Crafting a Design Tool – Parametric Families

Sharing knowledge is important to me, whether organically in the day-to-day workflow with my colleagues or through more formal large-group presentations and seminars. Over the years, I’ve developed a particular interest in Building Information Modeling (BIM); committed to advancing the practice of architecture, I take every opportunity to share what I’ve learned with our staff and the broader AEC community.

“Crafting a Design Tool” was a presentation I gave to the Los Angeles Revit User Group, an independent organization of architects, engineers, and contractors with an interest in advancing the use of BIM within our industry. The presentation focused on techniques for developing a series of formula-driven building components—windows, balconies, and façade elements—that could be used to rapidly study a variety of design options by editing a few key parameters.  The purpose of the presentation was to demonstrate advanced techniques for creating parametric components to improve the design process. With little experience in these techniques, the audience enjoyed learning how to leverage the power of math and logic formulas within Autodesk Revit.

Shown above is the formula-driven trapezoidal window component and its Revit parameters. A user can specify an angle and a base width, from which a stack of windows is generated.  The sloped edge of the windows aligns across the building façade and can be adjusted by editing the angle parameter.

You can take a look at the LA Revit User Group Website here:  http://losangelesrevitusersgroup.blogspot.com/