and go in, adjust the sun go look at it.’” www.AECmag.com

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“Democratisation of technology in the industry is one of the big things we’re driving right now, how to get more people to use the technology without having to be coders and scripters or visualisation experts. And we’re seeing it happen,” he says.

Bothma has several options on where to host Omniverse. To date, most of the testing has been done using on-premise hardware, but AWS [Amazon Web Services] is also an option. “I know some other companies - Woods Bagot, for example - have been doing some testing on the [Omniverse] View side on AWS with quite good results,” he says.

Whichever route KPF ends up taking, the Omniverse nucleus will certainly be centralised and maybe imaged in one or two locations. “That’s the real benefit to us, for someone in Shanghai to be able view this model that’s been published by three of our other offices and be able to see it the

same as we see it,” says Bothma. “And they don’t have to wait for large files and [wonder] ‘do we have the right version of whatever software was used in the past.’”

Beyond viz Always on the front foot, Bothma is already looking beyond core AEC workflows and thinking about where Omniverse could take KPF in the future.

“It has the capabilities to do a lot more than just architectural collation and so forth - robotics, and a whole bunch of other things,” he says. “And those things are going to be very appealing to me because we’re going to start looking at not just how we look at a building from its visual aspect, we might want to start looking at how we construct a building, and that might be even with robotics, and the use of machine learning and so forth.

And, and, and…”.

■ nvidia.com/omniverse

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Designviz ‘‘

We imagined a world where most of the works would be automated and symbiotic, where engineering takes a step forward to aid humanity and its inherent need for advancement

’’

Project: Central Bank of Iraq in Baghdad Client: Newtecnic/Zaha Hadid Agency: Arqui9

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In the case of the new 172m high Central Bank of Iraq, the futuristic setting devised by creative studio Arqui9 only increases the drama of its curving form.

The brief for this visualisation came as part of a series of studies to showcase the engineering side of the buildings featured; emphasising the client Newtecnic’s ingenuity for constructing the future.

In addition to the typical focus on the structure, renders feature futuristic con-

struction systems, robotic materials delivery and holographic blueprints — highlighting potential upgrades that the building could embrace in the future thanks to Newtecnic’s engineering.

“Each portrait represents a particular phase of construction in the retrofit process,” says Arqui9 creative director Pedro Fernandes.

“Along with Newtecnic, we thought long and hard on how we could integrate variwww.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 08:02

ous types of technological advances into each image, making sure we kept with the integrity and language of the project.”

In the visualisation, elements like the hybrid solar voltaic facade panels are enhanced more than they would be in other renders, as well as revealing the constructive systems below.

Fernandes says that it was important for Arqui9 to consider that buildings — such as the CBI, which has a delivery www.AECmag.com

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date of 2021 — have a huge lifespan and will need to adapt to the environment and times throughout in order to remain relevant and sustainable.

“We imagined a world where most of the works would be automated and symbiotic, where engineering takes a step forward to aid humanity and its inherent need for advancement.

“Focusing on the importance of good engineering for a sustainable future of

the landmark building.”

Following initial storyboarding of ideas and scene concepts, the model data was initially provided to Arqui9 as a Rhino model from Newtecnic, which was then exported into FBX format and into Autodesk 3ds Max. The studio, based in London, then began to add 3D elements, compose the scene and add the humans and objects that inhabit the render.

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Gallery

‘‘

Excluding the building we had no context to go off and had to reinvent the future of the place and the surrounding buildings and context machinery, which also proved to be quite tricky at times

’’

“Excluding the building we had no context to go off and had to reinvent the future of the place and the surrounding buildings and context machinery, which also proved to be quite tricky at times,” recalls Fernandes.

Aided by the realtime rendering in Corona Renderer, Fernandes’ team was able to develop and iterate several quick mood concept designs.

“We explore the scene and find a composition that fits best with our idea,” he says. “Many times, formulating a quick sketch on these in order to quickly develop and compose a few key shots.”

From these, a pair of images might move through to the next stage, with client approval, to the adding of textures 48

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and other refinements of the 3D model.

The next stage takes place in Adobe Photoshop, in order to add additional atmosphere and mood. “This is where we like to say ‘the magic happens’!” laughs Fernandes.

“We commence with a raw render straight out of 3ds Max, compositing various render passes, including reflections passes, ambient occlusion passes and Z-depth pass.

“We complement these with a lot of digital painting, of clouds, haze and atmosphere as well as using additional images from our photo reservoir, like sun and sky, as well as overlays.”

The goal of focusing on futuristic technical elements created some challenges

for the team — namely imagining how the world would look and how construction work would be carried out in the near future.

Arqui9’s creative director concludes that from the very beginning they knew they were working with future thought provocateurs in Newtecnic. “[They] wanted to push and test the boundaries of what engineering and architecture represented for humanity and its potential forthcoming technological advances.”

Expertly, Arqui9 matched this with images that encapsulate a gritty and atmospheric future that is perfectly believable.

■ arqui9.com ■ newtecnic.com

www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 08:02

Case study

The road to digitisation Technology continues to play a transformative role within the fabrication business of Wareing Buildings as the UK steel framed building specialist advances its strategy of digitalising its operations

B

ased in Lancashire, Wareing Buildings offers a complete steel service to its clients; designing, fabricating and installing structural steelwork, in addition to cladding, external façades and timber work. In August 2020, it became the first company of its kind in the UK to fully roll out Tekla PowerFab, a suite of software which enables more efficient, businesswide management of the steel fabrication environment, providing a flow of information throughout the project lifecycle from inception to completion.

It was part of the company’s ‘smart digitisation’ strategy to digitise all of its operations, which it says will enable it to achieve an almost 10 per cent productivity gain. The ongoing development programme will be completed by 2023, with investment into Wareings’ additional buildings, equipment and technology set to total c.£1.8m.

Having begun using Tekla Structures in 2012, cloud-based Trimble Connect in 2017, followed by Tekla Structural Designer in 2018, Wareing Buildings was selected by Trimble to trial its PowerFab suite at a proof of concept stage in late 2019. Fast forward to present day, and the company has now utilised elements of the software on more than 1,000 of its projects. Doing so has provided customers with a truly enhanced experience when it comes to information modelling.

“We’ve had a very traditional set up for a long time; we’ve found ourselves drowning in post it notes and hand50

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For the redevelopment of St Anne’s Pier in Lancashire, a combination of Tekla Structures and tried and tested laser scanning technology enabled Wareing Buildings to create an exact 3D replica of the iconic Victorian jetty, built in 1885.

The software detects when there

are clashes between components – those which typically go unspotted in 2D drawings and can lead to additional expenditure and resources to rework and refabricate steel components – so the company could measure, plan, build and deliver its renovations with guaranteed accuracy.

drawn designs which, though intended to offer the absolute best outcomes for our clients, are subject to errors because that’s human nature,” says Matt Hastwell, senior draughtsman at Wareing Buildings. “Digital technology, such as that within Trimble’s suite of Tekla software, Tekla has revolutionised how we work and will continue to shape our operations for many years to come.”

“There is traceability, accountability and every part of every project is centrally available to all parties – via Trimble Connect. All of this enables better coordination and visibility, both at an internal business level and also externally with clients.”

As a fifth-generation company, Wareing Buildings has utilised PowerFab as a way of bringing together its teams – all of whom have different levels of experience with digital technologies in construction – regardless of which stage in the project lifecycle they are responsible for. For example, in addition to material ordering and fabrication sequences, Wareing Buildings also applies PowerFab to the transport and logistics stage of its workflow, providing real-time information on what load is going on, to where and when.

“PowerFab’s usability and simplicity mean everyone has been able to adapt to it, and now, even those that didn’t own a smartphone or tablet before we introduced it are adept with it, and they shout about its benefits,” says Hastwell.

“PowerFab is extremely efficient when it comes to the transfer of data. By sync-

“The technology’s intelligence has made such a difference and has improved the level of accuracy we can offer customers, to such an extent that we’ve utilised it on the redevelopment of our own facility,” says Matt Hastwell, senior draughtsman at Wareing Buildings.

ing up all elements of a project, we can further reduce the likelihood of human error. Tekla Structures, for example, automatically connects to all associated fabrication drawings, kit lists, material quantities and fabrication schedules, meaning that any change to the model is automatically reflected in all associated documentation. From there, the data within the model in Tekla Structures can feed into our CNC machinery, increasing accuracy and speed in production.

“Because people can see the difference it makes to clients, they’re more receptive to it and more willing to get to grips with it.”

Looking ahead, Wareing Buildings has set its sights on making more of Tekla’s PowerFab suite mainstream practice in its workshop, in order to continue transforming the service it can offer to clients. In recent months, it has begun using Trimble Connect for Hololens 2, a mixed reality technology, which enables it to overlay the 3D model, measurements and directions for fabrication onto the raw material.

“This technology can take us to some really special places,” says Hastwell.

“Hololens is yet another thing we had never envisaged having at our fingertips but one which we now want to be able to use on every project because of the way it improves our operations. This is not a case of using innovation for innovation’s sake; it’s making a true commercial difference to our business and that of our customers, as we can pass on savings to them and use our time to offer greater levels of consultancy.

■ tekla.com ■ wareingbuildings.co.uk

www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 07:59

Successful Projects Rely on Good Collaboration

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Our solution allows your whole supply chain to access only the information they require and ensures the latest revisions are being used by the project team, with a full audit trail available to avoid potential disputes.

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Case study

Revisiting the golden age of beer The NavVis M6 indoor mobile mapping system plays a key role in an adventurous scanning project to help bring an old brewery back to life

W

hat to do with an empty brewery? This is the conundrum faced by Brau Union in Linz, Austria.

The brewing company has a historic site in its property portfolio, the Poschach Brewery built in 1836 by Franz Lehner, which has been vacant and abandoned since 1981. While at the beginning of the 20th century the brewery was producing around 100,000 hectolitres of beer a year, today the surrounding area has a greater need for modern office space.

brewery,” says Lindert. “An incredible achievement, because the poor lighting conditions, tons of old furniture, dirt, cobwebs, heat in the attic and cold in the basement were a real challenge for our team.”

Also of value was the 6D SLAM (simultaneous localisation and mapping) technology in NavVis M6, which automatically compensates for differences in height.

“Sometimes there was no level ground in the site,” Lindert says. “The rubble caused a few shocks, but we managed to continue scanning without a problem.”

Fermenting a solution

Last orders

Brau Union is embarking on a program of renovation to breathe new life into the property, but the first decision to take is not an easy one – should the brewery be demolished or rebuilt? To proceed with confidence, the company needed to take complete inventory of the building and its surroundings.

That’s why Brau Union commissioned indoor scanning specialist Looom to digitize the entire building and create as-built drawings. Using the NavVis M6, an Indoor Mobile Mapping System (IMMS) on wheels, a complete digital floorplan would be created to support the client in their planning.

Looom captured a total of 57 individual scans with registration carried out in the browser-based software, NavVis IndoorViewer, to deliver a high quality 8.9 GB point cloud, comprising billions of points. Together with over 5,000 panoramic HD images, it was now possible to completely digitise the premises, creating an accurate digital copy of all five floors of the brewery building. This includes as-built floor plans and sec-

tions created with the help of the highquality point cloud.

NavVis IndoorViewer also gave the building owners remote access to the digital assets – completely independent of location – from any lightweight device.

“The building owners can now comfortably survey all areas on a laptop or tablet, they can mark points, highlight individual rooms and carry out exact planning,” says Lindert.

“Because the building is so old, some of its walls are still extremely thick, often more than one metre,” adds Lindert. “The question therefore arises as to whether it is more cost-effective to renovate and rebuild the building, but leave the basic structure intact, or demolish it completely.”

The owners still need to make that decision but, as Lindert concludes, with highly detailed construction documentation and the information readily available to all stakeholders, “Nothing stands in the way of a successful revitalisation for the site.”

■ navvis.com ■ looom.at

Who put the lights out?

The talented team at Looom were flexible enough to be able to start on the project right away. But during their first inspection of the five-storey building, they noticed an unusual restriction – a complete absence of electricity.

“Our indoor mapping specialists were faced with completely new challenges,” explains Looom project manager Alex Lindert. “Almost every area of the area to be scanned was without electricity. So not only did we have no light, but we also had no functioning sockets!”

Undaunted, the team set out with pen and paper to form a plan of action. They laid more than 300 metres of extension cable and from a full trailer they installed LED lights. Now with the building properly lit, the scanning could start in earnest.

“In just five working days, two specialists with two NavVis M6 devices scanned an area of around 45,000 m2 in the old www.AECmag.com

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Case study

High-speed delivery Willmott Dixon deploys cloud-based document and information management solution to help deliver the National College for Advanced Transport and Infrastructure defect-free and on-time

T

he National College for Advanced Transport and Infrastructure (NCATI), the new name for the National College for High Speed Rail (NCHSR), will play a key role in helping provide the higher-level skills needed to transform the UK rail and transport infrastructure network. Willmott Dixon, the privately-owned contracting and interior fit-out group, was awarded the delivery.

The project duration was 15 months and was valued at £21.2m, comprising both extensive teaching and workshop space. The complexity of the project required a system that brought all the various groups together to work from a common data environment, allowing Willmott Dixon to surface and address challenges early and often.

Initially, NCHSR was not a BIM level 2

requirement from the stakeholders.

However, prior to the project starting, Willmott Dixon made the decision to deliver all new projects to BIM Level 2 after seeing the benefits on previous projects.

The collaboration conundrum One of t h e l a r g e s t c h a l l e n g e s Willmott Dixon faced in completing the project was the interoperability between software platforms — between the architects, structural engineers, varying internal standards and several software solutions, working off the same set of data was a near-impossibility.

Once the supply chain extended to the inclusion of fabrication software, the issue became even more unmanageable, resulting in more time spent resolving than actually federating the models. Due

to interoperability issues, the company couldn’t create a data file so the simplest method for resolving this issue was for the architects to produce a coordinate setting out drawings for the project team to base the model from.

Time and costs were increasing pressure on the administrative burden that arose from using more traditional paperbased processes. The company was looking for a system that would automate transfer of accurate, complete and unambiguous information that could increase productivity, reduce cost and help ensure a smooth handover.

Master view To operate from a single system, Willmott Dixon implemented Viewpoint For Projects across its whole construction process. VFP is a cloud-based document and information management solution which enables customers to share, control and collaborate on project documents with dispersed projects teams.

“Across the business, we all use VFP,” says senior design coordinator James Henderson. “We use it for pre-construction, so before a job becomes live we look at concept design, all the way through to construction.

“When we’re delivering a project onsite with our delivery team, VFP is a common theme throughout the whole business and it also allows us to work in a common data environment particularly when we’re delivering projects and BIM Levels 1 and 2.”

Straight from the field The NCHSR project also utilised the Viewpoint tablet-based system Field View, which integrated with the common data environment VFP in order to provide the latest project information in real-time from anywhere.

The Willmott Dixon supply chain and consultants also utilised these systems, particularly the use of tablets onsite to manage Field View data as opposed to leaving the work front to refer to emails or 54

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www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 07:55

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hard copies of project information.

The design consultants shared every revision of project information to VFP so that remote access to the latest project information was provided to the wider team, allowing continuous integration of project information.

Changing hands

controls were flexible enough to allow us to cater them to what a project needed whilst also having a standardised approach to it as well.”

Fixing snags along the way

“With Field View, snags are broken down into two parts. First, we try and deal with all snags while work is taking place onsite to make the project run a lot smoother — Real-time records so we start a quality delivery system, so as Henderson adds, “The main benefit of we’re going through the works as they get using the software in terms of ROI for risk signed off as the task is being created. In mitigation would be the use of site diaries. doing that, we created 523 tasks,” continWe’re able to record what is going on in ues Henderson. real time so if there are any issues we can “Then, when we get to the end stage of then go back to event as if it was yesterday the job, when we’re trying to get to the finto find out what had and had not occurred ishes, we start another snagging process. so we can move along more proactively.

In total, there were 293 snags identified “Using it like myself, from a design using Field View, which allowed us to get point of view, it’s the revision control — so the ‘real-time effect,’ where we work a lot the software only ever shows the latest quicker. The biggest benefit is that we are revision so there is no chance of working snag-free two days ahead of handover, so we can hand over a BIM Level 2 project, snagto record what is going on in real time so free, to the client.”

By digitally transforming its processes, Willmott Dixon created benefits to endusers following handover, which included eliminating work for the estates department by being able to operate the building efficiently immediately after handover.

Gaining access to real-time information meant all stakeholders in the project could make quick, informed decisions on operation and maintenance expenditure based on actual asset We’re able performance and staif there are any issues we can then go back to event Staying on-site tus. Costs were reduced as if it was yesterday to find out what had and had “This process would from automating processes that were previ- not occurred so we can move along more proactively have originally required ously done on paper site teams to go back to and, as all construction the office and fill out the data was available, refurbishments could to the wrong information.” necessary paperwork,” says Jowett. be made at a lower cost and in less time.

The integration of VFP and Field View “Instead, what Field View allows our As Willmott Dixon BIM information allowed the NCHSR Project team to delivery teams to do is actually stay on site manager Ben Jowett notes, “One of the remotely manage a number of construc- whilst carrying out the tasks they need to, key benefits for us, particularly using tion processes much more time-efficiently which keeps the project running smoothVFP, was the control of access of infor- such as: health and safety permits, quali- ly. The last time we surveyed our people at mation — we work on a lot of law and ty delivery inspections and site diaries. Willmott Dixon on Field View they order projects and digital information One significant benefit the team realised believed they were saving up to five hours security is very important, particularly by using these systems was more time per person per week. Spread out across all with BIM — there are a lot of security spent onsite versus utilising time on the of our projects that’s quite a significant standards surrounding the protection of administrative burden that more tradi- saving in time.” digital information. I think the access tional paper-based processes require.

■ viewpoint.com

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’’

www.AECmag.com

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Review

Fujitsu Celsius J5010 If you’re after a quiet, well-built and compact workstation that also packs a punch then the Fujitsu Celsius 5010 ticks all the boxes, writes Greg Corke The small form factor (SFF) workstation is no longer the entry-level machine it used to be. Like other workstations in its class, the Fujitsu Celsius J5010 packs a phenomenal amount of processing power into its 8.3 litre chassis.

With a choice of 10th generation Intel Core or Intel Xeon W-1200 processors (with up to 10 cores) and up to 128 GB RAM, it’s ideal for a range of 3D designcentric workflows – not just CAD or BIM, but entry-level simulation, point cloud processing, even ray trace rendering.

Graphics are more mainstream, but it still supports a wide range of CAD-focused GPUs, including the Nvidia Quadro P2200 (5GB), which is typically found in workstations much larger in size, but more on that later on.

Our test machine’s Intel Xeon W-1270 (8 cores, 3.4GHz, 5.0GHz Turbo) might not be the fastest Xeon W-1200 series CPU out there, but it’s notably cheaper than the Xeon W-1290 (10 cores, 3.2GHz, 5.2GHz Turbo) and is still perfect for CAD. Indeed, in CAD software Solidworks it took 77 secs to export our IGES model. This is only two seconds slower than the Scan 3XS GWPME Q120C (tinyurl.com/AECcorei9) and its Intel Core-i910900K (10 cores, 5.0GHz o/c) which currently tops our charts.

We’d expect similar from BIM tools like Revit.

Throughout the singlethreaded Solidworks test, the Xeon W-1270 maintained a steady 4.7GHz. This is a touch lower than the advertised Turbo of 5.0GHz, but nothing unusual, as theory and practice rarely align.

For design visualisation, the Celsius J5010 tells a slightly different story. It completed our multi-threaded KeyShot rendering test in 346 secs, a little slower than we expected. Here, we observed all 8 cores running at 3.6GHz, only a touch above the base clock of 3.4GHz. In a larger desktop workstation, where there’s more space and beefier fans, you might see the same CPU clock a little higher. In the Scan 3XS GWP-CAD Q116C, 58

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The GPU differentiator? for example, the 8-core Intel Product spec Core i9-9900K ran at 4.2GHz, For many years, Fujitsu has completing our render test 53 uniquely supported a full■ Intel Xeon W-1270 CPU (8-cores secs faster. height graphics card in its SFF (3.4GHz, 5.0GHz On paper, this machine workstations. This is done Turbo) looks a great fit for point by way of a riser card that ■ Nvidia Quadro P2200 GPU (5GB cloud processing, another makes the GPU sit parallel, GDDR5X memory) multi-threaded process. But rather than perpendicular, ■32GB (2 x 16GB) you might need to apply a to the motherboard. It means DDR4 ECC memory few tweaks here and there the Celsius J5010 can be ■512 GB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD in order to get the best configured with the Nvidia ■314mm x 296mm x performance. Leica Cyclone Quadro P2200, rather than 89mm (w) x (h) x (d) Register 360, popular in the being limited to the low profile ■Approx. 8 kg AEC sector, really needs 64 Quadro P1000.

■Microsoft Windows GB+ of memory to get the In the past, this has given 10 Pro 64-bit best out of the software, so Fujitsu a notable advantage ■3-year warranty our test machine is a little over the competition, but now ■ £1,699 (Ex VAT) light with its 32 GB. Simply with Dell and HP offering fujitsu.com doubling up RAM would custom versions of the mobile considerably improve on the Quadro RTX 3000 in their 4,511 secs it took to import and register new SFF workstations, this is no longer our 90 GB point cloud dataset, as it would the case. We haven’t tested the Quadro allow the software to use significantly RTX 3000 but, on paper, it should offer more of the workstation’s 8 CPU cores a small improvement over the Quadro (see tinyurl.com/leica-CPU for more info).

P2200, plus dedicated RT and Tensor Those dealing with large datasets might cores for ray trace rendering, and entryalso consider increasing storage capacity. level VR support.

While the 512 GB M.2 NVMe SSD is fine Of course, not everyone needs or for general workflows, it is also available wants to pay for such levels of graphics in sizes up to 2 TB. For even more capacity, performance and the Quadro P2200 is there’s room for two 2.5-inch SATA HDDs, still a great choice for CAD and BIMor one 3.5-inch SATA HDD up to 8 TB. centric workflows. When working at The HDDs are held in a modular drive FHD resolution, you can even get decent bay, which can be easily clipped out from performance in demanding real-time viz the chassis after removing its cover, also tools like Enscape, where we recorded revealing the M.2 SSD on the motherboard. 24 frames per second when navigating a The chassis itself is very well built, sizeable museum model. incredibly solid and, at 8kg, surprisingly heavy Conclusion for a machine of this If you’re on the lookout for a quiet, wellsize (314 x 296 x 89 mm). built, compact workstation that packs a It can be positioned punch in both single-threaded and multihorizontally or vertically threaded workflows, then the Fujitsu with detachable feet that Celsius 5010 ticks all the boxes. give it stability. It’s also While the specs in our review machine well-equipped with ports, are well-suited to CAD (with the option with 2 x USB 2.0, 2 x USB of even moving down to a 6-core Intel 3.2 Gen 2 and 1 x USB 3.2 Xeon W-1250), the chassis gives plenty Gen 2 Type-C on the front of scope to ramp up the specs in all areas. and plenty more on the Adding more memory, CPU cores and rear, along with an RJ-45, storage would make the machine much Mouse/Keyboard (PS/2) better suited to simulation, point cloud and a 25-pin parallel processing and CPU ray tracing. You port, something we’ve not simply won’t get the same flexibility seen in eons. There’s also an in an Ultra Small Form Factor (USFF) optional M.2 Wi-Fi module. workstation like the HP Z2 Mini G5 or Dell Considering its size, the Celsius Precision 3240.

J5010 does an incredible job of cooling.

The one area where the Celsius J5010 Throughout all of our tests, it was virtually can’t get a boost is the GPU. And while the silent, testament to the smart engineering Quadro P2200 will serve most workflows inside. In fact, fan noise only became well, those that need more oomph may noticeable when rendering on both the be better served by the HP Z2 SFF or Dell CPU and GPU, something that most users Precision 3440, which both carry the are unlikely to do with this machine.

Quadro RTX 3000. www.AECmag.com

21/11/2020 07:35

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