LAS VEGAS — Autodesk Inc. unveiled several new technologies for building information modeling (BIM) at its annual user conference, Autodesk University. With these announcements, Autodesk said it continues to extend BIM value across the full lifecycle of the built environment.

“We are expanding the reach of BIM on multiple fronts — into conceptual design on one end of the spectrum and into construction on the other. Our advancements are empowering professionals to move from designing objects and simply representing their ideas in 2D and 3D to designing in context while optimizing and better predicting the performance of their designs,” said Amar Hanspal, Autodesk senior vice president of Information Modeling and Platform Products. “Autodesk is helping to drive higher levels of productivity into the building design, infrastructure and construction industries both in the office as well as in the field with our expanding desktop, cloud, and mobile portfolio.”

The new BIM tools include:

• Autodesk Dynamo update — For building designers, Autodesk announced a major update for computational design with the merger of Autodesk Dynamo and Autodesk DesignScript. Dynamo is an open source visual programming environment for BIM. It can be used stand-alone, or allows users to extend the parametric capabilities of Autodesk Revit software products. Autodesk DesignScript is a programming language that is intended to help designers build and analyze complex geometric models that would be difficult to model with interactive techniques. Now both are coming together in Dynamo to deliver a user interface that combines DesignScript’s visual feedback with Dynamo’s tight integration with Revit.

• Autodesk FormIt update — The company also announced that the BIM-based conceptual design tool, Autodesk FormIt, now includes a web-based application that runs on a choice of browsers for Windows and Mac (currently available in beta at autodeskformit.com). On all platforms — including previously released iPad and Android versions — Autodesk said FormIt gives designers easy-to-use tools to create, collaborate, and share early-stage design ideas and continue their BIM process by taking models straight into Autodesk Revit. FormIt for iPad has been updated to take advantage of iOS 7 and also includes new energy analysis features that enable users to get simple indications of potential building performance, which provides important insight at the beginning of the BIM process that can reduce rework later.

Looking ahead, Autodesk demonstrated a forthcoming feature in the FormIt family of applications that supports real-time collaboration, which will enable designers to simultaneously access and collaborate on design models.

• Topcon collaboration – Building on Autodesk’s existing collaboration with Topcon, the two companies are working together to further improve the integration of BIM workflows and field layout. Autodesk is developing a new BIM 360 mobile app for iPad that further simplifies the process of precisely locating BIM coordinates on a construction site. Designed for general contractors and the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) trades, the app controls a robotic total station — as well as the new LN-100 3D positioning system from Topcon — that can accurately position control and layout points on the construction site, and as-built data can be fed back into the design model via BIM 360 for quality assurance.

For more information, visit www.autodesk.com.

Publication date: 12/16/2013

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